Yep, here's a poster for "The Eternal Jew".
Posted on 06/25/2004 11:37:33 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
When Lion's Gate Films went before the ratings board this week to appeal the R given Fahrenheit 9/11, Michael Moore's hotly debated documentary about the Iraq war, the studio made an unusual argument.
Moore would not delete one profane utterance or disturbing image to appease the board. Nevertheless, president Tom Ortenberg argued unsuccessfully, the rating should be changed to the less restrictive PG-13 because the film is important and deserves to be widely seen.
"We need more public debate of the issues facing us today, not less debate," he said. "The 15- and 16-year-olds who are going to be asked to fight in the next war need to be allowed a chance to see what this war is like."
If that sounds more like a political argument than an artistic one, it's in keeping with the film's spirit. The scathing attack on President Bush is being released with all the trappings of a campaign event.
Ronald Reagan once joked about the thin line between politics and entertainment. This year, in the nation's movie theaters, the line has been obliterated. A wide array of politically tinged films is joining summer's traditionally escapist fare.
Some were made with the clear intent of influencing debate, if not the presidential election. It remains to be seen if movies can sway voters, but either way, film is emerging as an important voice of liberal politics, just as talk radio became a medium of conservative political expression in the 1980s and '90s.
Robert J. Thompson, professor of television and popular culture at Syracuse University, says this is a far-reaching and culturally significant development: "The other side of the argument seems to have finally found its medium."
Fahrenheit 9/11 is the most prominent example. Never before has such a nakedly political movie been released this close to an election. Sight unseen, it has inflamed passions.
The California-based Move America Forward lobbied theaters not to show it. Moore hired former Bill Clinton political advisers Chris Lehane and Mark Fabiani to set up a "war room" to counter attacks on the movie's accuracy.
Although Ortenberg said Fahrenheit 9/11 opened yesterday on 868 screens -- the most ever for a documentary -- Sal Russo, a Republican political consultant, maintained that the Move America Forward effort was successful.
"We've increased awareness that the film is neither a documentary or entertainment but only an effort by Moore, as he says, to help to defeat President Bush, even if it's at the cost of our war effort against terrorism," said Russo.
Both sides are using election-style campaign tools, including the Internet, talk radio and cable news shows.
MoveOn, a liberal, Internet-based advocacy group, is urging members to pack theaters this weekend and to hand out leaflets. The group will attempt to mobilize moviegoers by inviting them to house parties across the country on Monday. Moore will address the gatherings -- which MoveOn estimates at 1,000 -- and answer questions via a conference call. 'The Hunting of the President' premiere, June 16, New York
Lion's Gate hired Mario Cuomo, the former New York governor, to help appeal the R rating and to promote the movie on shows such as CNBC's Hardball. Cuomo helped craft the studio's statement and would've delivered it, had the ratings board not banned him from the hearing.
Before Fahrenheit 9/11, the year's biggest political movie was The Day After Tomorrow, a disaster epic about global warming that got more ink on op-ed pages than on entertainment pages. It featured a president and vice president who seemed based on Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.
Coming up are the documentaries The Hunting of the President -- about the "vast right-wing conspiracy" to damage Bill Clinton -- and Bush's Brain, a critical appraisal of political adviser Karl Rove.
Next month, Denzel Washington and Meryl Streep will star in Jonathan Demme's remake of The Manchurian Candidate, a political thriller whose updated plot involves the first Gulf War. Filmmaker John Sayles' new Silver City offers an unflattering portrait of a Republican gubernatorial candidate who resembles Bush. It's scheduled for September release. Sayles told ABC news he wrote the script in two weeks because it was important to rush the film into theaters before the election, "just to get into the conversation at the right time."
One of the few political movies with a conservative bent, a low-budget documentary titled Michael Moore Hates America, doesn't yet have a distributor. First-time Minneapolis filmmaker Mike Wilson turns the tables on Moore, needling the firebrand director and subjecting him to the same critical treatment Moore has given to corporate and political targets.
"The movie theater is a terrific place for public discussion and debate about the issues facing our country today," said Ortenberg, who welcomes the efforts of MoveOn and others on behalf of Fahrenheit 9/11.
Why is this happening now?
The explosion of political movies seems part of a larger phenomenon. Perhaps not since the 1960s has politics been so central to American life. Events such as the Monica Lewinsky scandal and Clinton's subsequent impeachment, the controversial 2000 presidential election and the response to 9/11 have galvanized the public.
"Politics has become like an enormous miniseries, very much in the public eye," said Thompson.
Sales of political books have mushroomed. Political debate fills radio airwaves and is a mainstay of cable news. Political satire is flourishing. Statistics show that young people get less information from newspapers and television news programs than previous generations, but turn increasingly to liberal and conservative Web sites.
Advancing technology has a lot to do with the increased interest in politics.
"Twenty years ago, we only got a little dose of politics on television -- a half hour on the evening news," Thompson said. Now, the rise of cable television, talk radio and the Internet "allows so much more information about politics to be out there."
As the number and type of news sources grow and audiences become fragmented, the traditional goal of objectivity has been devalued. People increasingly seek their news from sources that match their ideology.
Fox, the top ranked cable news network, has a conservative slant. The Daily Show, Jon Stewart's satirical news program on Comedy Central, is popular among young liberals. Conservative and liberal Internet users turn to openly biased sites such as the Drudge Report, TomPaine.com and Buzzflash.com.
Moore's work is firmly in the trend of advocacy journalism. He is at the forefront of filmmakers changing the definition of documentary film. Though he is probably now the most influential documentarian, his work angers some more traditional directors. Pioneer Albert Maysles, for example, called Moore in a 1998 interview "the most evil man in the business. He targets people for his own purpose. His point of view is everything."
Russo, a leader of the effort last year to block the showing of a miniseries about Ronald Reagan on network television, maintains that Moore's point of view isn't the problem. Russo doesn't object to Farenheit because it attacks Bush, he said, but because it might undermine the war on terrorism.
"We're in a time in American history when we need national resolve," Russo said. "We just celebrated the anniversary of D-Day. Just as during World War II, even though there were dissenters, we had to muster national resolve to defeat fascism. Now we need national resolve to win the war on terrorism. That's pretty non-negotiable."
Thompson thinks factionalism -- the way liberals and conservatives tune each other out and listen only to opinions they agree with -- is potentially harmful.
"A truly informed person wants to listen to ideas he disagrees with," he said. "It would be a healthy thing for Rush Limbaugh's audience to go to Michael Moore's movie and for Michael Moore's audience to listen to Bill O'Reilly."
I see your point, but the truth is that in all reality, no one is going to see this movie, especially 15 & 16 year old kids, R rating or otherwise. The only people who will go are the same leftist hacks who went and saw "Reds" 20+ years ago. It's a documentary, it sucks as a movie, and it will bomb. My kids and their friends are going to "White Chicks". It's funny, entertaining and it's what real movies are all about. We'll read about it on Monday morning, but this is the way it will be.
The good news? Fahrenheit 9/11 dropped 11% in its second day. Considering its only showing on 7 screens in a city with 50,000 people per square mile, failing to sell out those seven screens is a pretty big failure. O sure, we're talking afternoon screenings on a work day, but we're also talking East Village types here. How many of them *have* jobs? In the day time?
O, and uh, for the record... that's seven screens at just two theaters!
Vermin.
Debate occurs when both sides of an issue are forcefully presented. This IS NOT DEBATE.
Next lie, please.
Oliver Stone tried to do this back in 1988 to President Bush 41.
Perhaps if he had sought foreign fundraising he would have been successful. The Soviet Union would have been a good cash base.
True, it's and exercise in Democrat back-slapping and only the confused and anti-American ticket holders will have a seat. However, the media will feed on this, as they do all scummy things, and their twisting of facts to rewrite history needs to be confronted.
Yep, here's a poster for "The Eternal Jew".
I heard that it was shown for the first time tonight in one our theatres and it got rave reviews afterwards. It even got a 5 minute standing ovation by the crowd.
All for media consumption.
Excerpt from "Hillary Clinton and the Radical Left"Hillary Clinton and the Third Way ***MY SUBJECT is Hillary Clinton in her role as America's foremost leftist. This is not an obvious idea to those leftists who identify themselves as radicals. Purists of the creed are likely to regard both Clintons as opportunists and sellouts of their cause. But the left is not and has never been a political monolith, and its factions have always attacked each other almost as ferociously as their political enemies.
It is possible to be a socialist, and radical in one's agendas, and yet moderate in the means one regards as practical to achieve them. To change the world, it is first necessary to acquire cultural and political power. And these transitional goals may often be accomplished by indirection and deception even more effectively than by frontal assault. Political stratagems that appear moderate and compromised to radical factions of the left may present an even greater threat from the perspective of the other side. In 1917, Lenin's political slogan wasn't "Socialist Dictatorship! Firing Squads and Gulags!" It was "Bread, Land and Peace." ***
"I am one of the millions who thought Hitler had all the answers. We only saw the good things; we did not know about the bad things to come."- Leni Riefenstahl"What have I ever done? I never intended harm to anyone. I do not know what I should apologise for. I cannot apologise, for example, for having made the film "Triumph of the Will" - it won the top prize. All my films won prizes."
"(Triumph of the Will) was a totally unique and incomparable glorification of the power and beauty of our movement."- Adolph Hitler
"Artistically she is a genius, and politically she is a nitwit."- Liam O'Leary, film historian.
I sent the following to a few theatre managers as per the e-mail list provided in a thread a few days ago. There was only one reply to the message (below the following).
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Subject: Do Not Show "Fahrenheit 9/11"
To: fred@carmike.com, philip@carmike.com, film@carmike.com, do07@carmike.com, do12@carmike.com, do14@carmike.com, Jacque_clark@centurytheatres.com, Chris_OKelley@CenturyTheatres.com, Nancy_Klasky@centurytheatres.com, David_shesgreen@centurytheatres.com, Victor_Castillo@centurytheatres.com, srodriguez@manntheatres.com, jhebert@manntheatres.com, info@manntheatres.com, comments@manntheatres.com, rjansson@manntheatres.com, Kconnor@amctheatres.com, Jbeynon@amctheatres.com, Psingleton@amctheatres.com, Jmcdonald@amctheatres.com, Mmcdonald@amctheatres.com, mcook@amctheatres.com, vdaniels@amctheatres.com, gthyer@amctheatres.com, gslayton@amctheatres.com, ddelaria@regalcinemas.com, kevink@regalcinemas.com, robbya@regalcinemas.com, rwinograd@regalcinemedia.com, barry.brown@regalcinemas.com, pbrandow@regalcinemas.com, gdunn@regalcinemas.com, amiles@regalcinemas.com, mcampbell@regalcinemas.com, dgurin@regalcinemas.com, film@savoytheater.com, info@rialtoarts.com, Cameranet@aol.com, webmaster@drexel.net, info@drexel.net, marketing@little-theatre.com, info@little-theatre.com, comments@landmarktheatres.com, magnolia@landmarktheatres.com, hughw@landmarktheatres.com, dianea@landmarktheatres.com, MattL@landmarktheatres.com, lorim@landmarktheatres.com, maura_Campbell@loewscpx.com, john_walker@loewscpx.com, John_mccauley@loewscpx.com, kerry_moots@loewscpx.com, michael_norris@loewscpx.com, brian_blatchley@loewscpx.com, bmcmannis@gqti.com, mjohnson@gqti.com, Goodrich@gqti.com, dkerasotes@kerasotes.com, tjohnson@kerasotes.com, kjohnson@kerasotes.com, joanvoelzke@marcuscorp.com, stevemarcus@marcuscorp.com, bruceolson@marcuscorp.com, ghill@wallacetheaters.com, marketing@wallacetheaters.com, service@wallacetheaters.com, astone@consolidatedth.com, customerservice@consolidatedth.com, ctortolano@pacifictheatres.com, cdougher@clearcin.com, wsalisch@clearcin.com, dlewis1@clearcin.com, jhanson@national-amusements.com, mdixon@national-amusements.com, operations@national-amusements.com, jwelman@crowntheatres.com, hcleveland@crowntheatres.com, cdugger@crowntheatres.com, zcole@crowntheatres.com
Dear Theatre Managers:
Do not show that disgusting pig's (Michael Moore's) "Fahrenheit
9/11" film. It's propaganda against our USA, our soldiers and the
lives of our loved ones. Neither I nor my readers will ever visit
any theatre that shows it.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0156524/
Ewige Jude, Der (1940)
"Overall, however, the Berlin Gestapo reported that audience reaction to this film was 'highly favorable,' particularly the scenes equating Jews with disease-spreading rodents."
can you show me where this study is (online)?
I would love it when discussing the so-called "biased" Fox News with dims.
I also mentioned to him that perhaps he should tell the theater manager and owner that he will take his business elsewhere if the theater is going to persist in demonizing conservatives.
CFR prohibits free speech. A boycott is a protected form of protest.
OK, so it is bit iffy quoting a Frenchman in these times - but one of my favourite quotes of all time is from Voltaire:
"Sir, I do not agree with a single word you say. But I will defend unto death your right to say it.".
Let Moore stick his Baloney in the greatest Market Place of all: "The Market Place of Ideas". Better ideas are out there. So Answer it. Win it. Move on Proud.
"Over 800 of our most patriotic men and women have died for an illegal war in Iraq," said Karen Trietsch, one of the three women wearing pink wigs and clothing outside a Boulder movie theater. "People will come out of the theater wanting to do something."
......"Today the theater is a gathering point for people upset with the Bush administration," Clark said. "He's the worst president in U.S. history."
Dani Rickel, a manager at the theater, asked protesters standing in front of the theater doors to move off the property. She said the theater had received death threats and didn't want to cause any more controversy.
"Everybody on staff is here and we're just keeping our eyes open," Rickel said.
She said the theater decided to show "Fahrenheit 9/11" because it's an independent art house and shows films that challenge people intellectually.
The theater had called the police earlier in the day because voter registration volunteers had been stopping traffic in the parking lot, Rickel said. She said the police told her that she could kick them off the property.
The members of CodePink and others were asked to stand on nearby sidewalks.
Jonathan Singer, a volunteer coordinator with the Boulder County Democrats, said people come out of the theater charged up, and Democrats want them to take charge of the nation and the election.
"It's difficult, because being pushed off the property has muted us," he said.
The AMC 24 theater in Westminster did not have any protesters, but it did receive an upset phone call. Theater Manager McKensey Orten said a man called her and said he was a patriot, Christian and Republican who was upset that they were showing Michael Moore's film. .....***
________________________________________________
[Somehow I doubt this - it sounds more like a Chris Lehane ploy]
__________________________________________________
9/11 film stirs up Sarasota***"It made me think and broadened my horizon," Fogo said.
Jan Schneider, a congressional candidate who lost to U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris, R-Sarasota, came to see the film in which Harris makes a cameo. Schneider's supporters surrounded the theater and passed out fliers and buttons. Schneider said she didn't know if the film would directly affect the 2004 presidential election but said that a combination of factors, including the fallout in Iraq, should disillusion the American citizenry on the Bush administration.
"We can't get used to a government that lies to us," Schneider said. "We want truth and integrity."
Conservative groups such as Move America Forward tried to stop theaters from showing the film, and Citizens United filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission, asserting that the film was in violation of campaign finance rules created by the McCain-Feingold legislation. And radio pundits such as Bill O'Reilly have blasted the film and its "unpatriotic" director Moore.***
The concept is nothing new. Movies have been liberal propaganda tools since their inception, with very few exceptions, Hollywood movies encourage every liberal, negative, destructive to society novelty which comes along.
If anyone really wants to change American society a good place to start would be to encourage boycotting Hollywood movies. But too many times individuals who call themselves conservative or moral christians, are willing to suspend their private morals and separate their actual belief systems from their public acts by supporting Hollywood and the music industry.
You simply cannot separate the two. Either you are against the liberal propaganda and their destructive agenda, or you support it. Artistic license is no excuse.
Well put, my friend. Don't support the jerks. I don't. Last movie I saw was the Passion... eleven times.
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