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zombiewhacker
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
1475 Posts |
 Posted - 02/22/2006 : 1:16:16 PM
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Long Cut, interesting to note that Hollywood is currently working on a movie about the first war in Afghanistan, with Tom Hanks in the lead.
[url]http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0472062/[/url]
Sam Mendes is being considered to direct. Mendes' last film was Jarhead. Make of that what you will. |
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Ericb
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
648 Posts |
Posted - 02/22/2006 : 2:26:09 PM
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Farhenheit 9/11 was about George W. Bush rather than the Iraq war. Personally I think it hurt the opposition to Bush rather than helped it. It made them (or us as I'm not really fond of the guy) look petty and paranoid. A coherent critique of the policies rather than the man would have been better, though it wouldn't have made any money. Agitainment, from the left or the right, has really had a horrible effect on US politics.
"I reserve the right to look as well as be boring." - Robert Fripp |
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tam1MI
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
558 Posts |
Posted - 02/22/2006 : 3:13:53 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by BrainFromArous
Every serious discussion of this subject must begin with the recognition that the CPUSA was a subversive fifth-column movement controlled by a hostile foreign power. That is an objective fact.
That is true, but it is also true that by the time the time McCarthy came around, the CPUSA had, thanks to the Venona Project, been gutted. Not a single person that McCarthy accused is mentioned in the Venona transcripts for the simple fact that, by the time he came along, they had all been caught and dealt with.
Now, it is true that some of McCarthy's accusations were accurate. That is because J. Edgar Hoover was secretly feeding McArthy FBI documents which fingered known Communists (there is still disagreement amongst historians as to whether any of these people were accurate). The reason Hoover did this was because he was working with the Eisenhower campaign to get Ike into office. Once that goal was achieved, and the Republicans didn't need McCarthy anymore, his FBI tips dried up. That's when McCarthy's more notorious bogus accusations began, including his career-destroying claim that the military was shot through with Communist infiltrators.
As for the reason why Hollywood tends to shy away from movies about the atrocities committed by Lenin and Stalin, I think the reason is that, firstly, atrocity movies, unless they are about the Holocaust, don't sell. Look at how The Great Raid, a movie that accurately depicts Japanese atrocities in WWII, flopped. And it had a happy ending! Secondly, the problem is compounded by the fact that any such movie would, obviously, need to be set in Russia or Eastern Europe. And the only movies that Hollywood believes Americans refuse to see more than atrocity movies are movies that don't feature Americans. That is why a movie like Reign of Fire, set entirely within Britain, has American troops show up out of the blue to help the protagonist. Why not British troops? Because "Americans won't watch a movie that doesn't have any Americans in it!" |
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Ericb
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
648 Posts |
Posted - 02/22/2006 : 3:22:57 PM
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"As for the reason why Hollywood tends to shy away from movies about the atrocities committed by Lenin and Stalin"
Also, I think that Holywood probably thinks that watching people slowly starving in government made famines, rotting in labor camps or simply being shot has less "drama" than watching people being marched into gas chambers by officers wearing skulls on their caps. As someone once said, "Soviet Communism was a tragedy, Nazi Germany was a horror story." I think that is one of the reasons you see much less of the former in hollywood films.
"I reserve the right to look as well as be boring." - Robert Fripp |
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Tork_110
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
360 Posts |
Posted - 02/22/2006 : 8:16:54 PM
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| People, you're all missing the big picture here. We are all here for one reason, and that's to pester Ken into writing more movie reviews. |
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zombiewhacker
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
1475 Posts |
Posted - 02/22/2006 : 11:28:23 PM
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| Really? I thought we were here to cruise chicks and bum smokes. |
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BlamWalker
Archdeacon of Jabootu
USA
14 Posts |
Posted - 02/23/2006 : 4:15:57 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Long Cut
Recall that, during WWII, those movies that mentioned the war at all universally supported it, and those that had nothing to do with it even gave it a nod here and there. Oh, we wound up WINNING that one in four (for us) years. It's called a total national will to win. Maybe, just maybe, having something like 90+% of the US population all for victory helps a bit, don't you think?
Just so you know, prior to the Pearl Harbor attacks, US involvement in WWII was not, in fact, universally supported. Many groups protested US involvement, feeling that the whole thing was a European problem and none of our concern. It took Pearl Harbor to put everyone on the same page. Not only that, but our behavior at the time wasn't entirely heroic either: everyone seems to forget about the concentration camps we herded US citizens of Japanese descent into during that time, claiming "it was for their own protection." |
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BrainFromArous
Preeminent Apostolic Prelate of the Discipleship of Jabootu
USA
102 Posts |
Posted - 02/24/2006 : 06:17:31 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by TheFoywonder
BrainFromArous, go outside and get some oxygen. The fact that you flipped out over my use of the phrase "may have been" was one of the most irrational overreactions I've seen in quite a long time. I don't doubt that there were Communists at work nor am I trying to insinuate that there weren't. I didn't read anything else in your long winded diatribe because your flipping out over semantics that don't meet your political approval tells me all I need to know about your heavy handed point-of-view.
Do you even know what the word "semantics" means? And since when is responding to someone's words an "irrational overreaction?" Did I threaten you? Put a curse on you? Demand that Ken ban you? Show up at your house with a chainsaw? What?
Or is "heavy-handed" just your phrase of choice for someone strongly objecting to something you say?
BTW - Given that I'm a pro-choice, pro-legalized pot, pro-gay marriage atheist who cannot stand George Bush, I'd say your ideological radar could use some fine-tuning.
Or is anyone who deviates from the McCarthy=Monster orthodoxy automatically some kind of right-wing gargoyle?
I will also say that you must lead one sheltered life if you take my comments to be "flipping out." I mean, really.
quote:
This is why I usually stay out of political discussions. Just when I think some of the smarty pants liberals I work with are annoying I can walk into a thread on this message board and be reminded of just how insufferable those on the right can be too. McCarthy is one of history's villains. End of story. There may have been... (Ooops, better rephrase that before Arous flips out again) THERE ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY WITHOUT QUESTION AND DON'T DARE ANYONE EVER TYPE ANYTHING ABOUT THIS SUBJECT WITHOUT USING SUCH COMMANDING TERMINOLOGY Communists, argue amongst yourselves all you want, history has been written and McCarthy and his committee are amongst history's villains and the focal point of one of the ugliest periods in American history. Feel free to keep arguing about there being actual Communists or that McCarthy had the right idea even if he went about it such a way to undermine his own agenda, it doesn't change how history is going to look back upon it.
If by "history" you mean yourself and those who agree with you, then you're right.
Back to the point. Is the existence of actual sedition among CPUSA members, leaders and sympathizers incidental or irrelevant to how McCarthy and the anti-Communist movement more generally are to be viewed?
Or, let me put it this way: Why is the word witchhunt used so often in conjunction with McCarthy or Anti-Communist unless the intent is to suggest that there were as many seditious Communists as there were actual witches in Salem - that is, none?
Why is this? "Witchhunt," we hear, over and over again. Could it be that the American Left - and especially their Arts & Crafts contingent in Hollywood - doesn't want anyone to look too closely at just how taken they were with Communism, up to and sometimes including placing themselves in service to the USSR?
If the CPUSA had been a bona fide domestic reform movement, if the anti-communists really were chasing phantoms, that would be one thing. Then I would share an unqualified negative view of McCarthy, etc.
But that's simply not true. The problem was real.
(For how real it was in Hollywood, check out Red Star Over Hollywood: The Film Colony's Long Romance With The Left by Ronald Radosh.)
Adherents of the McCarthy=Monster orthodoxy act as if this doesn't matter. I think it does.
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Boards don't hit back.
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BrainFromArous
Preeminent Apostolic Prelate of the Discipleship of Jabootu
USA
102 Posts |
Posted - 02/24/2006 : 06:19:52 AM
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Side note: I've been here (that is, the Jabootu site and boards) for awhile now, but mostly lurking. I used to post as "Brummbar" but it seems all those old threads are gone. Shame, that.
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Boards don't hit back.
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TheFoywonder
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
833 Posts |
Posted - 02/24/2006 : 07:55:00 AM
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Amazing... Arous, I post something admitting I overreacted in my posts and responses and yet you turned right around and went off on another long winded rant (which again, I did not bother to read all of after the first paragraph). Seriously, dude, go outside and get some fresh air.
Now Playing in Foyeurism at Schlocktoberfest.Com:
BALLAD OF THE NASTY HERO - An overlooked gem of 80s action cheese gets it due
Plus: B-WARE THE BLOG is alive at http://www.livejournal.com/users/foywonder |
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TheKusabiBringsThePain
Altar Boy of Jabootu
8 Posts |
Posted - 02/24/2006 : 11:31:56 AM
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You have trouble with short and simple questions too, don't forget. For example, if someone in Hollywood were to propose making a movie about the activities of Alger Hiss, would it be squelched on the grounds that it justified McCarthy's so-called 'witchhunt'? Would that be a legitimite reason in your eyes?
And on another matter, for someone who decries Devin Faraci and the rest of the Chuddies you sure do allow yourself to be influenced by his/their debate 'tactics'. You just can't help bringing that kind of crap here.
The Repentance will come. |
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zombiewhacker
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
1475 Posts |
Posted - 02/24/2006 : 1:55:22 PM
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Okay, guys, ease up. Let's not go another round, please. Foywonder apologized. That took character. Give credit where credit is due.
Foywonder, Brain's initial point was that he's (she's?) libertarian on many issues and anti-Bush so political pigeonholing doesn't work there either.
If we must have political discussions on a board dedicated to bad movies, let's at least desist from the assumption that anyone who holds beliefs different from ours must either be a psychotic loser or a brainwashed automaton. Uwe Boll does not post on this board!!! |
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tam1MI
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
558 Posts |
Posted - 02/24/2006 : 4:49:10 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by TheKusabiBringsThePain
For example, if someone in Hollywood were to propose making a movie about the activities of Alger Hiss, would it be squelched on the grounds that it justified McCarthy's so-called 'witchhunt'?
Actually, some years ago there was a very fine, balanced miniseries made about the Alger Hiss case called "Concealed Enemies". (You can find the IMDB entry for it here: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0087079/). It subsequently won two Emmys. |
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TheFoywonder
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
833 Posts |
Posted - 02/24/2006 : 5:21:30 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by zombiewhacker
Okay, guys, ease up. Let's not go another round, please. Foywonder apologized. That took character. Give credit where credit is due.
Foywonder, Brain's initial point was that he's (she's?) libertarian on many issues and anti-Bush so political pigeonholing doesn't work there either.
If we must have political discussions on a board dedicated to bad movies, let's at least desist from the assumption that anyone who holds beliefs different from ours must either be a psychotic loser or a brainwashed automaton. Uwe Boll does not post on this board!!!
And pigeonholing was a big part of my overreaction that day which is in part what I apologized for. The fact that I apologized for my overreaction and politely bowed out of the debate then still got jumped on by two others... Between that and my own excessive hyperbole, I think I at least proved my point about modern political discussions being pro wrestling for pseudo-intellectuals.
And never underestimate the power of Uwe Boll. He has people that scour the internet looking for stuff people have written about him. If we trace the call it might just be coming from inside the house.
Now Playing in Foyeurism at Schlocktoberfest.Com:
BALLAD OF THE NASTY HERO - An overlooked gem of 80s action cheese gets it due
Plus: B-WARE THE BLOG is alive at http://www.livejournal.com/users/foywonder |
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BrainFromArous
Preeminent Apostolic Prelate of the Discipleship of Jabootu
USA
102 Posts |
Posted - 02/24/2006 : 10:23:47 PM
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For the record, folks, my second response post to Foy was 27 text lines of commentary. 27 lines. Hardly a "long winded rant," methinks.
That said, I will honor Zombiewhacker's request and table this argument. I suppose it's clear by now that Foy and I are pretty much cemented in our respective positions, so things would only get more pedantic and ad hominem from here.
As a peace offering, I apologize for any bad behavior on my part.
I do have to warn you all, though, that there is one Internet entity who makes Uwe Boll look like a hermit. I will not speak his name, lest he appear. (shudder)
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Boards don't hit back.
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