Day: September 9, 2011

For The 10 Year Anniversary of 9/11 LFM Presents a New Series: Terror Watch

From "Strike Back" on Cinemax.

By Jason Apuzzo. With the 10-year anniversary of 9/11 approaching, I thought today would be a good time to launch a new series here at Libertas that I’ve been intending to do for a while, called Terror Watch. Terror Watch will join our other ongoing Libertas series (Invasion Alerts, Cold War Updates, Sword & Sandal Reports) and will cover the new wave of films, TV series, video games and even graphic novels dealing with the War on Terror.

The very fact that we’re able to do such a series is representative of a gradual and welcome change that’s taken place in Hollywood and popular culture over the past several years, a change whereby positive depictions of the War on Terror as a just and necessary cause are no longer considered taboo in entertainment circles. This change has been building for several years now (and has already been rippling through science fiction for quite a while), although it was accelerated considerably this past May by Navy SEAL Team 6’s successful mission against Osama bin Laden – an event that appears to have semi-officially opened a new chapter in Hollywood’s willingness to depict the struggle against terrorism as a vital activity.

And although one might be tempted to treat this development as coming too late to affect the public’s morale regarding the wars in Afghanistan or Iraq, my sense is that how history perceives those conflicts is still very much up for grabs, especially for younger Americans – and so this new trend is one that I very much welcome. This does not mean, of course, that all of the projects we’ll be discussing will be very good – I suspect quite a few may be dreadful – but I advise people to keep an open mind. Certainly several recent projects – The Devil’s Double and Four Lions, most notably – have really been superb, and overall I think there is reason for optimism.

Why optimism, you might ask? Because Hollywood isn’t as dominated as it used to be by the Baby Boomers.

For his Washington Times article today entitled, “Hollywood AWOL in War on Terrorism,” my colleague Christian Toto kindly asked me to comment on Hollywood’s overall reaction, ten years on, to 9/11 and the War on Terror. Here is what I said:

Jason Apuzzo, conservative filmmaker and editor of Libertas Film Magazine, says politics clearly played a role in Hollywood’s initial reaction to 9/11.  “Their primary response [to 9/11] was to ignore it,” Mr. Apuzzo says. But that appears to be changing, witness the upcoming film on Osama bin Laden’s death at the hands of Navy SEALs due for release next year, as well as director Peter Berg’s adaptation of “Lone Survivor,” a film detailing the hunt for a Taliban leader.  “As the baby boomers start to retire off the scene in Hollywood, it’s becoming less of a factor,” Mr. Apuzzo says of the industry’s politically charged greenlighting process. “Younger people are not as hesitant about dealing with this issue.”

Diane Kruger is a journalist captured by The Taliban in "Special Forces."

Many people nowadays believe that the Obama Presidency is the primary reason behind whatever change of heart there’s been in Hollywood of late regarding the War on Terror, and there is no doubt some truth in this. Yet while I’m sure that Obama’s Presidency – and specifically his successful management of the bin Laden raid – plays some role here, my sense is that this change was likely coming regardless, due to the gradual changeover of the industry to a younger (i.e., non-Baby Boomer) generation. By my experience, the younger Hollywood generation – and this includes the independent filmmaking world – is much less ideologically driven than the Boomers were, and are far less conflicted about the current war than was the Vietnam generation.

So this is ultimately why I’m optimistic: the people dominating Hollywood today are not the same people who were running the industry 10 years ago right after the 9/11 attacks. They are, instead, a generation driven by a desire to simply make careers for themselves – rather than to fight proxy culture-wars through the cinema, as their parents’ generation so often did.

So without further ado, let’s take a look at some of the War on Terror projects that are heading our way down the tracks …

Continue reading For The 10 Year Anniversary of 9/11 LFM Presents a New Series: Terror Watch

Veronica Lake, by George Hurrell

By David Ross. My preferred form of Internet time-wasting is “Google Images.” I collect photos of great writers, Georgian architecture, Michelin-starred food (the kind I may never get a chance to eat), nineteenth and early twentieth-century art (Samuel Palmer, Lyonel Feininger, Wyndham Lewis, etc.), and, yes, glamour shots of classic actresses, including, but not limited to, Anouk Aimee, Lauren Bacall, Capucine, Audrey Hepburn, Katherine Hepburn, Anna Karina, and Grace Kelly, preferably in Givenchy or Chanel, always in glorious black and white. In short, I’m a minor connoisseur, on which basis I would like to make the reckless assertion that the above photo of Veronica Lake, circa 1941, is the greatest still photo – the most elegant, seductive, multivalent – ever taken of an actress. The photographer was George Hurrell (1904–1992), whom Virginia Postrel calls the “master of Hollywood glamour.” You can read about his revival here and buy his work here.

The photo seems at first glance your standard come-hither boilerplate, elevated, obviously, by Veronica’s preternatural bone structure and hallmark tresses. I find, though, that Veronica’s expression has a kind of Gioconda irreducibility. At once sexy, weary, predatory, and demure, her expression seems to say something like, “I have no interest in you – no interest in the mere world – but if you insist, I will rouse myself to the matter of your destruction – and you will relish every wound.” Notice the faint sneer that registers at the right corner of the mouth; notice the shadowed right eye that carries dual connotations of the harlequin and the gun moll with a shiner; notice the coffin-forming play of light and shadow. This is a disconcerting silhouette indeed: a dark little study of sex and death, a forked image of the sleeping beauty and the stirred succubus, the thirst-awakened vampiress.

In comparison, Rita Hayworth kneeling on her satin-sheeted bed and Marilyn Monroe struggling with her billowing skirt are images of mere adolescent wish fulfillment, of sweaty pubescence. If buxom vistas are your thing — well, enjoy. Hurrell’s version of Veronica Lake belongs to an entirely different category. Its glamour recalls Beardsley, Weimar, what have you; it’s not kid’s stuff.

Posted on September 9th, 2011 at 2:07pm.

The Art of Stage Fighting: LFM Reviews My Kingdom

By Joe Bendel. Early Twentieth Century China was a rough and tumble place. If the Shaolin monks could mix it up with warlords and imperialists, why shouldn’t the actors get in on the act? Two adopted brothers will play parts in a high tragedy of almost Biblical dimensions in Gao Xiasong period action revenge drama, My Kingdom (trailer here), which opens today in New York.

Young Er Kui’s singing voice saved his life. Unfortunately, the rest of the Meng clan, including his little sister, were beheaded by the cruel Prince Regent. Er Kui is raised – with the slightly older Guan Yi Long – to be an apprentice to revered opera performer Master Yu. Opera is serious business in 1920’s China, especially when Master Yu is awarded a golden plaque designating him “The Mightiest Warrior.” Drawing a full contact challenge from the resentful Master Yue (with an “e”), Yu must “break his spear,” and retire from the stage after losing the duel under somewhat questionable circumstances.

Both brothers, however, yearn for vengeance. Yi Long is determined to regain their master’s golden plaque from Yue, while Er Kui is determined to bring down his wrath upon the Prince who bestowed it. The first proves relatively easy, but enormously cinematic. The latter will be more difficult, considering the offending Prince is dead. He had seven sons, though (but maybe not for much longer). Further complicating matters is Xi Mulan, Yue’s lead actress and former lover. She now shares the stage with the brothers who have taken over Yue’s Beijing Opera troupe, which is more than a little awkward.

Kingdom is somewhat akin to Japanese filmmaker Kon Ichikawa’s truly classic Revenge of a Kubuki Actor, combining a behind-the-scenes view of traditional theater with a good old-fashioned payback story. However, Kingdom has far less angst and much more melee, with Master Sammo Hung serving as action director (as he did for Detective Dee and the Ip Man franchise). He puts quite a stamp on the film, choreographing the fight scenes with appropriately theatrical flair. Continue reading The Art of Stage Fighting: LFM Reviews My Kingdom