Finally, Justin- I enjoyed “Munich”, a very worthy film. Spielburg walked a tightrope, remaining steadfastly anti-terrorist while raising the ‘cycle of violence’ specter.

I don’t think it’s you as much as the age of the thread. By now, the trenches are dug, the barbed wire is laid, the batteries are sighted in, and nobody has the energy to charge into No Man’s Land.

Thanks, Justin, for your nice words.

I have enough trouble making my POSTS one, unified whole. I think if tried to do comments in one, elegant (hah!) essay-like piece, I’d probably have to just give it up.

This was my first time commenting here. I will acknowledge right up front that I’m utterly renowned for my typos in comments. I type quickly, very; I speak quickly, very, very; and the problem is that I think more quickly–very, very, very!–than either of those things.

I’d rather that it be otherwise, but it’s not. So it goes. Sorry for the skipped words and whatnot, though.

Don’t sweat it. Actually, I like your multiple comments. They keep thoughts in digestable chunks. It’s certainly a departure from the norm, but I actually dig it.

Hope you continue to read and comment.

I’d rather that it be otherwise, but it’s not. So it goes. Sorry for the skipped words and whatnot, though.

It still is.

Only now, it either wants to whack that audience for not sharing Hollywood’s politico/socio vision, or coast by with the most puerile stuff. Either way, it translates to contempt.

It just does.

But I’ll leave with this: When artists–at least of the most pop forms, which, regrettably, is the true with regard to film, for the most part, for the most incredibly long time–degenerate to the point that they think that their art is mostly about propagating their narrow, personal and political views, they’ve become living, breathing visions of O. Henry’s “Gift of the Magi.”

Go look it up.

And he’s right.

(Aside: That’s true generally in the Arts. What, you don’t think so?)

Traditionally, some of the great films of independent view–some of the greatest films, period–among which are those we now consider icons came about as a reaction against a larger mainstream.

That’s not to put down the mainstream.

It is to say that they would not exist otherwise.

The original post both reflected its writer’s necessary talent for writing both headlines, and more important, good ledes (that’s not a misspelling, by the way).

It did reflect a particular point, and even a point of view (though I daresay more narrow, as presented, than espoused. At least I hope). It didn’t reflect a lack of a larger knowledge of movies, or the artistic, societal, and historical background thereof.

But, no. I’ll react in fragments.

Where to begin …

if you think all movies should be for entertainment only, why not all books too? What’s the difference?

Because I never said “all movies should be for entertainment only.” I said, or would say, Hollywood has built its reputation and its audience on making entertaining movies, and now it is succumbing to the temptation to make political statements dressed up as movies. I think it’s dangerous — more for Hollywood’s bottom line than for America’s political system — when the people who brought you “Gigli” now want to instruct you how to vote (”A project will only move forward if she finds it has a valid social or political message”).

Hollywood is a particularly poor choice as an educator, because its core skills are manipulation of images and emotional appeals, which are qualities of propaganda more than education.

I prefer that Hollywood studios concern themselves primarily with making entertainment and story-telling vehicles that the public expects, and leave the polemical filmmaking to those who are better at it, better qualified to do it, and worth watching.

I no more care what a Hollywood producer thinks about the social complexities of the Middle East than I care what my bartender thinks about them. All things considered, I prefer the bartender, actually.

It would be the same with a book. When a Tom Friedman or a Samuel Huntington or a Robert Fisk writes about the Middle East, it’s worth knowing what they’ve said. But I don’t read them for amusement. I find Roddy Doyle enormously funny, and maybe I learn something about Irish working class life when I read him, maybe I don’t. But I don’t really want to read his thoughts on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Ne sutor ultra crepidam, goddamn it.