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Written by Scott Meadow
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Wednesday, 04 May 2005 (read 1581 times) |
Apparently even mentioning Michael Moore's Fahrenheit
9/11 without condemnation is too liberal for some
conservatives. In a recent Wired piece, George
Lucas mentioned the controversial film:
Fahrenheit 9/11.
People went nuts. The folk aspects of that film were George Bush or
Iraq or 9/11 or -- intense emotional issues that made people put up
their blinders and say, "I have an opinion about this, and I'm not
going to accept anything else." If you could look at these issues more
open-mindedly -- at what's going on with the human mind behind all
this, on all sides -- you could have a more interesting conversation,
without people screaming, plugging their ears, and walking out of the
room like kids do. (click here for the whole article)
"So what?" you may say. Well apparently this just way pissed off conservatives like Libertas
who saw this as promoting "subversive" filmmaking, in which "film is
there to be used to shape people’s values," seemingly ignoring the
obvious fact that, by this argument all filmmakers
are "subversive" because there's always a
message. Apparently in Conservativille you can make art without
having any message whatsoever. All Lucas did was state the
obvious, and then slap Moore for not making his point more
effectively. Perhaps it's that Lucas isn't judging and condemning
Moore outright that so irritates the conservative mind. Perhaps
it's just that nobody took art appreciation at the Heritage Foundation
and whipped out some talking points so it's all very confusing to them,
I dunno. Maybe they're just not paying attention to what they
watch or thinking critically about the movies they do like.
Okay, well, here ya go fellas:
- All films have a statement. People who have nothing to say don't make movies.
- A film's message can move you; that's generally
called a 'good film.' If it was a bad film, you'll learn more
about the human condition from reading your breakfast cereal. For
reference, check out The Flintstones (1994).
Okay some movies don't have a message. Well this movie
anyway.
- If a film's message causes you to rethink something
you believe, maybe it's because you're understanding another
perspective and learning something new and NOT because of some massive
conspiracy against your value system. Maybe.. *gasp* ..
when looked at from a certain perspective, one you hadn't thought about
before... you're wrong. Insight isn't always
bad, is it?
- Not everything is propaganda. Knock it off
with the Nazi Germany allusions already. It's
old.
Granted, some movies have more to say than others, and more interesting
things to say, and yeah Star Wars can be viewed as
analagous to America's engagement in ..*yawn*.. Vietnam, blah
blah. There's a warning about technological dependence in
The Terminator series, a message about fate and
chance, along with lots of special effects. Yeah, we liberals
sure do like to explore the human condition, all righty, and if that
pisses you off, maybe just stick with the Ozzy and
Harriet fiction collection you got for X-mas.
Hmmm. Art without a statement. I'm no art professor, but
I'd guess that even that is making a statement.
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