Posted on 10/02/2024 8:54:36 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Daily Wire commentator Matt Walsh released his bitingly comedic documentary, Am I Racist?, in early September to great acclaim, vexxing film critics and industry insiders who see themselves as the exclusive gatekeepers of the silver screen.
The movie’s surprise success—even while facing vicious left-wing attacks—stood in stark contrast with the failure of Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis, a sci-fi political drama with an anti-Trump political subtext that opened over the weekend with neither critical nor audience acclaim—despite its bloated budget, all-star cast and abundance of Hollywood hype.
This pattern may signal a shifting trend in consumer sensibilities. Prior conservative-friendly films, such as Angel Studios’s Sound of Freedom, have exceeded box office expectations, while movies and television series deemed exceedingly “woke” have continued to fizzle.
That includes Disney’s most recent addition to the Star Wars canon, The Acolyte, which drew backlash from loyal fans for its preoccupation with feminist and LGBT virtue-signaling.
By aggressively alienating conservative viewers, leftist Hollywood studios “are leaving plenty of money on the table, and we’re happy to come in and take some of it, because, at a minimum, you are explicitly refusing to serve 50% of the audience,” Walsh said, according to Variety.
Am I Racist?, an irreverent look at how “diversity, equity and inclusion” proponents fail to grasp their own hypocrisy, raked in $4.5 million on opening and has a 97% audience approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Walsh, who incurred leftist notoriety with his previous documentary, What Is a Woman?, goes undercover in the film as a progressive interviewer, meeting with prominent DEI speakers like White Fragility author Robin DiAngelo.
The movie, which cost $3 million to make (the expenses paid to so-called DEI experts are a running joke throughout the film) had grossed more than $11 million as of Sept. 30, according to Box Office Mojo.
Meanwhile, Megalopolis made $4 million at the box office in its opening weekend and has a 34% audience approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
The film—a $120 million passion-project decades in the making for the Godfather director—is a cautionary tale about a fragile republic, susceptible to greed, corruption and fascism, with a plot that loosely transposes the fall of the Roman empire into a modern setting.
Unfortunately for Coppola, his film failed to impress most critics, who thought the message was obfuscated by too many ideas.
While the movie tried to be nominally inclusive by casting Trump-supporting Oscar-winner Jon Voight, Coppola wasn’t shy about connecting it explicitly to the current U.S. political landscape, insinuating that democracy hung in the balance with the upcoming Nov. 5 election.
“Men like Donald Trump are not at the moment in charge, but there is a trend happening in the world, there is a trend toward the more neo-right, even fascist division, which is frightening,” Coppola said, according to Deadline.
Saw it last night, good stuff.
Wife liked it too. While she’s Republican and on board with me generally, I’m more into this stuff and wasn’t sure if she would like it.
I watched the JD Vance interview with Tucker that was done 4 years ago and is on FOX nation, then watched Hillbilly Elegy on Netflix. JD has some story, if he stays true he will not only help Trump for 4 years but help the nation for another 8.
>Getting Robin D’Angelo to pay reparations to one of his crew, who is blackish, is outstanding.
I was literally laughing out loud in that part of the movie, as were a couple others (there were only 8 in the theater, but it was a late weeknight showing). That was classic.
Since Jussie features for a piece of the movie, here’s perhaps the best 5 minutes of comedy in the last 10 years:
Dave Chappelle on the Jussie Smollett Incident
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZXoErL2124
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.