Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde

While not a good movie in the aesthetic sense, this is a good movie in the moral sense. Reese Witherspoon plays Elle Woods, who is probably the most morally fit movie hero in the last 20 years. She meets cruelty with kindness, tries to overcome problems by accentuating the positive, and refuses to engage in blackmail even when it would help her cause. It’s like she just stepped out of a Capra movie, got a new wardrobe from Doris Day’s closet, and leapt into the post Sept. 11 world to remind us that we don’t have to be evil in order to fight evil, and that we can’t compromise our morals in order to attain our ethical goals. Too bad she couldn’t have done so in a better movie, but still, it might be worth watching this just to remind yourself that being good doesn’t mean being a hypocritical, mean, moralizing scold, (c.f. Dr. Laura and William Bennet), nor does it mean killing and hurting people in order to make the world safer and stronger (as in most Arnold Schwarzenegger movies and U.S. foreign policy decisions.)