'Black Hawk Down' Was Set to Blame Clinton for 9/11

NewsMax ^ | December 27, 2001 | Carl Limbacher and NewsMax.com Staff

[MeekOneGOP]

NewsMax.com

 

Thursday Dec. 27, 2001; 12:16 p.m. EST

'Black Hawk Down' Was Set to Blame Clinton for 9/11

Columbia Pictures' "Black Hawk Down," the holiday action adventure movie about the 1993 Somalia debacle that cost 18 U.S. soldiers their lives, was set to explicity blame ex-President Clinton for the 9/11 terrorist attacks before the film's director and producers decided to soft-peddle the connection.

In mid-November, before the decision to tone down the Clinton angle, the film was previewed for a handful journalists.

Before its final edit "Black Hawk's" closing crawl highlighted a series of events following the Somalia mission, including Clinton's humiliating troop withdrawal from the country, the humanitarian disasters in Rwanda, Bosnia and Kosovo and, finally, the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11.

"With what happened in Mogadishu, with the way that all came down, you end up with the terrorism we see today," the film's producer Joe Roth told the New York Times on Wednesday. "It's so obvious now, eight years later."

Roth said his partner Jerry Bruckheimer and "Black Hawk's" director Ridley Scott agreed with him that "we would be remiss in not making this connection to the general audience."

But ultimately the filmakers, along with Mark Bowden, author of the best-selling book upon which the movie is based, decided that blaming Clinton explicitly would be "unnecessary and too distracting."

"It was a judgment call," Bowden said. "And I know you would think that a decision like this would have had something to do with the commercial aspects of releasing a movie, but it didn't. It was all about what was the right thing to do for the film."

Noted the Times: "It would have been an unusually bold move for a big, expensive studio production like 'Black Hawk Down' to blame President Bill Clinton and American public opinion for setting the stage for the kind of terrorism behind Sept. 11."

Still, director Scott argued that even after the rewrite, the message is obvious. "I think the implication is there.... To me, it's very clear that there is a connection between Mogadishu and what is happening now. But to make it explicit at the end of this movie would have been too much."

"Black Hawk Down" is set to premier in select theaters on Dec. 28.

Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:

Clinton Scandals
War on Terrorism

[Diddle E. Squat]

Oops, thanks for the correction. I meant removal, not impeached. But while we are here, I am not sure but in the back of my mind seem to recall that the majority of polled Americans(east and west coasters) were also against impeachment.

[ken5050]

FWIW, I read somwhere that the film does contain dialogue that is very critical of Slick....and BTW, did you read that in the rebroadcast of the Concert fdor 9/11 from Madison Square Garden, the booing of Hillary was edited out?

[MeekOneGOP]

Kinda spooky, our two posts.
A bee stung my brother once.

---

It is spooky - I was thinking how similar they were myself!

[jethropalerobber]

I imagine we'll have to wait for the director's cut when it comes out on video/DVD to see the original intent?!

isn't the director the one who cut it?

[MeekOneGOP]

FWIW, I read somwhere that the film does contain dialogue that is very critical of Slick....and BTW, did you read that in the rebroadcast of the Concert fdor 9/11 from Madison Square Garden, the booing of Hillary was edited out?

---

Yes, I saw that article posted here on FR. Here it is, in fact:

Hillary Boos Vanish From McCartney Concert Rebroadcast
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/fr/597516/posts

[KC Burke]

Mark Bowden, the book author, depicted in this report as blaming Clinton, doesn't do that in the book. He passes the blame around to everyone. The UN, the upper level commanders, the Congress, Bush (the elder) and Clinton all get their share. He does point to Clinton as being unwilling and incapable of formulating a correct program, before, during and after, but the book doesn't come off as an idictment of Clinton, rather its a realistic look at military operations when used in police and nation-building actions mixed with UN involvment.

[Grig]

Letting the viewers come that that conclusion on their own instead of beating them over the head with it will be more effective IMHO, although I'm sure that wasn't the intent. Of course the problem with that is it requires that the audience has the brain cells to draw that conclusion.

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Hopefully, they'll come out with a Ron Brown movie.

[Hemingway's Ghost]

Could it be that they are setting up sales for the DVD "uncut" version ?

If they are, I'll buy it. I'm currently halfway through the book, and it's one of the best non-fiction books I've ever read. If the movie's half as good as the book, it'll be a tremendous success.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

BUMP!

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Thos f*cking b*st*rds!

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Dang! I meant that last reply for the linked thread referenced in Reply 25! OOPS!

[finnman69]

From what I have heard it will be pretty obvious we got in deep doo doo in Somalia becasue of the leadership. I can't wait to see this movie. Ridley Scitt is a fantastic director and the buzz is that the movie will kick ass and be very accurate.

[Sloth]

There is no mention of 'blaming American public opinion" for 9-11, only the disgraced, impeached , alleged serial rapist ex-President Bubba Klintoon. The Slimers will never give up...

American public opinion made him president. And even after they all could not help but know exactly what he was, they still supported him.

When the American people elect a rutting hyena as President, it ain't the hyena's fault.

[Heyworth]

The problem we have here is that we don't actually know the text of the crawl that they're talking about, but reading between the lines of the article, it probably went something like: "In the wake of the Battle of Mogadishu, public outcry led to the withdrawal from Somalia and Bill Clinton's subsequent squeamishness toward other military ventures, including a serious war on terrorism, which in turn opened the US to more attacks culminating in 9/11." And it's a valid point that the American people didn't want their boys in harm's way for no good reason, and that Clinton did little to try to lead America into changing their mind. Except when it was Bosnia, of course. Let's face it, there was no credible political leadership from anywhere that was arguing that we had to go full-bore into Somalia after that. Or that we had to stop the genocide in Rwanda.

I'm not one of those that agrees that the sole blame for 9/11 can be laid at Clinton's doorstep. Every president going back at least to Carter has some responsibility for what happened. How is Clinton's withdrawal from Somalia different than Reagan's withdrawal from Beirut after the Marine barracks bombing? Didn't both of them just encourage Muslim fundamentalist terrorism by handing them a victory? But there's never been a true consensus in America over attacking terrorism head-on until now.

Should the crawl have been removed? Probably. It's a verity of screenwriting that those sorts of crawls are a cheat for something you weren't clever enough to make clear within the film, but which the audience should probably know. And I think most everyone now knows the antecedents to 9/11.

[VOA]

But ultimately the filmakers, along with Mark Bowden, author of the best-selling book
upon which the movie is based, decided that blaming Clinton explicitly would be "unnecessary and too distracting."

At least I now know I won't be wasting $8.00 (or more) to see this movie.
I just knew that once the whole story got filtered through Hollywood (just like
the film "Pearl Harbor"), filmgoers aren't going to get the whole story.

Any film that seeks to make MILLIONS of dollars of profit of the sacrifice of
brave men fighting, dying and following orders...and doesn't tell us who was ultimately
responsible for this cock-up...
is too "unnecessary and too distracting" for me to waste time and money watching.

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

REMEMBER THE RUNNING MAN

Remember how the govt and tv station created news to broadcast out of a situation that was completely the opposite of what happened that post just proves too many..... (who have any sense) that it can be done tin foil hat or not your life can be manipulated with or without your knowledge .

And sooner or later its comming

[beekeeper]

Great minds...

[MeekOneGOP]

Hopefully, they'll come out with a Ron Brown movie.

Zing!!!! Yeah!!! (with the TRUTH!)

[Mia T]

Q ERTY6 clinton-was-an- utter-failure HOLLYWOOD-REALITY-CHECK bump!

2-27-01

Frankenstein, The Sequel:

Hollywood--premier clinton creator--edits out its own culpability for 9/11 by editing out clinton's culpability for 9/11

Will its own vulnerability to terrorism (and worse) finally impel LA-LA LAND to reject "through the looking-glass for real" clinton ineptitude and depravity?

To his astonishment the handshake was declined. "You are not fit to be president of the United States," said Shughart Senior. "The blame for my son' s death rests with the White House and with you. You are not fit to command."

Dead Hero's Father Tears into Clinton

 

As Riefenstahl told it, editing-to-perfection was crucial....By editing out a shot of Hitler wiping his nose and including instead "more interesting expressions," by eliminating the human, Riefenstahl eliminated the inhuman.

Film Noir in the White House