PBS looks at views of US in Europe
At a Harvard powwow some years ago on the rift in Franco-American relations, a droll French scholar named Philippe Roger observed, deadpan, that "rift" implies a previous unity.
What's more, he added, the subject is seriously déjà vu. "We hear young people say, 'It's so last year,' " said Roger. "Well, this is so last century."
Roger noted that in 1861, the term "Americanization" first appeared in a broadside against the US by Baudelaire, of all people. Now it seems most French and other Europeans can't make it through a day without directing a robust tirade against us. Nothing new here.
This doesn't stop "The Anti-Americans," which airs tonight on Channel 2, from rehashing the old European animus toward us and our government. The hourlong documentary is part of the ongoing series, "America at a Crossroads," that explores the world post-9/11. But the program misses a chance to plumb beneath the hoary cliches about American-European relations and, worse, may actually be off the news when it comes to that old warhorse, France.
After all, Nicolas Sarkozy, the new French president, vacationed last month in the Gallic stronghold of Wolfeboro, N.H., and braved the Bush clan and burgers on Walker's Point, even if his wife took a powder. This leads to predictions of chummy times ahead between the two countries.
That said, there are still plenty of people who trash us. We watch a wildly popular French TV program use puppets to skewer George Bush, as it has done for years with virtually every public figure you can think of. We hear an Irish rock band hurl invectives at the US, and we catch marvelous traces of a British pop opera based on the Jerry Springer show to detail our superficiality.
There are no revelations, other than the overlay of Iraq in particular and Bush foreign policy in general atop the usual cant. (Yes, we know the Euros think we eat peas with a spoon.) One person calls the Bush global approach "an atrocity." Another notes there is no downside in Europe to being anti-American now.
That's an arresting statement, yet the show's producers - Louis Alvarez, Andrew Kolker, and Peter Odabashian - leave us hanging. Where does policy opposition stop and social disdain begin?
Still, it is fun to hear upper-middle class Brits go at us. "Why should an idiot society want a smart president?" asks one woman at a dinner party. An ordinary French woman call us fat and racist. (The racist charge always slays me given the French regard for Muslims in France.)
As always, more sophisticated voices in each of these countries preach moderation and point to ancient reasons for the bile: insecurity, fear of irrelevance, fear of culture loss, fear of a superpower, particularly when you used to be one. France still revels in Napoleon and his Grande Armée, while Britain still smarts at its loss of empire.
Boris Johnson, the rambunctious British MP, puts it plainly: "We used to rule the world and now we don't anymore." He cheerfully adds about France: "Deep down, the French adore America. They lie through their teeth."
But then, says historian Tony Judt, France is in a tough place these days. "France has nothing to offer the world, really, but good wine and cheese and opposition to the US."
Poland proves an interesting exception, because it actually likes America. Having endured czars and Nazis, it continues to look to us as its savior.
There we visit a country-music fair, complete with cowboy hats and American flags. The one complaint? How hard it is for Poles to get a US visa. "The French get the visas but they don't fight with you in Iraq," one man complains.
Other than that, "The Anti-Americans" feels dated, and it never addresses the most compelling question of all: Who do the Euros like?
Sam Allis can be reached at allis@globe.com.
