This column at Townhall by Erik Lokkesmoe explaining to conservatives what it takes to make good art is more misguided than mean-spirited, but hell, it’s fun to mock it anyway.
Conservatives, by definition but not always by practice, are curators of the good, the true, and the beautiful.
Jim Crow laws, state-enforced pregnancy, and the Iraq War–all acts of unparalleled beauty, so long as you have the proper mix of sadism and sociopathy in the viewer.
In the popular arts, however, we have become champions of the tame, the trite, and the temporal. (See “safe for the whole family� radio stations, movie reviews that count body parts and swear words, and paintings of nostalgic sugarplum cottages.)
Right away you know this guy’s advice will be bad because he breaks cardinal rule #1–Know your audience. A sideways swipe at Thomas Kinkaid (or however you spell it) is fun and all, but not really going to endear you to anyone in the Townhall readership.
Mistake #1: We try to improve art and entertainment from the top-down and the outside-in. For example, when well-meaning people, flush with cash but bankrupt on talent, attempt to “show Hollywood� by creating films that go around proven creative methods, the result is always the same: direct to video, a waste of time and money. Enduring change, meanwhile, comes from the bottom-up (working your way up from the mailroom) and the inside-out (working within the creative industries).
Mistake #1: Thinking that there’s a way to create scores of people enamored of the top-down, oppression-is-good philosophy who’ve had to fight the establishment. Covert ops are a good idea in some cases, but when it comes to propaganda, the tried-and-true Goebbels and Soviets methods are actually pretty effective.
Mistake #2: We don’t quite understand common grace – the idea that the good, the true, and the beautiful can be found in the most “unlikelyâ€? of places (Broadway) and people (liberal artists). Without a strong belief in common grace, we will either get angry at the culture or withdraw from it entirely.
The rest of us are waiting for the latter. Any…day…now….
Mistake #3: We discourage our children from pursuing careers in the creative spheres. Fashion designer or film editor, stage actor or singer-songwriter, these are not safe or stable careers. Then again, these days neither is business, politics, medicine, or any other traditional career. Be bold: fan your teenager’s creativity.
Mistake #3: Thinking that this is going to happen any time soon in an audience thoroughly trained to monitor their kids night and day for evidence of Teh Gay.
Mistake #4: We don’t give money to artists. Focus on the Family? Fine. A high-profile U.S. Senate race? Of course. Helping a singer-songwriter finish her album?
All Ani needs is a little right wing moolah and she’ll start writing songs like, “Take My Uterus, I Didn’t Need It Anyway”.
A lot of great art – the kind that offers the culture recreation and re-creation – remains underground, stuck in studios, floundering in film editing rooms, gathering dust in garages because the artist has no money to finish the work or get it noticed. Millions of dollars go to bloated organizations that do little more than send out chest-thumping and finger-pointing press releases condemning popular culture. Instead, fund the redemptive artist and we will change the world.
And there is nothing that a starving artist loves more than the Republican party, especially when they’re screaming about NEA funding cuts.
Mistake #5: We champion prescriptive art. In other words, conservatives prefer art that shows the world as it should be, not as it really is. Curing rather than diagnosing. Descriptive art, on the other hand, tells the truth about the human condition, while offering the audience glimpses into a “world that should have been otherwise.�
Sounds good, but I’m not sure what a movie would look like that showed the world as is while hinting at the conservative version of “better”–a movie about a young woman who finishes school because she has an abortion with the hint in the background of the punishment she should have had coming? A movie about a baby who should have died getting to live from Medicaid? A film about a pointless war never started?
Mistake #6: We do not support established cultural institutions like we should. From fundraisers at art galleries to opening nights at community theaters, conservatives are hard to find at mainstream cultural happenings. As a result, we have no impact on the shows produced, the art exhibited, or the people who run these culture-shaping institutions.
Not a great idea–you could send Dr. Adams to a showing of “The Vagina Monologues” and no doubt he’d have an impact as his body in the floor in a dead faint as the dreaded V word for the thing he fears the most was repeated, but I’m not sure that’s the impact conservatives want.
Mistake #7: We use the arts to save souls and sway elections. True artists enter their work with a sense of mystery, wonderment, always uncertain what may finally appear on the canvas or film or pages. Children’s author Madeleine L’Engle speaks of her surprise when a certain character appeared unexpectedly in the plot of the novel she was writing. She says, “I cannot imagine the book without [the character], and I know that it is a much better book because of him. But where he came from I cannot say. He was a sheer gift of grace.� A sermon can be artful, and Lord knows campaign ads could use some imagination. Mixing art and agenda, however, is propaganda, whether it comes from the left or the right. If you want to send a message, Samuel Goldwyn rightly said, call Western Union.
In other words, good art could be good propaganda, but that would be wrong. Luckily, if you voted for the man who spies on us and lied to us to get us into war, “wrong” isn’t really an obstacle.
Mistake #8: We do not see good movies when it really matters. Opening weekend is our only chance to “vote” on a film. Going two weeks later, getting it from Netflix, or buying a DVD version does not count; the first weekend is election day. A big turnout will not go unnoticed in Hollywood. Remember, this is show business.
But according to Chris Muir, you know a movie’s conservative because it does good box office. And you know it does good box office because it’s conservative. You can take this on faith; no need to actually look at receipts.
Mistake #9: We protest and boycott bad art and entertainment. Type the words “conservative” and “protest” into Google’s search engine and more than fifteen million hits appear. Writing angry letters, filing FCC complaints, and boycotting advertisers are rarely, if ever, effective. Here’s the answer: ignore the bad, praise the good. When you see something you like, write a thank you letter to the author, television network, record label, or magazine editor.
“Dear Editor, I adored the movie March of the Penguins. As a general rule, I’m afraid of nature documentaries because they might suggest that evolutionary theory has anything to do with biology. And this movie did, but that’s okay, because Townhall told me it was anti-homosexual-agenda, and that’s all I need to know.”
Mistake #10: We like safe art. Soggy may be a better term. Easy to digest. Nothing that causes heartburn. Do we really want art that never challenges our convictions, wrestles with our beliefs, or questions our faith? Let’s not forget: beauty is hardly safe, truth is never tame, goodness is anything but trite.
Translation: The whining about content on TV and in movies has gotten so babyish that people are beginning to wonder if we grown adults have to have our food pre-chewed for us. Tone it down a little, people. Yes, that means you, Bozell.
71 Responses to “The art of applying lipstick to a pig”
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Does this mean there will be a change in programming at Spike TV?
What I’ve never understood about people who demand more pro-Christian programming is that they don’t know what “Christian” programming would be. Think about the recently cancelled “The Book of Daniel.” You would think the fundies would enjoy that: it’s about a minister who has secular problems, but he’s still tight with Jesus and his religion, and in fact uses both to overcome his problems. That’s something people of all faiths could get behind. But instead the fundies protested the hell out of that show. So instead of a troubled man looking to Jesus for the answer, what kind of show do they want?
I recently donated to “Air America Radio.” They’re getting out the message. They have 89 stations and I want to help them reach a hundred stations.
https://secure.airamericaradio.com/
Mistake #5: We champion prescriptive art. In other words, conservatives prefer art that shows the world as it should be, not as it really is.
Doesn’t that sound slightly . . . Communist? I’m sure his buddies wouldn’t go for that, or much else in his little manifesto.
Another brilliant take on those ‘Christians’, Amanda! You put it all in a nutshell here: ‘Jim Crow laws, state-enforced pregnancy, and the Iraq War–all acts of unparalleled beauty, so long as you have the proper mix of sadism and sociopathy in the viewer.’ Like your sense of humour when faced with all those theocrats and phallocrats.
I’ll stick with my theory: Conservatives don’t make good art because they believe that Red Dawn is the pinnacle of the movie form.
Look on the bright side: think of all the ‘Fountainheads’ and ‘Atlas Shrugged’ imitations we’ve been saved, because the conservatives dont foster the creative arts.
and parenthetically I still dont get the fuss about March of the Penguins being all pro-conservative: they think we should seek a new partner every year? or did they miss that?
Conservatives really have one problem with the arts, and that is their conservatism.
I know that sounds like a tautology, but it isn’t; if you’re a liberal and your daughter comes home and suggests that she’s decided to become a poet, you may sigh and roll your eyes, you may suggest ways she can support herself and be a poet too, but you won’t tell her to not be a poet. You just help her find a realistic way to be a poet and make more than $3,500 a year.
If you’re a conservative, you say, “Look, poets average $8 a month. Go into business or be an attorney–they pay better. More stability. Better yet, just marry a nice guy, and then you can stay home and raise the kids and write poetry with all your free time.”
Substitute actor, singer, sculptor, what have you, the point is that liberals are more at peace with their children deviating from the “norm,” whatever that is. Conservatives want their kids to do things by the book. Obviously, there are exceptions, but it’s reductive over time; simply put, more liberals go into art because it’s viewed as a liberal endeavor.
As for his suggestions, believe it or not, but they’re not bad. But they won’t work, because when you come right down to it, conservatives are who they are.
I don’t know if it’s entirely true conservatives won’t support their children when it comes to the arts … my father is pretty durned conservative and he’s quite supportive of me (stagehand) and my brother (performance major, will graduate one of these years, honest) in our chosen fields. My sisters, though … one’s a mechanical engineer and the other is a chemist (also quite supported). So maybe he’s just banking on one of them to support him in his old age.
I suppose he does occassionally break from the hard conservative line now and then … he hates people who want to mix religion and government, and don’t you dare tell him his daughters should be at home baking pies for their husbands.
Funny, I thought the reason conservatism and art didn’t mix is because art is about unbounded creativity, opening the mind and heart, and asking questions, while conservatism is pretty much defined as being bounded, closed, and unquestioning.
Nice try by the original author, but he comes across a little too earnest, like a Log Cabin Republican. “Gosh, I have all these inner feelings that conflict with those of my political peer group, but I can’t bear to part with either. Maybe I can have both?”
*bzzt* But thanks for playing, sparky. Just try not to be too hurt when your “friends” say nasty things about you at your gallery opening.
Teaching a conservative to understand art is like teaching a dog to knit. Amusing at first but ultimately futile. Repressives turn out things like Hitlerian or Stalinist realism. The scale may be heroic but the content is sterile.
All what you said, and the points are on splendid display in:
Chimp 9/11 (A Tale of the Christ) (Title if I ruled the world.)
Actual Title: DC 9/11: Time of Crisis
IMDB Plot Summary: Scheduled to air shortly before the second anniversary of the September 11 attacks, DC 9/11 takes an inside look at the Bush Administration, beginning with the day of the attacks, and following the President’s journey to Ground Zero, culminating with his now famous national address nine days after the attacks. The film covers the many difficult decisions and tasks faced by the President and his staff as they were challenged by the possibility of the “first war of the 21st Century.” Eschewing their own feelings and healing process, the President and his team instead tended to the needs of a wounded country. Based on real life accounts the docudrama will interweave actual footage from these haunting events.: [Summary written by Showtime Networks Inc].
Made with the “guidance” of Smirk & Sneer admin members cronies and apologists (and some highly questionable and very stinky jack). Yes, the Republican Palace had a huge hand in the script. Karl Rove, Karen Huge and other Dept of Hooey talents contributed some ludicrous “real life” moments like the First Hero shaking off concerns about personal safety and demanding that his plane be turned around immediately — vowing not to let some “tinpot dictator” — [:: shaking fist :: Husseinnnnnnn!] — shatter his handsome moral curge or wholesome gutlike clarity (whatever the fuck the operative phrase was that week.)
Blurbs:
Holy fucking shit, they should just drop two megatons of this crapfest on countries to stun them into glassy-eyed, open-mouthed submission. The children will escape with their lives and have infrastructure to grow up in. - Peanut
I just threw up in my mouth a lot. - Mr. Peanut
Isn’t it kind of cool that George Takei/Mr Sulu (as Norm Mineta) is the Transportation Secretary? - Peanut’s wingnut trekkie cousin
Related fun fact:
A Showtime exec emailed a (Canuckian) media critic — she had laughed about US-media enabling the Chimperor’s vanity-prances in butch dressup — and told the “leftist cunt” to take “a long walk off a short pier.” She then wrote a column about that, too.
I hate to say it, but he actually has a point. A couple, in fact:
1) There should be entertainment without vulgarity or gruesome violence* that isn’t, well, “Full House.” There should be the other stuff too, but sometimes I want something I can show my stepdaughter.
2) If wingnuts keep screaming “Hollywood is a cesspit!” they’re going to discourage those among their own who might be tempted to go try and make the kinds of movies they’d like to see — although not the extremists who feel all entertainments not explicitly Christian in character are evil — and who have the potential to do it well. i mean, I understand Passion of the Christ was good if you like that sort of thing.
3) His #5 is dead-on: stuff that isn’t realistic has a big obstacle to overcome to get its message across.
*I don’t know what “family-friendly” means. I’d have to know which family.
I remember that one. It’s a movie that does the impossible–makes Shrub look even more arrogant and clueless than he actually is. I recall one scene where Plastic Shrub meets a kid who tells him “My daddy’s missing. He worked in the Towers.” Most politicians would say “I’m sorry.” Or “We’re doing all we can.” Or “God bless you.” or something like that. PS gives the kid an autograph and says “Tell your daddy you met me!”
Unbelievable.
“March of the Penguins” has a conservative message??? The father and mother penguins EQUALLY SHARE PARENTING DUTIES! The mothers go off and hunt for their own fish, as do the fathers, both of whom regurgitate it for the baby.
And they all get together to share their body heat, like a big hippie commune, too.
I appreciate his attempt, I really do. I agree with Amanda’s criticisms, but those seem more directed at the reception of his ideas rather than the ideas themselves.
Still, as someone who works in the arts (college music prof and composer/arranger), it is halfway decent to see someone trying to tell conservatives that Art Won’t Kill You.
It’ll probably fall on deaf ears.
WF
fashion designer an unstable career? Um, no, not necessarily? Unless you want to design your own label, fashion industry is pretty much like any other industry. Maybe bitchier… and more sexual-harrasement-prone, unless you’re lucky to work with gay men.
I can see acting or film-making as something not necessarily guaranteeing a paycheck, though.
March of the Penguins a conservative movie?! -boggles- the hell? I agree with garymar - when we watched it, I was like, GO EQUAL PARENTING RESPONSIBILITIES!
I mean, I appreciate his sentiment, but it’s pretty pointless.
Amanda, it’s awfully hard to Fisk this townhall column because, let’s face it– the guy is right about conservatives’ problems. Of course, his attempt to whack some sense into right-wingers on the subject is futile, but he can tell what the problem is. The liberal evangelical Fred of Slacktivist has made plenty of the same arguments about evangelical Christian art.
Um, no. You protest and boycott good art and entertainment. It’s often very effective, which is why so much art and entertainment these days is bland and shit.
I agree with Wes and Hershele. This is an honest attempt to say something useful.
#1. Yes, people with lots of cash and no talent are going to create dreck like “Left Behind”. The same could be said of the record companies that launched the careers of Britney Spears and Justin Timberhead.
“Enduring change comes from the bottom up and the inside out”, weeellll, not exactly, but close. How about, “start small and grow carefully.” or, ‘remember, it’s about the music (or art) not the money.” Overnight sensations like Britney or even Elvis tend to create dreck or descend into it when celebrity burns out whatever talent they had. Pete Seeger and ani defranco have never achieved celebrity status but have had successful careers making great music, often outside of the mainstream music industry. The evangelical christians know this; they’ve created their own musical counterculture. Much less well known is that us acoustic folkies have done the same, with independent record labels like Rounder and Green Linnet
#2 This sounds like a peace offering. “..the idea that the good true and beautiful can be found in unlikely places and people(liberal artists) …” “common grace” sounds like a search for common ground. If Eric is offering his hand I am willing to shake it. Now, could we just get Coulter and Limbaugh to switch to decaf?
#3 and #4. Dead on Let your kids sing their songs and tell their stories. And don’t get bent out of shape before you think about what they’re really saying.
#7 Absolutely right and good advice for any artist, left or right. Bob Dylan’s “Masters of War ” is a fine rant but Eric Bogles “Band Played Waltzing Mathilda” and John McCutcheon’s “Christmas in the Trenches” make a much more powerful statement just by telling a story and letting it speak for itself.
#10 Damn straight. See #’s3 & 4. This sounds like a suggestion that Christians take a second look at “The Book of Daniel” and “The Last Temptation of Christ”. I think I could learn to like this guy even if I do disagree with him about almost everything.
Mistake #8: We do not see good movies when it really matters. Opening weekend is our only chance to “vote� on a film. Going two weeks later, getting it from Netflix, or buying a DVD version does not count; the first weekend is election day. A big turnout will not go unnoticed in Hollywood. Remember, this is show business.
I took my whole family to The Chronicles of Narnia the first week, to send a message to Hollywood. So the Chronicles made 10 times as much as Brokeback Mountain. So which gets the Golden Globes? A propagand piece that Goebbels couldn’t have done better.
Back in the Renaissance, there used to be Patrons of the Arts. These were rich guys who would commission artists to do art works for them. One of the things that was required of the artist was to create something the parton enjoyed. Arts patrons didn’t give bags of money to artist and say: “make whatever the hell you want. Our Lord and Savior in a jar of urine or his Mother covered in elephand dung would be good places to start”.
So the Chronicles made 10 times as much as Brokeback Mountain. So which gets the Golden Globes?
And as we all know, how much something sells is directly related to how good it is; this, of course, is why nobody likes that box office super-flop, It’s a Wonderful Life, and all people love without question the Star Wars prequel trilogy.
As for opening week being the week, I’m not sure how true that is anymore. The overseas market and dvd sales are starting to really make their power felt, especially the latter; hell, Universal took a chance on Serenity solely because of the sustained dvd interest in Firefly.
Wow. A discussion about art and it took the reactionary only 20 comments to bring up the two pieces done 13 years ago. That’s a new record.
Tony, honey, sweetie, dear, the art world is full of millions of wonderful things, many of which you may actually like. Come back when you find something that isn’t mass produced kiddie fare, m’kay?
“Chronicles of Narnia” was flat and dull especially in comparison the “Lord of the Rings”. Tilda Swinton was great but there was not much else going on. It may have been fun for kids but in dramas for adults you need a little more than endless cute-5-year-old reaction shots to get an award. Maybe something about heartache, longing, betrayal and love. Mmmm. Were there any movies that hit on those this year?
In other words Apples and freakin’ Oranges Tony.
Tony, Hollywood is all about making money. Rest assured, Hollywood is going to have no problem marketing more mass-market, big-budget films directed at children (and their parents). There is a more acute shortage of movies that adults will see with other adults. The latter category is generally what awards focus on– mostly because movies in the latter category at least aspire to be well-written, well-acted, and interesting (though they tend to fail at this, which is the problem we face).
“Patrons of the arts” did not/do not tell their artists “make XYZ for me.” Patrons instead generally find an artist they respect and support the artist to do what the artist thinks is right. If the patron likes it, he continues his patronage. If he doesn’t, he finds another artist. Richard Mellon Scaife and the right-wing noise machine works in the same way.
Seriously, though, I don’t think parents should encourage their children to go into the arts. If someone’s going to be an artist, the least they could do is to at least do so as an act of rebellion.
“March of the Penguins� has a conservative message??? The father and mother penguins EQUALLY SHARE PARENTING DUTIES! The mothers go off and hunt for their own fish, as do the fathers, both of whom regurgitate it for the baby.
And they all get together to share their body heat, like a big hippie commune, too.
Not to mention how some penguins change mates each year, and that some penguins form same-sex bonds. They ignored that stuff.
Lord of the Rings has some pretty conservative themes, and it did OK.
The basic problem with making a conservative movie is that good movies are about people and empathizing with them - empathy is not a major conservative virtue. A good movie draws you in so that you care about the characters, so you understand their motivations, their fears and their desires. The essence of modern conservatism is not giving a crap about anyone who doesn’t adhere to the correct belief system, desire the right things, and fear the right things. That rather limits the plot lines.
no, Tony’s right. we should set the clock back to the Middle Ages.
So I’m gonna go purchase myself a Princepality from the Church and torture my political enemies for laughs. In fact, since I can quite literally buy and sell your ass, You have thirty seconds to tell me why I shouldn’t have you brought up on charges of treason and publicly executed. If you can tell me why, without using hte letter E, I’ll spare your life. if not, I’ll have you executed and your family sold into servitude on a ship.
Petty? perhaps. but I learn from your sorts. The villainy you teach me I will execute; and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction.
Spot on with the empathy observation, togolosh. I’d also add that many movies (and stories in general) involve inner struggle and searching for answers. These are pretty antithetical to conservative tropes as well, and when they do try to touch on them, it’s usually in a heavily didactic manner (”there’s only solution, we’ve got it, and you either follow along with it or you get punished”).
Makes for lousy narratives, as it avoids the complexity and confusion of human experience.
Tony, do you actually know anything about Andre Serrano and Chris Ofili? Or were you just remembering something you heard Rudy Giuliani yelling about a few years ago and parroted it in the hopes that it would actually have some resonance to this particular discussion?
Sorry to go all Godwin’s Law here, but a example of how conservatives react to art (and the art they create in response) can be found by doing a little research on the term “Entartete Kunst” (”degenerate art”).
Eye-opening, provided your eyes aren’t already open (or aren’t nailed shut).
To be fair, what really stifles great art is the need to put your agenda *before* your inspiration–that old saw about putting the cart before the horse. Saying your goal is to make Conservative OR Liberal Art pretty much aborts any art you could make before it happens.
It’s easy to point out the conservative fundie foibles because their agenda is SO narrow and literalist that no real inspiration could survive the winnowing process of fitting “Christian” messages into every frame of a movie.
But it can happen with any agenda, when the Goal takes over from the Muse: noble aspirations aren’t enough.
“I took my whole family to The Chronicles of Narnia the first week, to send a message to Hollywood”
Most people appreciate, or movies, or entertainment to experience and enjoy them. If you’re patronizing art in order to send a message back to the creator, you’re missing the whole point.
“A propogand (sic) piece that Goebbels couldn’t have done better.”
Um….as somebody who’s actually SEEN “Brokeback Mountain”, may I ask: “What the hell are you talking about?”
I’ll put aside the suggestion that tolerance for homosexuals is comparable to exhorting Hitler, offensive as it is. It probably took a lot of restraint for you to avoid asking, “What’s next, a movie about bestiality?” But “Brokeback Mountain” is a love story about two gay men in a particular time and place. It shows how limited their options were, and how their own self-loathing drives them to deny their feelings (by, among other things, marrying women they don’t really love.) It’s not a “message movie”, but if one persists in searching for one, that message would be “homosexual men shouldn’t hate themselves. They shouldn’t deny their true feelings. They shouldn’t drag innocent people into the situation by entering a marriage that leaves them both unhappy.”
Um-of course not. But that’s only an objectionable message if you think homosexual men SHOULD do all those things. We call people who hold such an opinion FUCKIN’ MORONS.
In related news, “Goodfellas” is a propaganda movie too: it warns us that being a gangster can be a bad thing. Oh, and “Fargo” warns us that kidnapping and murder are wrong. (Anybody care to chime in with other examples?)
Sorry, meant to say:
Most people appreciate ART, or movies, or entertainment to experience and enjoy them. If you’re patronizing art in order to send a message back to the creator, you’re missing the whole point.
(Anybody care to chime in with other examples?)
Disney’s Beauty and the Beast says that violent men make great mates if a good woman just showers them with enough feminine love.
But it does have nice music.
Pulp Fiction taught us that it is unwise to poke a stick at John Travolta’s career.
Well, there’s an entire genre of both feature films and crappy made-for-TV flicks that all revolve around the following basic plot: impossibly WASPy American family living in fantastically huge house in suburbs is threatened by stranger (take your pick: person of colour, working-class man, single woman [of any social class], foreigner, etc.) who is plainly “jealous” of their so-wonderful lifestyle.
Which of course teaches us that impossibly WASPy Americans are at the pinnacle of human worth and that any criticisms from the rest of us are all down to our envy of their general fabulousness.
Damn: pushed “submit” too soon.
They probably also teach the impossibly WASPy that anyone “different” is a sad little specimen wracked with the realisation of its own inferiority yet lazily unwilling to put in the work it takes to be just so damn great. And who, if showed any sympathy or friendliness, will likely respond with treachery.
Sorry to go all Godwin’s Law here
Yeah, Tony ‘Ang Lee = Goebbels’ already beat you to the punch on that one.
“Fight Club” taught us that, unless you get enough sleep, you will sprout a personality that looks remarkably like Brad Pitt.
Well, if that’s the deal, HouseofMayhem, I’ll stop sleeping right away. Although the unfortunate side effect was that Brad dressed like Herb Tarlek in that movie.
The Little Mermaid tells girls that you don’t need a voice if you have a pretty face and a great body. And powerful men (especially daddy kings) are generous and noble, but powerful women are evil, evil, EVIIIIL, and need to be destroyed by powerful men like the Prince.
But those evil women get the best songs. So maybe it evens out.
Maybe this is just me in Calgary talking, but last I checked, conservatives DO fund the arts. I can’t recall the last play I went to that wasn’t sponsored by an Oil company.
Thomas Kinkaid offends my art historian sensibilities.
That being said, I think the problem with relating art to conservatives is that Modern and Post-Modern Art is all about pushing boundaries, and is about making people feel something. And if that something is moral outrage, all the better.
Conservatives don’t like to push boundaries; they like to stay in their little boxes. That’s why there was such an outcry at Robert Mapplethorpe’s exhibitions — it was a view into a lifestyle that they’d never seen, and wanted to avoid. Maybe it repulsed them, maybe it aroused them — but either way, it offended them, so they labeled it pornography. Serrano’s Piss Christ was offensive, so they labeled it Not Art, forgetting the fact that some art is offensive, or was when it was first created. (Manet’s Olympia, for example; during its first exhibition they had to put it behind glass, or something equally protective, because it was so pornographic.)
Then again, I’m a metalhead, so I have a very high tolerance for offensive anything.
You mean like this?;-)
Well, a high tolerance for everything except bad puns — if that was even directed at me.
(hahahahahaha.)
LOL! Well, it was directed toward everyone who appreciates bad puns–and bad cow puns.
So the Chronicles made 10 times as much as Brokeback Mountain. So which gets the Golden Globes? A propagand piece that Goebbels couldn’t have done better.
And here we see why the wingnut faction like Tony is incapable of producing good art.
1) Lowest-common-denominator stuff like Narnia will always appeal to them over adult films with serious themes. They really like children’s flicks with talking animals and stuff.
2) They confuse quantity with quality.
3) In a weird twist, they think anything that doesn’t toe the Jeezus-is-my-best-friend line is propaganda.
Hey, Tony, after Bible study, be sure and herd the kids over to Chuck E. Cheese for the Gilligan re-runs. Call it ‘Culture Night’.
“I took my whole family to The Chronicles of Narnia the first week, to send a message to Hollywoodâ€Â?
Exactly what time yesterday were you born, Tony?
I love it when Hollywood convinces the gullible religious folk that if they buy a movie ticket, they’re scoring a touchdown for Jeezus. It’s brilliant segmented marketing — the general public goes to see a cute kid’s film which is quickly forgotten in a month, the fundie preachers tell the sheep to rush out in hordes to “send a message” — and the Hollywood studio laughs all the way to the bank.
But anything with that super-hot Tilda Swinton in it, I’m not gonna miss!
They really like children’s flicks with talking animals and stuff.
Didn’t The Last Temptation of Christ have a talking dog ?
I actually appreciate the author’s distinction between propaganda and art. While I don’t often use the word “propaganda,” I regard it as a neutral expression — propaganda isn’t necessarily deceitful or manipulative, it’s an effort to express a partisan position. As one of my comrades put it, the difference between propaganda and art is that propaganda allows of only one interpretation, while art tries to portray life in its complexities and embraces contradiction, and thus cannot avoid allowing of more than one interpretation.
While I do tend to think there are more good artists left-of-center (partly because I think reality is biased to the Left), there have been a few right wing artists I’ve found interesting, and I think it’s a bit foolish to simply say there aren’t any or that they aren’t worthwhile at all — partly because a good work of art can be interpreted in more than one way.
Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness is often seen as a critique of colonialism. It is, in a sense — a critique of a particular style of colonialism. The narrator’s sympathies are clearly with the colonialist project, and he accepts and embraces racism. Yet in displaying the shortcomings, failings, and dangers of colonialism, the story allows itself to be read in an anti-colonialist light.
Similarly, in Milton’s Paradise Lost, the point is expressing Milton’s idiosyncratic view of Christianity, and Satan is intended to be just appealing enough that his ultimate failure and defeat is most affecting. Yet that’s allowed for generations of readers to read Satan as the real hero of Paradise Lost.
I’ve heard it said that no anti-war movie can avoid some pro-war content, and vice versa. A critique of war must allow for the appeal of war; a championing of war must allow for the fact that war is dangerous and destructive and cannot be accepted as a permanent condition by even the most belligerent. Consider Saving Private Ryan, which is at points nauseating in its celebration of WWII in the European Theatre as the “Good War,” yet is most famous for the nightmarish opening two minutes.
Good art approaches the complexity of life.
Throwing out a “bitch about movies” thing:
Is anyone else convinced that kids would be able to handle much, much smarter fare if Hollywood allowed it? That kids can handle moral ambiguity, complex characters, and genuinely troubling situations?
karpad, of course. I think kids can generally handle a lot more than their parents give them credit for, and I think the parents who forget that are the ones who forget what it was like to be kids.
FoolishOwl:
I’ve heard it said that no anti-war movie can avoid some pro-war content, and vice versa. A critique of war must allow for the appeal of war
Less loftily, I think the reason most of the Reagan-era anti-drug ads are so goofy and, I’m going to guess, ineffective isn’t because of the hairstyles, but because they were created by people who’d never taken drugs, and who in fact had a strong aversion to the idea of drugs — they felt it was a moral crusade, although that’s a bad metaphor, because the Crusaders were forgiven for their sins, while these people convinced themselves they’d never sinned at all. So the ads presented drug use as unrelentingly negative, an activity with no upside, no pleasure, that sucked the pleasure from other areas of your life.
karpad:
Is anyone else convinced that kids would be able to handle much, much smarter fare if Hollywood allowed it? That kids can handle moral ambiguity, complex characters, and genuinely troubling situations?
I have a fascination with the Hays code, which was built on the principle that adults couldn’t handle that.
Actually, that’s not quite true. It was built on the notion that movies were family entertainment (rather than something adults might do alone) and moral ambiguity might confuse kids. I think The Postman Always Rings Twice is a bit heavy for an 8-year-old all the same. It’s a very Victorian/Romantic attitude.
Karpad:
They didn’t “dumb down” themselves. The world they have to deal with is far more complex than the long lost Norman Rockwell Land.
The Little Mermaid tells girls that you don’t need a voice if you have a pretty face and a great body. And powerful men (especially daddy kings) are generous and noble, but powerful women are evil, evil, EVIIIIL, and need to be destroyed by powerful men like the Prince.
Actually, I was reading up on Hans Christian Andersen recently, and that’s not what it’s about at all. The mermaid was HCA himself. He was a profoundly neurotic misfit with no money, and he relied on wealthy patrons to make his way in the world. That meant not always saying what you want to say.
I have a fascination with the Hays code, which was built on the principle that adults couldn’t handle that.
True, but then you have The Yearling.
Yeah, that’s what the story is about, but I’m talking about the Hollywood Disney version, which has about as much to do with HCA as a minnow does with a whale.
“A propogand (sic) piece that Goebbels couldn’t have done better.�
Um….as somebody who’s actually SEEN “Brokeback Mountain�, may I ask: “What the hell are you talking about?�
Darned typos.
Bill, propagandA, by it’s nature is subtle. If it weren’t, the effect would be a lot worse.
The men, out riding the range to swells of fabulous music, and breathtaking vistas. Close to God. Even when they’re humping like bunnies.
Break to the broken down shack with the squalling kids and the clingy wives. No swelling music… no breathtaking vistas.
Message: Marriage == stifling. Kids tie you down, take away your freedom.
Fudgepacking a buddy up in the mountains == Liberating.
As feminists you ought to have been apalled at the way these women were treated. But I guess destroying the family trumps patriarchial outrage any day. That’s why y’all like the sexual harasser Bill Clinton so much.
Tony, dude, only a literalist with the reading capacity of a 4 year would interpret a movie like Brokeback as a Goebbels propaganda piece. It’s about what marriage means to the CHARACTERS–it’s about not acting on your truest instincts, and when they’re off packing fudge, they’re acting according to their truest selves (yes, closer to what God intended for them), while the marriage is seen as a damaging and confining lie, to both husband and wife, IN THIS STORY. What the institution of marriage means to YOU, the audience, well, that’s kinda up to you. If you approach stories the same way you approach the operating manual to a DVD player, then you’re a fricking idiot.
Message: Marriage == stifling. Kids tie you down, take away your freedom.
Fudgepacking a buddy up in the mountains == Liberating
I hate to bring up the old trope about what homophobia says about the homophobe. So I won’t.
I will say this: with all the jokes and TV ads and TV shows about how stifling and burdensome marriage is for men, why do men still get married? Why do men tend to have sex with women rather than other men, when (stereotypically) men are better companions in all other contexts? How easy do you really think it is to convince men to abandon sex with women in favor of, as you so delicately put it, fudge-packing?
I mean, mountains and vistas have been seen as liberating for centuries, so it’s obviously the sex part that bothers you here.
Bill, propagandA, by it’s nature is subtle. If it weren’t, the effect would be a lot worse.
Um, propaganda is generally the opposite of subtle. This is from almost the first page that comes up for “propaganda” in google. The germans were masters of it. Why? No subtlety. No ambiguity. A simple message for simple people.
Nuts. Messed up the coding. Here it is again.
Honestly, how many die-hard Clinton supporters are there here? I’m willing to bet you’ll get some strong critism of his welfare policies and his limited progress of women’s issues.
Press further, and I bet you’ll get some critism of his personal life (but that’s not really the point of a president, is it?)
Tony, we’re not out to destroy families. Or “Family values”. But you have to ask, are they really that valuable if they depend on the subjugation of women?
Honestly, how many die-hard Clinton supporters are there here? I’m willing to bet you’ll get some strong criticism of his welfare policies and his limited progress of women’s issues…
That would do for a start, Antigone… :p
Oh, and Tony’s fudge-o-phobia is my best laugh of the day thus far. Yes, straight men and women universally dislike anal sex, especially once they’re married. All gay men love anal sex all the time. Lesbians can’t even utter the phrase “anal sex” without express permission from the Dyke Mothership first. Bis, oh forget them. They don’t exist anyway. You might as well talk about the sex life of the unicorn. :p
Methinks that somebody never took the Sexuality 101 course, and is getting all his knowledge from some Church group and those cheap video booths in the back of the nearest adult[sic] “entertainment center.” Ho hum.
Speaking of families, what about the scene where Lurleen practically rapes poor Jack in the back of a truck? Or doesn’t that count, since it’s hetero?
Message: marriage = stifling. Kids tie you down, take away your freedom.
Right, heterosexual males are big fans of domesticity — you never hear em belly-ache about their stifling marriages and freedom-sapping wives and kids.
The ones who are all worried about the effect of marriage and kids are … gay men, right?
Tony is utterly clueless, CourtneyM. The movie establishes that the guys shouldn’t have gotten married to begin with. (Of course, he hasn’t actually SEEN the movie, so his conclusion about the supposed message it sends is based entirely on ignorance) I guess a marriage based on a lie is better than no marriage at all.
If the relationship between the two men had been strictly platonic, and nothing else in the story was changed, THEN the message about marriage would have been:
Marriage=stifling.
But since it’s isn’t, that’s not a logical conclusion to draw. Then again, I wouldn’t expect somebody who equates gays with Nazis to think logically.
Oh, and if you get married when you’re only 19, kids DO tie you down and take away your freedom. You don’t need to see any movie to know that, just an ounce of common sense.