PROMETHEAN ANTAGONIST

I recently saw Sin City, the widely praised hybrid animation/human-actor film of violence and excess (there’s often a delay between when movies come out in America and eventually make it up to my area of Japan).

The artist in me liked the artistry aspects of the film. In spite of what one may have gleaned from past rants on this site, I like artists -- when they actually produce art (as opposed to pretending to have the credentials to effectively run a nation state).

This is not a film review but I will say that Sin City’s technique, a quasi-animated monochrome tableau, is “artistic” and impressive. Some of the script writing was rather well done as well (i.e. “delusions of eloquence”). One can see Quentin Tarantino’s contributions to the film; plenty of gratuitous violence to satisfy the perverse artiste’ in anyone (I’m personally not into the dismembered body parts kind of thing).

Halfway through the flick, an Irish character refers to America as the “land of opportunity” sarcastically while adding a chastisement regarding its “low taxes” (the left’s PR folks are never really clear why it’s a grand and heroic thing to take more of people’s money). This is all, of course, to let us know that the crime-laden cesspool of violence and cruelty we’re watching is supposed to be a city in America. Prior to the comment, I thought it was just some timeless fantasy locale. I’ve lived in several places in America, both urban and rural (New York City being one of them), and “Sin City” didn’t have the slightest resemblance in character to any of them. It was more than ironic that the Irish character in the movie was the one decrying America’s “low taxes” (which actually aren’t so low) considering that Ireland has only recently risen from perpetual poverty to considerable prosperity after having enacted free market principals – which include, of course, lowering taxes.

While watching this interesting, well done -- but disgusting -- movie, I was confirming to myself the premise of an article I had recently read which theorizes as to why Hollywood is in another serious slump (as it had been at other times in its past). The essay could be accused of some right wing conspiratorial perceptions but, on the whole, I think the writer is on to something. While some Americans and a whole lot of Europeans and Canadians etc. may gain satisfaction seeing the U.S. depicted as a corrupt, sinful, and horrid place, a lot of American audiences prefer something more uplifting, or at least honest. In watching such depictions of The United States (this isn’t the first movie to depict the country as a violent, gloomy, and evil society), you’d never know that, on average days, lots of Americans attend concerts, art galleries, and baseball games, or do the laundry, hug their childrdn, tie their shoe laces, and take their families to picnics or even (dare I say) church.

Unless you regularly read conservative or libertarian blogs and websites, it may never even occur to you to question the fantasy images Hollywood regularly produces depicting the U.S. In movie after movie, the villains are greedy corrupt corporations, and their military-industrial puppet masters. In truth, the State department and even the CIA are full of “progressives” who openly despise their country and sympathize with its enemies (not a new thing).

In many movies of late, the template has swayed so far from reality that the latest terrorist movie, Flight Plan features an air marshal and flight attendant as terrorists (it couldn’t possibly be an Islamic Fascist fanatic now, could it?!).

It now seldom occurs to the herd in Hollywood to make a movie where the bad guys actually bear some resemblance in character to the ones in real life – fanatical terrorists, totalitarian ideologues, and coercive socialist authoritarian control freaks. No, the frightening villain of most movies is…the business person -- capitalism and its supposed ever-present “greed.” Does it not strike one as a little odd when one of the wealthiest cliques’ in America -- the Hollywood crowd -- lectures the rest of us on the horrors of …wealth? Of course this shouldn’t be a surprise from an industry that has had a long love affair with everyone from Joe Stalin to Fidel Castro. I’d love to see a movie about Castro or Che, for example, where the audience actually gets to see what these guys really did, both in acts of violence and in their destruction of an island nation.

Hollywood will still no doubt continue to produce pampered elitists’ fantasies while wondering why their audiences in America continue dwindling, but the Democratic party keeps putting out the same Jacobin product as well and wonders why they keep losing elections (even against a “stupid simpleton/evil genius”).

If you like watching movies where evil violent villains scurry about in assorted rat holes, go for it, but if you’re considering such templates to be accurate depictions of America, at least have the knowledge, sense, and insight to know that they’re not. The real “sin” in all of this is that rich Hollywood spoiled brats hate the country that has afforded them wealth, prestige, and influence; one of the most dynamic, diverse, prosperous, and generally good countries to have graced the pages of history.

One must remember, there are many whose idea of good is an “equality” (leveled conformity) imposed by coercive centralized state authority and a “peace’ where, in all confrontations, freedom loses – truly sinful behavior.


***************************************************

A Comic Commentary from Promethean Visions:


Fairness


***************************************************

Promethean Quote from The Promethean Observer:

"‘Geniuses’ are overrated. I prefer the simple wisdom of common folks; for their general decency and common sense, as well as the unlikelihood that they'd kill millions of people in some grandiose utopian social scheme.”