Posted on 08/07/2006 6:13:10 PM PDT by BlueJ7
Like I said earlier, you have to earn the right to depict it by dealing with it seriously.
She was just awful in W of the W
That aside, this controversy reminds me a lot of the Brooke Shields' movie, "Pretty Baby" in which she is a young virgin auctioned off in a bordello.
Should all unpleasant matter be depicted?
It pretty much has been in the history of art. The only thing that keeps folks from being outraged about it is their lack of education.
Figure Saturn ate his own children...for starters.
Hey, what about that Oedipus guy? Some joker, huh?
Unlike most FReepers who bash every actor and actress (and thereby reinforce the stereotype that conservatives don't know jack about the arts) I enjoy (most) Hollywood motion pictures and am a rabid fan of IMDB. I think Dakota is the next Jodie Foster.
Here's an oldie, but digusting one from Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus --
Drag hence her husband to some secret hole,
And make his dead trunk pillow to our lust.
What we have today is pretty tame in comparison.
Today this particular subject matter is the most taboo. In the Victorian Era however highly sexualized photos of children were quite common. The depiction of adultery in a novel was much more frowned upon.
Charlie Dodgson (aka Lewis Carroll) was one of those early photogs. His pictures are very disturbing to the modern eye.
Clearly, the Victorians were completely out of their minds.
When there are no standards, pretty much anything goes, under the guise of "art" and "tastefully dealing with dreadful subject matter."
Equivocation is the new norm.
I could be wrong, but I think the problem here is that this seems to not be done for the purposes of character development, but done for the purpose of titillation.
There are plenty of ways to film a scene in such a way that these issues wouldn't come up, so I'm unsure why the director wouldn't want to err on the side of making this less exploitive of the child, unless the exploitation was the goal.
I don't care, they whole idea is sickining, not too mention what it is going to dot to poor litte Dakota (one of the most talented child-actors today in my opinion..)
My Question: "When did we loose or consciences?".
When we began to idolize having an "open mind" (meaning open to every possible definition of what's acceptable) over basic human dignity.
Probably because there's no "sexually explicit conduct" involved.
Critical thinking has been the minds gate for centuries. Leaving the gate open invites flies which lay the eggs of permissiveness in fertile ground.
Your Judy Garland story reminded me of a story I heard Elia Kazan actually cop to in an interview. During the filming of A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN (one of my favorite movies of all time), he couldn't get little Peggy Ann Garner to cry in the scene where here father dies. Finally, he went over to her and told her that her real father, who was overseas fighting in the war, was KILLED! She cried all right.
Critical thinking presupposes having standards, and having standards is now considered "being judgmental," and being judgmental is the very worst thing one can be--moreso than being, say, a suicide bomber, though not worse than being a Republican.
I have not seen the movie so I really have no standing.
From what I have read about the movie, here and in other places, the rape scene is pretty realistic but does not include film shots of actual penetration.
So you may be right, it does not actually depict actual rape. But the second snippet of US Code I posted mentions "or appears to show" explicit acts.
This was put in because of cases where the kids acted out scenes, without "doing it", to avoid prosecution as pornography under 2251.
I guess these guys found a loophole, or are willing to go to court to prove they have one.
It was during Dodson's lifetime that a psychologist convinced the Victorians that the practice was wrong. Laws were passed, and many prominent English photographers destroyed prints and negatives.
Dodson's were destroyed on his death, of thousands, few remain.
Before that it was quite common for a family to pay for professional shots of their kids in the nude, some, as you said, in quite skeevy poses.
Is this movie an outlier, or is it a sign that we are moving back to Victorian standards of what (now is called) child porn?
DBrow -- don't forget death photos, some of the creepiest images you'll ever see, particularly the ones of the kids.
In my opinion, this movie is a huge error on so many levels. I say it's a smart move to give the kid a "star turn" and a chance to promote her acting chops. The subject matter is a big mistake and will overwhelm the performance. Plus, the whole Elvis thing just sounds goofy.
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