20116: Lawless: Movie Plot (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Robert Lawless <robert.lawless@wichita.edu>

I recently tried to sell this plot to Hollywood: Big, huge, gigantically
powerful nation is finally goaded into reinstating a legitimately elected
president of a small, little, poverty-stricken neighbor (who had several
years previously been ousted in a military coup whose legitimacy was
recognized by no international entity except the Vatican). The
reinstatement comes, however, only after the little country agrees to sign
off on the economic stranglehold of big, huge, gigantically powerful
international financial institutions. The little country, nevertheless,
manages to struggle along for several more years through several more
elections, culminating in the reelection of the original president.
Meanwhile the big country decides that it really, really doesn't like this
leader of the little country (who is, after all, little himself). For one
thing, this president seems to talk more about little people like himself
rather than pandering to the business community. So the big country spends
millions of dollars on projects that support the small elite
business-oriented class in the little country -- a class which it presents
to its own craven press as a political opposition -- while withholding any
aid to the legitimate government. Still, the little guy persists as
president. Well, now, suddenly out of "nowhere" appear several well-armed
gangs of criminals (some of which had close ties to the illegitimate
military regime) who race through several towns and cities murdering
members of the police force, a police force that had been denied proper
training and arms by the big neighbor. With various pro and con gangs
running around murdering people, the big, huge, gigantically powerful
nation decides that the little guy can no longer "govern" and takes him
into exile. Since neither the "political opposition," the big neighbor, nor
the criminal gangs have any plan or vision or even interest in governing,
nobody knows what's going to happen next. That will be in the sequel.
Hollywood turned me down. Totally implausible, they said.