We have, in this country, in this time, a spectrum of values that exists in the hearts and minds of the majority. These values are important because they represent moral innovation of the last centuries. People enjoy freedom—common people—on a scale not before seen. We have enjoyed it under a government that has passed power from party to party, democratically, for over 200 years. This is a unique phenomenon. Other countries, democracies, have not yielded such consistent results of peaceful transition. We have succeeded where so many well-intentioned peoples have failed because of the strength of our beliefs, and our confidence in our constitution, our system of government.
It is my belief that our values can be boiled down to two words: liberty, and individualism. We protect minorities in this country, and we do so right down to the individual. Certainly, a democracy can be called a tyranny of the majority—and in truth—because of the sins of our birth, we have not been able to grant ourselves the liberty economically that was so promised upon our independence.
Slavery and the slaughter of the American Indian have resulted in a warranted need for government assistance aimed at the children of these peoples. The reason I know this, is because I sense it. I trust my sense of the world and value it as much as, or more than, I value any person’s opinion. I have the liberty to speak this opinion, though to do so requires something else—something that can be referred to as the animator of our values.
The National Film Registry chooses 25 films every year to be preserved. It is my humble request that one film, this year, be added to this small list precisely because it is a standard by which we can measure the “something” I have made reference to. This film is Braveheart. Directed by Mel Gibson and released by Paramount in 1995, Braveheart is a story about a common man who defies tyranny, against all odds, to win back his country’s freedom.
William Wallace is this common man, and the something he possesses that animates all values is integrity. Without it, he would have never been able to bring his countrymen to the state of arousal they find themselves in by the end of the film when they defeat their enemy. He inspires them. He uses integrity throughout the picture to win his liberty, and it is my belief that his story is one that could inspire future generations to animate their own values.
It is not that William Wallace is willing to fight that makes him such a profound character. Many are willing to fight in the film. It is that he fights from his heart, without compromise, which makes him profound. He is a Scotsman, brought into a conflict he hoped to avoid when an English nobleman takes the life of his beloved wife for defending herself against English soldiers. From this point onward, he rallies the bravest of his peers to wage war against an evil English king known as Longshanks, but does so in the name of freedom for all of his people. There are moments throughout the film in which he is presented opportunity to betray his values, and yet he maintains his integrity and continues to animate his own freedom and individualism.
There is no way this story will not translate in years to come, to generations that may struggle against tyranny from both without and within. After Wallace sacks York, King Longshanks send his princess to meet with William “under a banner of truce” (Braveheart). She offers him gold. She offers him titles. She offers him land. Wallace will not accept. The princess pleads with him: “Peace is made in such ways.” Wallace responds with passion: “Slaves are made in such ways!” (Braveheart).
He will not lose his integrity, because without it he knows he will not be free, and freedom is more important than any luxury a title, some land, and gold could afford him. We forget today that there are things more important than status and possession, and Braveheart is a film that reminds us all that integrity, and the courage it requires, are the only ingredients necessary to live a full, free life—and generations to come will, without doubt, need reminding of the same.
Finally, after William Wallace is captured, he is presented to a crowd of English commoners at the occasion of his own “purification by pain” (Braveheart). He is going to die. This is a foregone conclusion. The only question is how. He can kneel before his executioners and beg for their mercy for a quick death, but, then, by his own words “Longshanks will have broken me” (Braveheart). He is hung. He is stretched by rope and horse. He is laid on a wooden cross, and gutted before his audience, and as he opens his mouth to cry out he screams not for mercy, but “FREEDOM!” (Braveheart). His executioners decapitate him out of frustration.
A man by the name of Robert the Bruce is named king of Scotland thereafter, and as he rides out to meet an English army, sent to sanction his crown, he holds a cloth of William’s in his hand. This man, the Bruce, betrayed Wallace earlier in the film, but under the guidance of a corrupt nobleman, his father. In him was the will to fight like Wallace did, but he lacked the integrity to follow his heart. It is William Wallace’s undying courage that inspires Robert the Bruce to fight for his countrymen’s freedom. Integrity breeds integrity, and, at story’s end, the Scots win their liberty.
No generation will be untouched by such courage—it is this same courage that affords us our freedom every day—and it is this courage, inspired by integrity, that can motivate us to seek better lives ruled by our integritous commitment to our hearts’ ideals. “Every man dies, but not every man truly lives” (Braveheart). This is William Wallace’s message, and it has nothing exclusively to do with fighting wars. It means that most men and women live out their entire lives without demanding of themselves the integrity, the courage, to follow their hearts, and I believe this film will inspire such qualities in those who live after us, therefore liberating people from tyranny through the ages.
Works Cited
Braveheart. Dir. Mel Gibson. Paramount, 1995. Film.