Amerika (TV miniseries)

"Amerika" – suggesting a Russified name for the United States – is an American television miniseries that was broadcast in 1987 on ABC. It starred Kris Kristofferson, Mariel Hemingway, Sam Neill, Robert Urich, and a 17-year-old Lara Flynn Boyle in her first major role. "Amerika" was about life in the United States after a bloodless takeover by the Soviet Union. Not wanting to depict the actual coup, ABC Entertainment president Brandon Stoddard instead chose to set the action of the miniseries ten years after the event, focusing on the demoralized American people a decade after the Soviet conquest. The intent, he later explained, was to explore the American spirit under such conditions, not to portray the conflict of the Soviet takeover.

Described in promotional materials as "the most ambitious American miniseries ever created," "Amerika" aired for 14½ hours (including commercials) over seven nights, and reportedly cost US$40 million to produce. The program was filmed in Toronto and Hamilton, Ontario,cite web|url=http://www.imdb.com/List?endings=on&&locations=Hamilton,+Ontario,+Canada |title=Internet Movie Database – List of Films shot in Hamilton, Ontario|accessdate=2008-01-29] and at various locations in Nebraska – most notably the small town of Tecumseh, which stood in for Milford, the setting for most of the action of the series. Donald Wrye was the executive producer, director, and sole writer of "Amerika", while composer Basil Poledouris was hired to score the miniseries, ultimately recording (with the Hollywood Symphony Orchestra) eight hours of music – the equivalent of four feature films.

Controversy and critical reception

"Amerika" arrived amid much controversy. Many critics and viewers felt it was too long and unrealistic, a number of people argued that it would be damaging to Soviet-American relations, and a spokesperson for the United Nations objected to the U.N. being depicted as an occupying force under Soviet control. Some conservatives felt that Soviet brutality was greatly underplayed; conversely, a number of liberals dismissed the entire miniseries as right-wing paranoia. At various points, the program was scrapped, delayed, and rewritten.

For their part, the Soviet Union threatened to shut down the ABC News Moscow bureau, although this threat was not carried out and indeed seemed to strengthen ABC's resolve regarding the miniseries. "We’re going to run that program come rain, blood, or horse manure," said ABC president John B. Sias, after the still-to-be-aired "Amerika" had generated more controversy and viewer response than any other ABC program before or since, including "The Day After".

"Amerika" was preceded by an ABC special addressing the considerable controversy prior to its airing ("The Storm Over Amerika"), and was followed by an "ABC News Viewpoint" panel discussion moderated by Ted Koppel, with Brandon Stoddard, Donald Wrye and several others addressing the issues surrounding the miniseries, along with questions and comments from a live studio audience in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

In its summary of the 1986–87 US television season, TV Guide called the miniseries "arguably the most boring miniseries in a dekade" and further said that "ABC's "Amerika" tried to hold America hostage for seven tedious nights (and a stupefyingly dull 14½ hours) by conjuring up a fuzzy vision of a Soviet occupation of the U.S." [TV Guide, June 27–July 3, 1987, issue #1787]

Ratings

The first two nights of "Amerika" garnered huge ratings, but audience numbers dropped thereafter, and the overall miniseries averaged around 19 percent of American television households, compared to a 46 rating for "The Day After". "It wasn't as big a hit as its supporters had hoped," said Ted Koppel, "but it wasn't a disaster, either."

Although a 35 share reportedly had been promised to advertisers, Stoddard was happy with the performance of "Amerika", claiming that all or part of the miniseries had been watched by 100 million people – a ratings bonanza for ABC, then in third place among the three major networks.

The miniseries was the second-highest rated miniseries of the 1986–87 US television season with a 18.8/29 rating/share. [(Three or more parts.) TV Guide magazine, June 27–July 3, 1987, issue #1787. All figures are based on the Nielsen Ratings. The rating represents the percentage of the 87.4 million TV households tuned to a station (sets watching this show). The share represents the percentage of TV sets tuned to a television station at the time of the broadcast (sets in use).]

Availability

"Amerika" has remained unseen on American television since its original telecast on ABC, possibly because its politics quickly became dated over the next few years with the breakup of the Soviet Union, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the reunification of Germany; perhaps also because it was not as popular as other miniseries. A VHS box set of the miniseries was released by Anchor Bay Entertainment in 1995, but no official DVD release is available. Portions of the soundtrack by Basil Poledouris were released on CD by Prometheus Records in 2004 (in a limited edition of 3,000 copies). The novelization is widely available from used-book sellers and online auction sites.

Genesis

Although claims have been made that "Amerika" was produced partly in response to the 1983 television film "The Day After" (which some critics felt was too pacifist for portraying the doctrine of nuclear deterrence as pointless), Stoddard dismissed this view, pointing instead to a column in the now-defunct Los Angeles "Herald Examiner" by Nixon speechwriter (and later, television personality) Ben Stein. Stein's column appeared a few weeks before "The Day After" aired. He wrote, in part:

blockquote|..."since my dear friends at ABC-TV have made a TV movie very rightly describing the terror of an atomic attack on America, perhaps they might consider something else. Perhaps they might make a TV movie about why the people of the United States face such a dreadful risk. They might make a movie about what life in the United States would be like if we lived under Soviet domination."

Here is the idea: Let's have a movie called "In Red America." It would be about a few days or weeks in the life of several American families after the Soviet Union had taken over America.

Stoddard acknowledged that Stein's remarks provided the inspiration for the series. Stein received a quit-claim fee from ABC for the idea for "Amerika" and was otherwise not involved in the production of the miniseries. [The New York Times: [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE1DD1730F936A25751C0A961948260 "TV VIEW; 'AMERKIA' (sic) – SLOGGING THROUGH A MUDDLE"] By John J. O'Connor. Published February 15, 1987]

Plot

Major characters

The storyline of "Amerika" primarily follows three political leaders:

Peter Bradford (played by Robert Urich) is a well-meaning, honest, county administrator in Nebraska who cooperates with the Soviets to create a better life for his community. Bradford attracts the attention of the Soviet leadership because, although interested in cooperating, he is independent, and widely respected by his constituents. The Soviets choose him to run one of the Bantustan-like states – "Heartland" – carved out of the former United States. Under the new regime, Bradford's title is "Governor-General."

Devin Milford (played by Kris Kristofferson) was a maverick politician before the Soviet occupation, and ran for President in 1988 (in the novel, 1992), after the U.S. defeat. He was placed in a prison camp for daring to speak the truth about the Soviet conquest during his presidential campaign. At the beginning of the miniseries Devin is declared "rehabilitated" and is released back into society, into the custody of his father, who lives in the county run by Peter Bradford. (Conservative critics of "Amerika" have claimed that in real life, the Russians would have been unlikely to release such a person back into society.)

Colonel Andrei Denisov of the KGB (played by Sam Neill) is the Soviet administrator for the American Central Administrative Area. At times, Andrei seems disappointed by the ease with which America has been conquered. He is romantically involved with Kimberly Ballard (played by Mariel Hemingway), an actress who discovers her American patriotism during the miniseries. Andrei's immediate superior and mentor is General Petya Samanov (played by Armin Mueller-Stahl), the Soviet military leader in charge of the occupation.

Major female characters, in addition to Ballard, include Peter Bradford's wife, Amanda (played by Cindy Pickett), Devin Milford's ex-wife, Marion (played by Wendy Hughes), and most notably, Devin's sister Alethea (played by Christine Lahti), who at the outset is prostituting herself to the local occupation leader. In subsequent episodes, Alethea finds her bearings and self-respect. "Alethea is the center," noted Donald Wrye. "She is a metaphor for America – not just phonically – and it is she who discovers her moral core through(out) the course of the series." Lara Flynn Boyle played Bradford's teenage daughter, Jackie.

The human drama of these characters intersects with the political intrigue of the Soviet plans for the breakup of America. Bradford, the pragmatist, clashes with Milford, the idealist; Bradford's wife is Milford's ex-girlfriend, who finds she still has feelings for Milford upon his release from the prison camp; Denisov appoints Milford's ex-wife, a powerful magistrate (and General Samanov's mistress), to serve as Bradford's deputy/assistant in Heartland; and Kimberly's renewed sense of American pride ultimately affects her relationship with Denisov.

Backstory

In the late 1980s, as the Soviet Union's economic and political decline puts it in danger of losing the Cold War, the Soviet leadership makes a desperate gamble to rearrange the global balance of power. Four huge thermonuclear weapons are exploded in the stratosphere over the United States. The electromagnetic pulse (or EMP) of these weapons destroys the nation's military and commercial communications and computer systems, electrical grid, and, indeed, any piece of equipment that relies on computer technology, such as most late-model automobiles. With America's ICBMs inoperative, and the National Command Authority unable to contact U.S. military forces abroad to counterattack, America is forced to accept Soviet terms for surrender: unilateral disarmament, the destruction of the dollar, and integration into the Soviet-led military/economic bloc. The United States quickly falls under Soviet military occupation – and the President of the United States and United States Congress become figureheads for their Soviet overseers.

The subsequent takeover of the U.S. is tamely dubbed "The Transition". The miniseries details the final phase of the transition – the breakup of the United States ten years after its defeat.

The above events are implied in the miniseries, although never directly explained. The description is taken from the novelization of the miniseries, "Amerika: The Triumph of the American Spirit" by Brauna E. Pouns and Donald Wrye (Pocket Books, 1987), based on Wrye's screenplay; Wrye is reputed to have written a 175-page treatment describing how the Soviets took over. An introduction to the miniseries explaining the downfall of America ended up on the cutting room floor prior to broadcast, and only a fleeting line by actor Sam Neill alludes to an America without communications, presumably due to the effects of the electromagnetic pulse. The loss of technology and communications, however, is effectively presented in the opening scenes: no radios are heard playing, television is shown only in the Soviet leaders' offices, one scene in a church is lit completely by candlelight, and a woman is seen using an old sewing machine operated by foot pedal.

Geopolitical situation presented

A decade after its defeat, America is occupied by a United Nations peacekeeping force called the United Nations Special Service Unit (U.N.S.S.U.). The U.N.S.S.U. is composed primarily of Eastern Bloc forces, and is overseen by an East German, Major Helmut Gurtman. U.N.S.S.U. troops periodically engage in "training exercises," which are destructive in nature, and highly intimidating to the local population.

Those Americans who engage in dissent, or who otherwise express their opposition to the Soviet occupation are stripped of their privileges and sent to exile camps, where they are anathema not only to the Soviets, but also to their fellow citizens. Association with (and assistance to) the exiles is generally prohibited, although a few brave souls risk the loss of their own remaining freedoms by offering humanitarian aid.

Production quotas have been imposed, and foodstuffs rationed, with the surplus presumably being shipped to the Soviet Union. Peter Bradford and other residents of the future Heartland must settle for soy cakes with molasses at the local diner. "That's what really makes you want to give up. You can't even get a good breakfast," says one character.

Against this background, Bradford ascends to the leadership of Heartland, hoping to reform the Soviet occupation from within; Milford is released from the prison camp, hoping to be reunited with his children and fight against the occupation; and Denisov hopes to "salvage as much as possible" of the old America, while realizing that the U.S. essentially must cease to exist as a nation in order to appease the "old men in the Kremlin."

Plot and resolution

The Soviet leaders of the occupation are faced with the dual problem of keeping America pacified and convincing the Politburo that their fears of a revitalized America are unfounded because the country is under occupation and can no longer pose a threat. The Politburo is not convinced, and even considers exploding nuclear weapons over several American cities, as a warning -- to the American people, and to the world. Samanov and Denisov, both of whom want the Soviet occupation of the United States to be a relatively humane one, are horrified by this idea.

At great political risk, Samanov finally convinces the Soviet leadership to accept a compromise plan: no nuclear weapons will be detonated, the United States will be divided into "client states" such as Heartland, and the U.S. Capitol building will be destroyed as a symbolic gesture of the destruction of America. At the same time, most of the members of the United States Congress are to be killed in a "terrorist attack" after they refuse to disband their legislative body, which the movie depicts very graphically.

After the attack is carried out – arguably the climactic scene of the miniseries – Samanov surveys the damage, and realizes the enormity of the crime that he has allowed to happen. Sitting in the Speaker's chair in the United States House of Representatives, he commits suicide. Denisov, who knows nothing about the attack until he is rushed to the Capitol and finds Samanov dead, is devastated by this turn of events.

In the final episode of the miniseries, Heartland is about to secede from the United States, with other regions to follow. There are scenes of Americans digging up guns they have hidden for ten years. Heartland troops, along with local militia, attack the local U.N.S.S.U. compound, effectively declaring war on the Soviet occupation. One scene shows Americans raising the U.S. flag on top of a grain elevator, and there is even reference to a Second American Revolution. The miniseries ends on a downbeat note, though, with General Sittman (the leader of the Heartland Defense Force and a former Marine) shooting Devin Milford just as he is about to make a nationwide broadcast calling on Americans to resist the breakup of the United States – doing so because this is an act of unlawful resistance against the newly-established Heartland, which Sittman believes to be the best hope against continued Soviet domination. Although there is hope that the spirit of America lives on, in the end it appears that the Soviet plan to dissolve the United States will come to fruition.

Some sources have claimed that the finale of the miniseries was deliberately left somewhat unresolved to allow for the possibility of a weekly television series sequel; but such plans, if they indeed existed, never materialized.

The divided United States

In this fictional timeline, the United States Congress divided the United States into several "administrative areas" in 1988, roughly one year after the Soviet takeover. As the miniseries progresses, these areas are planned to become separate nations, joined together in a new North American Alliance. A map shown onscreen reveals these administrative areas to be:
*California Special District: California, Nevada
*Western Semi-Autonomous: Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Utah, Wyoming
*Northwest: Oregon, Washington
*Southwest: Arizona, New Mexico
*North Central: Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wisconsin
*Central: Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska (this is Peter Bradford's administrative area, and the territory which eventually becomes Heartland, with Omaha as its capital)
*South Central: Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas
*Southern: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi
*Mid-Atlantic: Delaware, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia
*Appalachia: Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virginia
*Ameritech: Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania (presumably named after the phone company that serviced these areas)
*Northeastern: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont

In addition to these administrative areas, Washington, D.C. apparently comprises its own National Administrative District, South Florida is described by a character as the "Space Zone," and there is a passing reference to three "International Cities," which are not specified.

Alaska is mentioned as never having been pacified, requiring continued engagement by Soviet troops, and there are also pockets of armed resistance in the Rocky Mountains and in West Virginia. There is no mention of what happened to Hawaii, or to U.S. territories such as Guam and American Samoa.

The Rust Belt (presumably "Ameritech") faces its own special problems. Most of its advanced factory equipment was removed at the start of the occupation and taken to the U.S.S.R. The region suffers 50% unemployment as a result, and its residents are not permitted to leave, except to volunteer for factory work in the Soviet Union, from which no one has yet returned.

Travel and communications between the various zones is heavily restricted, part of the "divide and conquer" plan of the Soviet occupation.

New international zones

Both the novel and miniseries leave the impression that, with the death of freedom in America, there is nowhere else in the world where it may be found. In the novel, one character muses: "The truth is, we've reached the first time in history where there's no place left to escape to. America, England, Israel, Canada, there was always a beacon of hope somewhere. Now there's just one world and it's all bad." This dialogue suggests that the Soviet Union or other totalitarian forces conquered other free countries after the U.S. coup (it can be surmised that the EMP which disabled American technology probably would have also crippled Canada and Mexico, for example, and Denisov even says at one point that "we control most of the world"). There is also a scene with two emigres from the German Democratic Republic who came to the United States before the Soviet takeover and are now exiles in their new country: "It's one of life's little jokes. We escaped from East Germany to come to the promised land; now the promised land has become worse than what we left."

In this new world, Fidel Castro heads what is now called "Greater Cuba", embracing most of the Caribbean and Latin America, and the Chinese region of Manchuria evidently has been absorbed into the U.S.S.R., as General Samanov remarks at one point that a rebellion has happened in "our own Manchuria." A person named "Mbele" heads the "Socialist Republic of Southern Africa," "Barghout" is the leader of "Iraqistan," and Eastern Europe is described as being a "powderkeg." The Soviet/Communist occupation of the world depicted in "Amerika" is not a peaceful one, echoing the unrest in the occupied United States.

National symbols

The flag of the occupation is the pale blue UN flag, with crossed American and Soviet flags superimposed on the sides. The American flag is shown without its stars, and this starless flag is displayed during the "Lincoln Week" ceremonies (see below). The standard American flag is outlawed, although one scene early in the series shows a group of war veterans marching with the old American flag upside down, this being intended as a distress signal. Peter Bradford asks one of the Soviet leaders if they are going to arrest them, but they do not. "The Star-Spangled Banner", America's national anthem, is also outlawed, although this does not stop a group of citizens from singing it – haltingly at first – after the "Lincoln Week" parade.

Abraham Lincoln is included with Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin in propaganda. Indeed, the signature scene in the film is a twenty-minute, dialogue-free depiction of the celebration of "Lincoln Week" festivities (a holiday replacing the Fourth of July), with both Lincoln and Lenin displayed on banners that were most likely intended to be striking and startling to television audiences of the time.

A new Pledge of Allegiance is given by "rehabilitated" political prisoners upon release from the American gulags. The oath states: "I pledge my allegiance to the flag of the community of American, Soviet, and United Nations of the World, and to the principle for which it stands – a nation, indivisible with others of the Earth, joined in peace, and justice for all."

While the prisoners are told that they are free to refuse to make this pledge if they so desire, the circumstances under which the oath is administered would seem to indicate otherwise.

Social criticism

"Amerika" criticized American society in the 1980s, implying that apathy and an unwillingness to defend freedom on the part of many citizens made the Soviet takeover rather easy. At one point, a key Soviet official observes that their plans for conquering the United States succeeded far beyond their wildest dreams, because once the nation had been defeated, Americans turned inward, not caring about national issues, seeking only to retain a piece of the prosperity that had once been theirs. "It (the Soviet coup) worked because you lost your country before we ever got here," says the Soviet leader. "You had political freedom, but you lost your passion ... How could we not win?"

This theme is echoed by another character later in the film:

Another speech, by politician Peter Bradford (see below), lashes out at apathetic American attitudes:

An early scene shows schoolchildren in Chicago learning about Social Darwinism, which is characterized as the dominant philosophy in the old United States before the Soviet conquest and occupation, and a speech delivered by one child later in the series demonstrates the extent of Soviet indoctrination in the new America:

Quotes from "Amerika"

* "When you lose and fail, it is understandable. When you win and fail, that brings madness." – General Petya Samanov
* "Totalitarianism doesn't need armies. It only needs to control a couple of things – the media, and the ability to dispense privilege to some, and to withhold it from others. Of course, a weak and divided people helps." – The last, unnamed, President of the United States
* "All the kids growing up now don't have any idea of the difference between the symbol of Abraham Lincoln and what he actually stood for. You can't look at those eyes and not think of what being an American has meant. Now there's an end to it. Soon, there will be no America. We'll be history, quickly lost and distorted, like Mr. Lincoln himself ... I suppose there will have to be new revolutions, with new generations who will have to discover the values which our forefathers handed down to us. If those truths stop being real, maybe it's better to let them go, to let some new generation discover, as though for the first time. Maybe freedom is just one of those things you can't inherit." – Peter Bradford, at the Lincoln Memorial
* "Look at us. Here we are, who we are because our forefathers struggled through their lives – building a dream, sacrificing for it when that was what was called for, dying for it. We're the result. The dream didn't die with them. It lives in us. I can't, I won't abandon that legacy. America's not a flag, or a piece of territory – it's each one of us, in here, around the country. That's what America is. How can we give it up?" – Devin Milford
* "I'm not going to accept the breakup of America. I'll resist with my spirit, I'll resist with my life. I can resist because I've found the love of my children – the possibilities of their lives are more important than my own. I'll live through my children – through whatever good and true things I might have taught them, or the legacy of fear I might have left them. Each of us will find our best selves, or our worst selves – and in finding that, immortality." – Devin Milford, in the closing scenes

Influence

"Amerika" did not appear to have affected public opinion either of Communism or of the former Soviet Union. Because of its average ratings performance, however, "Amerika" is thought by many to have brought an end to the "epic" miniseries often featured on American television in the 1970s and 1980s. Later productions were generally much shorter in length, with the notable exception of the 30-hour "War and Remembrance" the following year.

Parodies

In February 1987, the miniseries was parodied on the NBC show Saturday Night Live as "AmeriDa", in which the U.S. is taken over by Canada. It took several cultural shots at Canada, including having Wayne Gretzky as the new president of AmeriDa, and the suggestion that Canada's army invaded using hockey sticks as weapons, a reference to Canada's perceived obsession with ice hockey. The American protagonist of this sketch (portrayed by Canadian actor Phil Hartman) reminisces for a country "where you don't have money that's all the colors of the rainbow," and where "you can spell words like color and flavor without using a 'u'."

The satirical Canadian radio program "Double Exposure" parodied the series in a sketch called "Kanada with a K", in which "Joe Klark with a K" rescues the nation from "Comrade Ed".

In the episode of "American Dad!" entitled "The Best Christmas Story Never", Stan Smith, the protagonist, goes on a trip back in time with the Ghost of Christmas Past. During the trip, Stan runs off and inadvertedly changes history. In the new timeline, John Hinckley, Jr. never tries to assassinate Ronald Reagan. Without the side effect of the attempted assassination making Americans think of him as a strongman, Reagan loses the election of 1984. This results in Walter Mondale becoming president and surrendering to the Soviet Union just 47 days into his presidency.

References

External links

*
*http://conelrad.com/newswire.php?id=P261
* [http://www.atlasgeo.net/fotw/flags/fic%5Eamrk.html The flags shown in the series] from Flags of the World.
* [http://youtube.com/watch?v=ZZy6SDrdyOM Amerika trailer at YouTube]
* [http://www.amerikadvd.com Amerika the miniseries on dvd.]