High drama. Searing conflict. That's what you might expect when you attend a viewing of Arnold Schwarzenegger's latest hit, True Lies -- but not in the movie itself. Rather, check out the picket lines surrounding theaters in many cities, deployed by Arab Americans objecting to yet another screen depiction of the Arab as blood-crazed terrorist. Alas, movies have a long tradition of stereotyping Middle Easterners:
The Arab as Exotic Lover. Immortalized as The Sheik (1921), Rudolph Valentino once owned the franchise on faux Semitic Romeos. The nobly savage Italian actor and a host of imitators swept a generation of European love...
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