Bill the blogger--AACK (at Volunteer Voters) and Southern Beale (at MrDTalk) are up in arms that others are, uh, up in arms about the Earthinthebalance message featured in the new animated film Happy Feet. Well, I haven't seen the movie, and from what I can discern, neither has AACK or SouthernBeale, so I guess we can only speculate about the outrageous outrage surrounding this film.
From what I can tell, AACK doesn't have any children, which might explain his glib response to the possibility that the Liberally-biased entertainment industry might be writing plots with a Liberal political message. (I'm still bitter about the screen-writer of Madeline for making the heroine a vegetarian and the anti-heroine a bratty meat-eater.) So, stick with universal "truths" or values in writing a screenplay; be responsible with the platform I give you to "speak" to my children.
But possibly most amusing is Southern Beale's insinuation that CNN, USAToday CNN-Headline News, and FoxNews are all part of a Conservative cabal's coordinated campaign to creat "controversy." Obviously she has no problem with the movie's apparent environmental doomsdayism, but she plainly doesn't speak for me. Ticket-buying parents don't have a right to care what bees Liberal movie producers are putting in kids' bonnets?
Is it, as AACK alleges, "inherent hypocrisy" to complain about a movie's message? Not as hypocritical as getting bent out of shape for someone else caring enough to get bent out of shape.
Hello world!
7 years ago
13 comments:
Sure I'd like a movie promoting the sanctity of life, but I would understand someone being irritated if I (a) aimed it at children and (b) didn't let on in ANY of the marketing that it, for example, showed a dwindling of penguin population because mommy penguins could go to "tummy evacuators" just so they could, say, look dapper in their lady-tuxes. Slanted argument on the issue, sure! But I've got children to influence, whether or not their parents want to cooperate!!!
But a couple things regarding the religious stuff, I don't go after your perceived paganness or godlessness, elliemay, so lay off of mine. Ok? And I don't know when "the rapture" is going to happen but you ought to encourage such thinking by us Religious Conservatives . . . that way we wouldn't care about how public policy--intentionally or not, negatively impacts society, and we'd just sit back and let Liberals run everything into the ground.
I have yet to see Happy Feet or an Inconvenient Truth...but I don't see a problem with the message.
Movies, especially animated ones, are more and more being produced for Global Sales. Considering American Republicans are the only people in the Industrialized world still refuting the claim Global Climate change is real and it is accelerated by Man. It seems silly that a production company would refuse to put out a movie just for a handful of ditto heads.
Ned,
As for Conservative Christians allowing Liberals to run the world...James Watt subscribed to the "rapture" theory, and he did more to destroy the environment than any Interior Secretary before or since.
"We have every mixture you can have. I have a black, a woman, two Jews and a cripple. And we have talent." -- James G. Watt, describing the members of the U.S. Commission on Fair Market Value Policy for Federal Coal Leasing to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on September 21, 1983; from Bartlett's Online
Does that have dancing penguins?!
Oh, I intended to use the term, "y'all" somewhere in that previous comment but didn't.
Y'all could guess that I won't waste a thin dime to see Gore's movie. I can read all about it on-line, minus the "drama" and orchestral soundtrack.
Ned, I happen to be with you on this one.
The comparison to Inconvenient Truth that elliemay wields is not accurate for the simple reason that IT was open in its marketing about the pro-environment agenda.
Happy Feet is being marketed SOLELY as a family holiday film, with no mention about the environmental plot in print, radio or TV ads. That's a problem for many parents, believe it or not.
Ask yourselves this question: Suppose your kids were invited to a party at Chuck E. Cheese for $5.00 a head. It sounds like a good family outing. All the press for the party is that it is a "Chuck E. Cheese Holiday Bash!!! Fun For The Whole Family!!" You get there, you pay $20.00 for you, your wife and two kids. Then a preacher from a local conservative church gets up and starts talking about Christmas being about Jesus' birthday and Jesus loves all of us and isn't a shame that the Jews killed Jesus when He just came to love us.
How, then, would you feel about giving your $5 a piece to this? Would you be angry?
I think you might.
That's the equivalent to this scenario. Propaganda is propaganda.
Perhaps it wasn't my concern for the health and safety of my fellow human beings, rather, watching Captain Planet that informed my political views on the Environment. I will admit, I loved the show.
I wonder how many parents ban their kids from watching Bambi because of the negative portrayal of hunting. Or "All Dogs Go To Heaven" for it's scripturally unsound view of the afterlife (everyone knows dogs go to hell). I just wonder where it stops?
Btw, Veggie Tales didn't explicitly say it was a pro-Christian movie, is there anything wrong with that? I don't think so, but I wonder what you think.
"It seems silly that a production company would refuse to put out a movie just for a handful of ditto heads."
Yeah, and it wasn't possible to tell this story without those messages? Couldn't this story's "tension" be a once-in-a-lifetime snowstorm or one-of-a-kind predator rather than an endemic problem which is caused by capitalists or some other easily-identified culprit? Why pick a fight with someone in a movie and then feign indignant bewilderment that said target takes offense?
Oh, and "ouch" on the Watt quote.
"Btw, Veggie Tales didn't explicitly say it was a pro-Christian movie, is there anything wrong with that? I don't think so, but I wonder what you think."
Sean, the name of the movie was "Jonah" . . . there was an ocean and a whale on the poster . . . the trailer that I just watched mention NINEVAH. Even in post-Christian America those aren't cloaked terms.
ninewha?
I suppose the difference between VeggieTales and Happy Feet, is that there is not a large scale media organization out there to protest whenever biblical references get thrown into a movie...with the Environment, there is such a well funded effort to refute any and every attempt to show polluters in a negative light.
Sure the producers could have chosen a different plot device, but why? If the one they had worked, why should they change it to accommodate a handful of people who think pollution is a good thing? Perhaps the screenwriters of Ice Age should have rewritten their script to reflect the fact that the Earth is only 6 Thousand years old and therefore the Ice Age never really happened...I mean, they could have, so why risk alienating any parents who refuse to allow their children to see reality?
Sean said: "Sure the producers could have chosen a different plot device, but why? If the one they had worked, why should they change it to accommodate a handful of people who think pollution is a good thing?"
I'm operating under the understanding that the film's director intentionally amplified the movie's "green" themes. Read this.
But look; I don't worry a whole lot about the Media's direct impact on me and my wife and my children--relatively speaking, don't "consume" much media. I just think it is noteworthy that some are so "outraged" about outrage concerning this movie. Don't you think the theme "Ice Age" was a little self-evident?
And I am very comfortable with "reality," Sean. If you're interested, I will post something about my view on the subject of "global warming" soon.
Ned, I do believe my complaint was the following **and I quote** :
"There's no way to win arguments like this: people see what they want to, and no one can convince anyone that they're wrong. You can find a "liberal agenda" in the Yellow Pages if you look hard enough."
You've pretty much proven my point with this post, haven't you? Nevertheless, trying to mis-characterize my comment about this film is just wrong.
First of all, let me say "welcome to this discussion"; second I'll leave it to people to read your post for themselves (conveniently provided above); third I'll point that my post wasn't about the movie's agenda as much as your seeming agenda and fourth, you might benefit from reading the post "Inconvenient smoking gun" elsewhere on the blog. Merry Christmas Southern Beale!
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