By Jason Apuzzo. The LA Times’ Patrick Goldstein apparently wasn’t very pleased with Govindini’s DVD review of Prince of Persia from this past weekend. Patrick attacked the premise of Govindini’s piece yesterday, dismissing suggestions that the film has an anti-Iraq War subtext as “far fetched,” and rather ungraciously calling the review a “screed” in a piece over at the LA Times’ site.
Govindini herself will be responding to Patrick later, but I wanted to throw in my own thoughts on the matter.
• First of all, let me begin by saying that we don’t write “screeds” here at Libertas. Patrick really should know better than that – he must be confusing us with another site. Govindini’s piece is actually rather drily written – in fact, our readers were surprised that she invested so much care and analysis into an otherwise trite film – and her argument is well-referenced with respect to details within the film. I’m at a loss to understand how anyone who isn’t ideologically-driven could possibly read the piece, or what’s on this site regularly, and refer to it as a “screed.” The only “screed” here actually is the film – not our pointing out what’s in it.
• What’s extraordinary is that Patrick’s own piece neither refutes nor even addresses any of the specific details the review made about the film. He simply passes Govindini’s entire thesis off as “far fetched,” without actually engaging any of its details. Suffice it to say that if what she’s saying is so “far fetched,” why did he feel compelled to write the article then?
• Patrick’s entire ‘refutation’ of Govindini’s thesis amounts to this: that the film’s producer, Jerry Bruckheimer, is a Republican – and therefore the film simply couldn’t have an anti-Iraq War subtext. In other words, Bruckheimer’s party affiliation alone is supposed to make the actual content of the film irrelevant.
If that’s the case – i.e., if a filmmaker’s political affiliations are entirely determinative of the content of their films – then here are a few cases I’d like Patrick to address:
- How it is that ‘Republican’ Rupert Murdoch’s Fox funded and released Avatar, which more or less everyone on planet Earth (save Patrick?) agrees was as ideologically left-wing as any film Michael Moore or Oliver Stone has ever made?
- How is it that ‘Republican’ Sylvester Stallone could make The Expendables, featuring a waterboarding former CIA operative as a villain?
- How is it that ‘Hollywood liberals’ Steven Spielberg and George Lucas could make Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull, featuring murderous Soviet spies bent on mind-control as villains?
- How is it that ‘Hollywood liberal’ Angelina Jolie could make Salt, featuring rogue ex-communist agents as villains?
- How is it that the first major Hollywood film made about Nelson Mandela (Invictus) was made by ‘right wing Republican’ Clint Eastwood? I would’ve thought good ‘Hollywood liberals’ would’ve beaten Clint to the mark on that one.
I could go on but you get the point. [I could spend an hour writing about all the left-wing content that eventually appeared in the ‘right wing’ show 24, for example.] None of these cases really make sense, if what Patrick says is true. Because actually, I dare say that it’s Patrick who is viewing things here in a somewhat simplistic manner, if he thinks that something as complicated as a film can have its meaning neatly and easily grasped by looking at the party affiliation of the producer writing the checks. I’m surprised I even have to say that to someone as otherwise savvy as Patrick is.
What we try to focus on here at Libertas – and the Stallone/Expendables controversy really demonstrated this – is the content of entertainment, rather than what ‘team’ entertainers are supposedly on.
For example, just recently we reported here at Libertas how Mad Men’s Jon Hamm made disparaging remarks about the Tea Party. It was disappointing to report that, because we like Hamm’s show here – and we suspect that a lot of people who attend Tea Parties do, as well. Interestingly, however, we haven’t stopped reviewing Hamm’s show – i.e., we haven’t junked it – just because one actor made a few injudicious remarks. Hamm’s private opinions are ultimately his own, and aren’t dispositive of the meaning of the show. It would actually be silly to think they were.
The interesting thing is that earlier this summer, in a different context, Patrick seemed very much in agreement with us here about the political subtext of both present and past science fiction cinema. Patrick himself was floating some pretty wild ideas about the recent wave of alien invasion projects, even going so far as to suggest that these new movies are a reaction to “the collapse of the economy.” Now that’s really far fetched, Patrick – unless you associate alien invaders with T.A.R.P.
Let me conclude, though, with the real whopper line in Patrick’s article from yesterday.
There are tons of liberals in showbiz, but when it comes to big-budget studio films, all those liberals check their politics at the door. They’re trying to sell movie tickets, not make converts.
I don’t even know where to begin here. Patrick, are you kidding me? Please convey all this to James Cameron, or Oliver Stone, or Roland Emmerich – because I suspect those particular Hollywood liberals and makers of ‘big-budget studio films’ would passionately disagree with you. Your argument is as much with them as it is with us here. I don’t know how you missed the memo on this, but Hollywood has cheerfully branded itself as liberal – even if not 100% of the time – and nobody feels any compunctions any more about jamming politics into big-budget fare if they feel like it. That Rubicon was crossed long ago.
Posted on September 22nd, 2010 at 1:02pm.
First Goldstein states that it’s “obvious” that Body Snatchers was related to the paranoia of anti-Communism and the Red Scare, accepted writ in film theory. As far as I know, no sci-fi filmmakers have ever stated they intended this reading. I know, I know, intentionality doesn’t count in postmodern analysis. So why then doesn’t G’s analysis stand on legs just as solid as Goldstein’s? Why can’t we “read” this film any differently than we read a Body Snatchers?
I agree, Pat. The silly part of it is, the ‘meanings’ of sci-fi are usually much more muted and ambiguous than what’s in something like Prince of Persia, with it’s comically on-the-nose dialogue.
Patrick Goldstein saying such things, please tell me it isn’t so!! I have been such a big fan of his but am very disappointed to hear this. He is so clearly wrong. Appreciate the way you have demonstrated this so well, Jason, but so sorry that you have had to do so. He has been a big fan of Libertas in the past and I very much regret that he has so clearly missed the point Govindini was trying to make in her excellent review of the dreadful “Prince of Persia”. As mentioned in a comment I made about her review earlier, she often sees things in a film (and quite correctly) that others miss. Certainly Patrick Goldstein missed the point about the hidden weapons and its significance in the context of this awful film.
Thanks, BB, I’ll make sure she reads this!
Mr. Goldstein obviously approached his piece with heavy bags of preconception, and a large chip on his shoulder. But the real problem here is that he seems unable to grasp the subtext of Govindini’s article, which was that she saw Prince of Persia as anti-Iraq War propaganda.
Her conclusions are hard to dispute, and that may be the reason Goldstein didn’t touch the content of the piece.
Since there’s so many lies about the war that are believed, it’s easy to see a reaction like this a mile away. He sees the piece as far-fetched because he doesn’t know anything about the war beyond “Bush lied, people died.” He also doesn’t seem to be aware that there are a lot of Ron Paul/Pat Buchanan Republicans that are not only against the war, but fall in line with the leftist lies about it.
This is what’s frustrating about leftists: They say uneducated things, and you have to respond to them. It’s easy, but it’s like hitting balls at a batting cage — it just gets tiresome after a while.
I’m sure Govindini doesn’t have the time to write a sidebar about Saddam’s 500 tons of yellowcake that was found … or the Oil For Food Scandal that facilitated his weapons-building capabilities … or the Iraq Survey Group’s confirmation of Saddam’s WMD facilities … or that George W. Bush’s pitch to Congress was about WMD PROGRAMS, not STOCKPILES … or that Saddam gassed hundreds of thousands of Kurds. This is all common knowledge too all people except leftists.
Wow, I wrote a review for this movie on my movie review site and I completely missed the Iraq war references and now that they were pointed out, they’re incredibly obvious. I was so focused on the stand in for the Tea Party (Molina) that I must have just glanced right over them. Either that or as I realized the movie was so bad, I stopped caring about the dialogue.
Good point Shinsnake – that’s true about Alfred Molina’s character – he had a number of funny lines about government taxes and being a small businessman. That was actually another point I was going to go into in my review, but honestly, it was getting so long that I had to focus on the major theme which was the Iraq War subtext.
I don’t know how anyone who is male could argue with Govindini, she’s too attractive. Plus, add the brains and it’s a no win. I think I would be too distracted to argue with her.
I haven’t seen Prince of Persia yet, I might give it a view. As far as liberals only wanting to sell movie tickets, why all the political messages in the recent films if that’s the case? Watch pretty much any recent Matt Damon release, hardly considered small films, and there has been a message of a reliable liberal slant.
Well thank you Shane – that’s very gallant of you to say that!
Patricia, Beautiful Blossoms, and Vince – thanks so much for your comments. I will be responding to Patrick as soon as I have a moment – I’m in the midst of about a dozen different things right now. In the meanwhile, Jason has covered the major points, but I have further thoughts of my own that I want to add.
In general, while we’ve had many positive exchanges with Patrick over the years, Patrick does have a blind spot when it comes to acknowledging the left-wing messaging in a lot of major films. The fact that he’s engaged with us on a number of occasions and has had a lot of good things to say about Libertas indicates he’s an open-minded person, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t still have his preconceptions. I’ll address a few of those in my own post later.
Thanks again for all your comments and the excellent points you all make.
You know, Jason, I was a bit miffed at you for panning “The Expendables” because the black hat was a rogue CIA guy. After all, even Rambo 2 had bad US government dudes in it and Stallone has ridden his right wing rep for some time. It was also recommended by another film site. 😉
So I just went to see it for myself, and you know what? You were right. The tinfoil hat crowd’s favorite “CIA behind the drug lords/dictators” claim, a CIA assassination plot borrowed from Apocalypse Now and, of course, water boarding an innocent brave artist girl.
I would point out that panning a movie based on it’s actual content, instead of the rep of who made it shows integrity. Something which most people would take as a positive.
K, I can’t thank you enough for that – really. It means a great deal. Whether it’s a matter of my integrity or not, I can’t say – I simply try to report what I see.
Had to return to make another couple of comments after reading Patrick Goldstein’s post more carefully. Like many liberals, he does not notice the left-wing bias that exists in many of the films being made today. It is not clear from his review whether or not he has actually seen “The Prince of Persia”. Whether he has or hasn’t is almost irrelevant because Govindini makes her point very effectively by so carefully citing statements and specific dialogue from the film referring to hidden weapons and the importance of finding these to justify going to war. It is not difficult to see this as being related to present-day concerns about hidden weapons and the war in Iraq and I am sorry that Patrick Goldstein does not see this as clearly Govindini and other readers have. Overall I felt that Patrick Goldstein didn’t take nearly as much care in writing his post as Govindini did in writing hers. This is well illustrated by the fact that he didn’t even spell Govindini’s lovely name correctly (having written “Govindi” instead).