July 29, 2010

The final word on Oliver Stone

I have a nostalgic interest in Oliver Stone, going back to 1986, the Year of the Three Olivers (Oliver Stone's Salvador and Platoon, Oliver North's Iran-Contra Scandal, and Oliver Sachs's The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat). Clearly, Stone is over the hill and burnt out now, but for somebody of my generation, he's an interesting figure who burned brightly for a few years before everybody decided to hate him. Not that he doesn't deserve it, but he was hugely influential from, say, the screenplay for Scarface onward for a decade, so it might be worth trying to understand him.

In the comments, asfsdsdas says:
Oliver Stone's Jewish problem...

I think because Oliver Stone was born half-Jewish/half gentile, began on the Right and then moved to the Left, craves fame & fortune but believes in 'social justice', and blabbity and blibbity, there's a one-man civil war raging inside his soul. Even his leftist movies tend to be politically incorrect. Born on the 4th of July has a typical lefty ending, but there is much that defiles PC notions. Blacks at the VA hospital were hideous. And some blacks in Platoon were also pretty brutal and nasty. Any Give Sunday is both sympathetic to black athletes and angrily frustrated with their bulljive.

Anyway, Stone is like John Milius crossed with Gillo Pontecorvo. He grew up a Goldwater all-American conservative, went to Vietnam, got disillusioned and got caught up in 60s upheaval, and he's one messed up guy. But he probably likes being messed up because that's where the action is(as with Woods character in Salvador), creatively speaking. In a way, he probably identified with Nixon and even Dubya cuz they too were conflicted characters. Nixon didn't rise as an establishment conservative and Dubya wanted to reject the whole thing before being dragged back into it.

As a sports and war-and-guns maniac, Stone loves the man of power, the man's man. But he's also an intellectual and avid reader, so he loves ideas too. But the world of ideas is often at odds with world of action. Action often follows ideas, but action also often follows instincts, which are often non- or anti-idealistic. Stone wrote the script for the Scarface remake and it's clear that Stone admires Tony. He's a man of instinct than ideas but he's a man of action. He has big balls. He topples the half-Jewish/half-Cuban car dealer druglord. The Jew may be smarter but Tony has more guts. And though Wall Street is anti-greed, it's obvious Stone admires Gekko as a man of instict and will to power. And Jim Morrison was portrayed the same way in The Doors. He may have been crazy but he compromised nothing for his art and brand of crazy living. Stone may feel that Jews are too cunning, calculating, shrewd, and manipulative to be REAL MEN. Those are good qualities to gain power and keep it, but they lack the excitement of raw honest power that arises from the gut level. A Jew is more like Hyman Roth. A real man is like Tony Montana. Stone has both Roth and Montana inside of him, and so he struggles but he has fun with it.

53 comments:

Anonymous said...

That's actually a really smart reading of Oliver Stone, who's a much more complicated and politically heterodox figure than the caricature that cultural Stalinists like Whiskey or Andrew Breitbart want to reduce him to.

And I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss him as washed-up forever. Directors go through cold streaks that last for years or even decades (John Huston, Clint Eastwood, Robert Altman), but sometimes get their mojo back in late life. It's one of the benefits of being in a field that allows you to have a very long career.

Gary said...

I lump Stone and Spike Lee together as two enormously talented filmmakers who largely wasted their talent.

Anonymous said...

Wow, Andrei made the front page.

kurt9 said...

I agree. This is fair characterization of Oliver Stone. Stone is definitely a man of his time and generation, but he's clearly a more complicated personality than his right-wing detractors are willing to admit. Some of his movies were actually quite good (Heaven and Earth, for one). I agree that, like Clint Eastwood, Stone could get his mojo back.

BTW, that's a good point about Clint Eastwood. He definitely had a wandering in the wilderness from 1974 until around 1983. His "monkey" movies, for example, were atrocious. None of his movies between "Magnum Force" (1973) and "Sudden Impact" (1983) were any good.

Anonymous said...

Bull. If ever a cultural Stalinist walked, it's Oliver Stone, and if anyone made Stone a caricature, it was Stone himself. It's remarkable; the guy disses the Jews, and all of a sudden, all is forgiven

Ray Sawhill said...

Smart stuff!

NOT the Outlaw Josey Wales said...

None of his movies between "Magnum Force" (1973) and "Sudden Impact" (1983) were any good.

There's a regular here at iSteve, who calls himself outlaw josey wales, in honor of the best movie of the modern era.

But I am not he.

Anonymous said...

As I recall, Steve, you may be half Jewish, too, via your biological parents. In terms of genetic similarity theory, how does this mess with your mind?

Whiskey said...

Stone is a washed up cokehead (allegedly) hack, who if you believe the rumors ran up the budget on Alexander a million dollars because "he felt like it."

His flirting with anti-American folks like Chavez, Castro, Ahmadinejad who also hate Jews gets the Pat Buchanon crowd going, but that's it.

And yes he's a failure -- he's not able to move with the reality of the times, which is American weakness, growing anger of the White population at being replaced/displaced by Mexicans, and economic decline as America has to apologize for existing to every two bit nation.

Idolizing Castro and Chavez and Ahmadinejad who most Americans rightly identify as enemies is stupid and how out of touch (as in the Wachowski with the sex change operation) Stone really is.
-----------------
OT: Illegals protesting Arizona's law have blocked off Wilshire for 7 hours now.

Mr. Anon said...

"kurt9 said...

BTW, that's a good point about Clint Eastwood. He definitely had a wandering in the wilderness from 1974 until around 1983. His "monkey" movies, for example, were atrocious. None of his movies between "Magnum Force" (1973) and "Sudden Impact" (1983) were any good.

"Escape from Alcatraz" (1979) was pretty good. And I always thought that "The Eiger Sanction" wasn't bad, although it was rather ridiculous. Other than that, I agree with you.

Mr. Anon said...

A good take on Stone by Mr. asfasd....(aw, to hell with it).

Stone always reminded me a little of Rod Serling, another tough Hollywood liberal. Although Stone clearly was much more a man of the left, and has spent a lot of time wrestling with his inner demons.

Some of his movies were pretty good ("Born on the Forth of July", "The Doors"), and some were downright brilliant. "JFK" was an incredibly artfully made movie, despite being larded up with conspiratorial hooey. "Natural Born Killers", despite ultimately being amoral trash, was likewise brilliantly made.

What makes Stone paradoxical is the strong undercurrent of old-fashionedness in a lot of his movies. In JFK, Jim Garrison, was portrayed as a decent everyman, the kind of guy who used to be portrayed by Jimmy Stewart - and Stone shows a genuine fondness for the old traditional america. (Of course, in reality, Garrison was a devious and abusive prosecutor and a media whore.) The bad guys, at least some of them, were portrayed as degenerate homosexuals.

And Stone's "Nixon" showed a sympathy for Tricky Dick, that nobody else ever portrayed on film (until the recent "Frost/Nixon", at least). There's also a scene in "Nixon" where Halderman (James Woods) lays a rather anti-semitic rant on Kissinger (Paul Sorvino) and it's not portrayed in an especially condemnatory light. Stone is often indeed quite un-PC.

Anonymous said...

that's a good point about Clint Eastwood. He definitely had a wandering in the wilderness from 1974 until around 1983. His "monkey" movies, for example, were atrocious.


The "monkey movies" were two of his biggest commercial successes. Sometimes you have to skip the art and give the audience the entertainment they want.

Anonymous said...

I must say, Steve, you have been on fire over the last three months. Your posts are kicking butt all around, really really sharp.

Tanstaafl said...

Did somebody say "bulljive"?

Tanstaafl said...

Over at HuffPo, Saban just Emanueled Stone.

There's an ADL "canard" in this somewhere.

Anonymous said...

I have a different take. I think Stone is a typical left wing Jew who due to being only 1/2 Jewish and having a conservative father has some occasional right wing tendencies and therefore strays from the party line. Also, like Mailer he's fascinated by war, violence, and being macho but in a typically bookish Jewish way.

If you actually read the original Stone-Hitler comment articles, you'll find no direct quotes, and even the summaries and paraphrases don't really support the meme that he's a Jewish Mel Gibson. He's really just telling a truth that people don't want to hear.

Anonymous said...

OT

I don't usually do this, and won't mind if this gets moderated out on the grounds that it does not add to the conversation at all. Category: Idiocracy -Calling out homies is apparently news in Huntsville.

It gets worth it at about 1 minute in.

Rape attempt in the projects of Huntsville, AL.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VE0LRjQkWKk

Marc B said...

I enjoyed reading your take on Stone and have come to a similar conclusion over the years. Conservatives tend to view him simply as a commie, but I feel both he (and Mel Gibson) are far more interesting and complex than their detractors characterizations. He's made some great films (JFK, Wall Street, Platoon, Scarface & Missing), but I haven't paid much attention to his work since the Natural Born
killers filth that spewed forth from the gutters of
Hollywood. I despised that film despite seeing it during the most nihilistic phase of my life. It rubbed me raw because it was exploitation parading as social commentary. He was hopping on the chic ultra violence bandwagon of the early 1990's, something he should have left to the upstarts. I've always wondered if he was the primary influence for the director character, Lee Donawitz, parodied in True Romance.

Fred said...

Somewhat OT, but related to the Jews controlling the media theme: NY Post: "Pol aide's 'Jew' flap":

A Staten Island lawmaker reportedly canned his spokeswoman last night over her list of "Jewish money" donors to a GOP challenger.

Democratic Rep. Mike McMahon ripped flack Jennifer Nelson for giving the names to a New York Observer reporter because she wanted to show that rival Mike Grimm had little financial support within the district.

The list was titled "Grimm Jewish Money Q2."

"Where is Grimm's money coming from?" Nelson said. "There is a lot of Jewish money . . . from people in Florida and Manhattan, retirees."

Nelson further explained that the list was compiled by campaign finance director Debra Solomon, who "herself is Jewish so she knows a lot of people in that community."

"These comments were entirely inappropriate and there is no place for this kind of behavior," McMahon fumed to Politico.com.


On the positive side for most iStevers, you've got someone getting canned for mentioning Jewish political contributions. On the negative side, you've got those Jews giving money to a Republican candidate.

Anonymous said...

That's an analysis of Stone from someone (asdf) that feels smarter than Stone to me. Of all the people I'm interested in, I've never been that interested in Stone. I guess it's because he doesn't seem that smart to me. If he is by outcomes-based analysis, then he's smart in that perfect-bluff way that's beyond my detection capabilities.

That's the best writing I can think of that's been done by asdf. The only thing I think would've improved it is if he used two Stone characters instead of Hyman Roth.

Hopefully Anonymous

http:/www.hopeanon.typepad.com

The Anti-Gnostic said...

"Natural Born Killers", despite ultimately being amoral trash...

Actually, it's a very moralistic film. I don't plan on seeing it again any time soon--I need to avoid that kind of film at this stage of my life--but it's clear that Stone came down on the correct side of the fence with that one.

NB Killers, U-Turn, Any Given Sunday, JFK, Nixon, The Doors... I agree with Mr. Anon et al. Stone is more complicated than some folks would like him to be.

Here's who intrigues me these days: the Coen brothers. Brilliant, macho Jews who make obsessively detailed films about white people and white culture. They clearly love their subject matter, and their relentless message is beginning to scare folks.

Anonymous said...



the summaries and paraphrases don't really support the meme that he's a Jewish Mel Gibson. He's really just telling a truth that people don't want to hear.

Mel Gibson wasn't?

The International Jew said...

Not so off-topic:

http://www.tabletmag.com/news-and-politics/40762/playing-with-fire/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed:+kramerlinks+(Linkage+by+Martin+Kramer)&utm_content=Twitter

gwood said...

"Also, like Mailer he's fascinated by war, violence, and being macho but in a typically bookish Jewish way."

Stone won a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart with an Oak Leaf Cluster in Vietnam.

So,not exactly like Mailer.

Anonymous said...

"He grew up a Goldwater all-American conservative, went to Vietnam, got disillusioned and got caught up in 60s upheaval, and he's one messed up guy."

Funny stuff.

He strikes me as a convert who's more fanatical than the once born types. Classic divided self.

Interesting analysis Steve. What makes you think people don't like Stone now btw? (Aside from the Jew's control the media remark.)

Natural Born Killers might explain it. Worst movie ever made.

Anonymous said...

BTW, if you haven't already, check out Ron Rosenbaum's piece on Stone in his book Secret Part of Fortune. I think Stone literally got into a pissing contest with Ron.

adadfadfsdfasf said...

One should take into account the role of drugs in Stone's movies and worldview. People say stuff like LSD and other hallucinogens makes people see and think in terms of patterns. They suddenly notice certain existing structures they hadn't before or project thought-patterns on reality. Though BEAUTIFUL MIND has almost nothing to do with the real-life story, it is instructive on how someone who sees MORE reality than than others can begin to imagine or prject fantasy on reality.
I think Stone grew up with a view of the world that was rather clear-cut and gung-ho... but then he dropped some acid and a profoundly new world opened up(just when conspiracy theories and radicalism were abound in the zeitgeist). It's as though a young Pat Buchanan did LSD and began to question everything he'd been told.

Stone sees hidden patterns in everything, and it's as though his films are sensationalized versions of this ongoing flashback. I think Stone still savors that moment in his youth when the TRUTH was finally revealed to him. Stone feels that true reality is never as it seems or the official story of the powers-that-be but something that can only be accessed as primitive sorcerer-warrior gains through a Vision Quest. (One problem for Stone today is that members of his generation are the powers-that-be and he himself is a powerhouse filmmaker. So, who are they rebelling against? Since WASP powers-that-be and greatest generation are all but gone, Stone had no choice but to turn on Jewish power.. or look to Latin America for rebel leaders or hark back to earlier times when Wasps still ruled America, which is what his upcoming documentary is about.)

asdfasasfasfd said...

Generally, LSD-dropping hippies tended to be passive and pacifistic, but Stone grew up admiring men of action, so he couldn't totally lose himself among the deadhead crowd. He felt closer to Jim Morrison, who wasn't into the mellow Jerry Garcia stuff but was a wild man, a modern shaman warrior or some such. Some mystics seek wisdom by sitting still and meditating, like the Buddha. Some find mystical or magical truth in some other way, like going on a hunt(killing a lion among Masai or Jason looking for the golden fleece). I think Alexander the Great is appealing to Stone because he was supposed to have been the complete man--warrior, poet, mystic, proud Mace-Greek, world leader, lady's man, man's man, tyrant, rebel, peace-maker, murderer, martyr, etc. Many of his movies deal with drugs. Midnight Express, Scarface, Salvador, Born on 4th(alcohol and pot), etc. It's as though drugs can be abused for money(drug gangs) and mindless escapism(opiate of the masses) or it can be used to gain wisdom, truth, and secrets. I always thought NIXON was a movie envisioned under LSD trance, as if Stone channeled the spirit of Nixon. It is less the story of political Nixon than psychologial subconscious Nixon. It's as if Stone slipped Nixon some acid, and Nixon was re-experiencing his entire life as one long flashback.

asdfasdfasdf said...

If we use drugs as a metaphor for society, it can be medicine or it can be poison. I think Natural Born Killers was about popular culture as a bad addiction, and Stone partly incriminates himself, which makes it both interesting and disastrous as satire. There is an American Indian who tells Woody Harrelson, 'too much TV'. And Indians should know about double-edged nature of drugs since they used peyote and mushrooms to gain wisdom but then lost their souls to the bad medicine of alcohol. (I suppose they got their revenge by giving tobacco to the white man.)
According to this view, drugs can elevate or degrade, help us search for higher truth(good) or make us escape from reality(bad).

Stone probably identifies with both Jim Morrison in Doors and James Wood in Salvador. Morrison was really a poet and seeker in the Nietzschean mold but he couldn't resist all the women, drugs(for mindless partying), and lunacy. Wood character goes to El Salvador for both fun, escapism, easy women, cheap drugs, & thrills, AND justice, truth, courage, & right-thing-to-do. Stone sees himself as both shaman and showman. The spiritualist-moralist in him disdains the excesses of modern America but the wild-party-animal-dude in him wants to get wasted.

There's something kinda sad about NIXON as a 90s movie. 60s generation ragged on Nixon's generation for all the problems in the world, but when they took power in the 90s with the rise of Clinton, they were just as deceitful, corrupt, venal, and cutthroat. (In some ways, the Boomers were worse as they claimed to be morally superior than everyone else--all who preceded and all who followed.)
As Kissinger says in the movie, 'power is the ultimate aphrodisiac'. Whoever you are or whereever you came from, power is an addictive drug and ruiner of souls. But we all want it.

Perfect name too. Oliver STONE.

alonzo portfolio said...

"Natural Born Killers ... worst movie ever made."

Worse than The Fisher King?

Anonymous said...

The International Jew said...


Not so off-topic:


Lee Smith is a bug-eyed lunatic. He seems anxious to live down to every negative Jewish stereotype.

Anonymous said...

As I have written before- Natural Born Killers, Coming to America and Waitress are the worst movies ever made.

Dan in Dc

adasasfasfd said...

OT: A good piece on the World Cup from the NY Review of Books.

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2010/aug/19/shame-world-cup/

"In the last seconds of the quarterfinal between Uruguay and Ghana, Luis Suarez, standing on the goal line, stretched an arm out and palmed away a ball that would otherwise have settled the game in Ghana’s favor and made it the first African country to qualify for a World Cup semifinal, a fitting achievement with the competition being held for the first time in an African country. However, Asamoah Gyan struck the ensuing penalty kick against the bar and Ghana went on to lose the penalty shoot-out. Speaking to the press, Suarez declared that his was “the hand of God,” associating himself with Maradona’s famous hand-ball goal that sank another indifferent England team in the quarterfinals in Mexico in 1986.1 On that occasion the diminutive Maradona had punched the ball into the net above the goalkeeper’s head. Once again referee and linesman blinked. Uncontrolled by technology and unpenalized afterward, such “gamesmanship” gives the referee a chance to see or not to see, as is convenient. If technology is ever introduced, one suspects that the eyesight of match officials will improve dramatically and as a result the players will cheat less."

Hereward said...

"hark back to earlier times when Wasps still ruled America, which is what his upcoming documentary is about.)"

What Stone said about Jews is much milder than what he said about Anglo-Saxons (both American and British) in an interview a few years back. As I recall (I can no longer find the interview online), he said Anglo-Saxons are characterized mostly by a will to power - "Buddhist nightmare" was his phrase. He went on to say that whatever humanity the U.S. possessed was due to African Americans, and that the political, social, and demographic marginalization of the WASP(he mentioned immigration) was a good in itself. Damn, I wish I could find that interview. It may have been in Rolling Stone.
I don't recall any raised eyebrows about this opinions, much less any protests. I guess the sentiments were such New Left commonplaces that nobody in the media saw anything unusual or wrong in them.

Charlotte said...

Why is it everytime the mystery of the JFK assassination comes up, someone is sure to kneejerk "conspiracy hooey" like some Pavlovian dog salivation response. Come on -- NOBODY with brains believes the Official Story.

Or do you mean the government that took over after JFK told us all the truth? My bad. Of course the government always tells us the truth. They must. Otherwise they might not be on our side and I don't know what could give me that impression.
That "conspiratorial hooey" was the warp and woof of the Stone movie and it opened more files to researchers. The goofiest "conspiracy" about the JFK assassination was the one they told us on the television about 5:00 p.m., Friday, November 22, 1963, when they had the whole crime wrapped up and a communist defector back in the fold, taking rap. Come on. Even at 10 years old I knew something was funny and my 14 year old brother (future Physics Major) said there was a lot more to it than that.
Grow up. Governments and media lie. Their stories are much weirder, less believable and goofier than any conspiracy "theory." They are all "theories."

adsfasdasdfsf said...

If you watch "Platoon" you'll see classic Jewish attitudes at work. The good guys: The blacks, the druggies, the liberal Sarge who sounds like he's from Boston, and a couple of "hip" whites, The bad guys: The rednecks, the hardass Sarge from the South, guy from Indiana, the cowardly "lifer", the clueless Goy Lt.

This actually applies more to TIGER BAY by Joel Schumacher, which is well-made but comes with the whole baggage of liberal cliches.

Platoon has some cool scenes with blacks but also shows blacks burning villages, brutalizing civilians and raping women. And one black guy is especially repugnant. And another black guy goes for self-inflicted wound. There was even an article by a prominent black journalist that Platoon defamed black service in Vietnam.

The biggest problem in the movie is the Manichean presence of the two sergeants which undermines the realist tone of the film. It's comicbook metaphysics with Charlie Sheen's soul being torn between two spiritual forces. It's like Defoe and Berenger are the angel and devil within the heart of every person(especially in saturday morning cartoons). Sometimes they register as realistic characters, sometimes as arch symbols. They have political, social, moral, and psychological resonance, which is to say they are TOO MUCH.
But it's instructive that Berenger is seen with a bottle of whiskey whereas Dafoe introduces Sheen to marijuana(through a gun barrel which is like Indian peyote pipe).
Berenger uses a conventional drug to drown his pain; Dafoe uses the 'spiritual drug' to be in tune with his inner soul.

Berenger, as tough as he is, has surrendered himself to the savagery of war. Dafoe, because he can fight the fight but still maintain a detached philosophical view of the conflict, history, and life is seen as the superior man. He's not only a tough guy but a thinking guy. But did he have to die like Christ? It was a bit like Passion of Vietnam.

I recall there was a good review of this film in Hudson Review by Bert Cardullo, who made the valid point that as ruthless as Berenger seems to be, his attitude toward the war is morally and strategically is more consistent and rational than Dafoe's.

On the other hand, contradictions were bound to abound in a conflict where Americans were supposed to be SAVING Vietnamese from tyranny but were blowing a whole lot of stuff up. Not by accident did so many people in the 60s compare the war with cowboys and Indians, a point made especially poignant and satirically in LITTLE BIG MAN. But we can sense some of it in GERONIMO--by Milius and Walter Hill--where the leading white character is both a fighter against Indians and a peacemaker who respects Geronimo and feels sympathy toward the Indians. America was founded on idealism and imperialism, and this strain of doing good and kicking butt continued with WWII, Vietnam, and Iraq. Radical Jews may have exploited it but they didn't invent it.

asdfasdfasf said...

What Stone said about Jews is much milder than what he said about Anglo-Saxons (both American and British) in an interview a few years back. As I recall (I can no longer find the interview online), he said Anglo-Saxons are characterized mostly by a will to power - "Buddhist nightmare" was his phrase. He went on to say that whatever humanity the U.S. possessed was due to African Americans, and that the political, social, and demographic marginalization of the WASP(he mentioned immigration) was a good in itself. Damn, I wish I could find that interview. It may have been in Rolling Stone.

Sounds like terrible stuff but it seems like Robert Redford--and who can be more waspy than he?--feels even more strongly in this vein.
There seems to be a puritanical moral strain in wasp liberalism that is more didactic, simplistic, and one-dimensional than other kinds of leftism. Same goes for John Sayles, Mr. Boredom himself--except for the terrific BABY IT'S YOU.

I'll take Stone over Sayles and Redford. At least Stone has a crazy and wild side that has the guts to show the bad things about the leftists and blacks too. With Redford and Sayles--or dullard Beatty--we get nothing but b/w moral and social lessons.

Incidentally, John Milius also sympathizes with certain aspects of black culture. In an interview in a magazine devoted to screenplays, he said he preferred Hollywood black directors because they had the guts to tackle social issues--even if not honestly--that white guys were either afraid to touch or handled in the most PC way. I suppose he means DO THE RIGHT THING is more interesting than LEGEND OF BAGGER VANCE.

When Stone says stuff in the above interview, I wonder if he includes himself within the wasp community. Not only is he only half-Jewish but his Jewish father was very much the kind of Jew who went out of his way to wasp-ize himself as much as possible. So, Stone kinda grew up in a wasp or waspized milieu.

David Davenport said...

... I think Alexander the Great is appealing to Stone because he was supposed to have been the complete man--warrior, poet, mystic, proud Mace-Greek, world leader, lady's man, man's man, tyrant, rebel, peace-maker, murderer, martyr, etc.

Alexander also bisexual, a topic treated favorably and with great interest in several Oliver Stein movies.

( Stein ... Stone pere was a convert to Christianity, one suspects, similar to former presidential aspirant Kommodore Kerry's pater .. or was it Kerry's grandad? I forget which.)

Truth said...

"Incidentally, John Milius also sympathizes with certain aspects of black culture."

So do you, you're the one who's always talking about how great black athletes are.

Mr. Anon said...

"Charlotte said...

Why is it everytime the mystery of the JFK assassination comes up, someone is sure to kneejerk "conspiracy hooey" like some Pavlovian dog salivation response. Come on -- NOBODY with brains believes the Official Story."

No, I don't believe that we know everything about the events surrounding the assasination of JFK - I think there is (somewhat) more to what really happened than the official story. However, I also don't believe Oliver Stone. Why? Because he just made s**t up - and he did so because he thinks that sinister conspiracies are cooler than prosaic reality.

adfadfasdfasf said...

"However, I also don't believe Oliver Stone. Why? Because he just made s**t up - and he did so because he thinks that sinister conspiracies are cooler than prosaic reality."

I think JFK is a horrible movie. Because Stone is naturally over-the-top, sensationalistic, and excessive, he's at his worst when he tries to be even more over-the-top, sensationalistic, and excessive. It's like someone already high on coke taking uppers. JFK would have been far more effective done in the mode of NIXON(or ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN), presenting a labyrinthine world of webs stretching infinitely and interconnecting and controlling just about everything. Alas, what we got was the style of CURRENT AFFAIR or HARD COPY tabloid news shows.

People involved in a conspiracy should act as though they are involved in a conspiracy, not as if they want the whole world to know. Another problem with the movie is the Capra-esque innocence layered atop the most extreme paranoid cynicism. It's like MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON crossed with the BOURNE TRILOGY. It just feels wrong.
Stone gives us a world where everyone and everything is corrupt, dark, and disturbing, BUT we are to put ALL OUR TRUST in this one man, Jim Garrison, who's a top-notch wonderful guy, a man of the purest courage and ideals, Elliot Ness incarnate from the Untouchables. Movie after movie, Stone's 'good guys' are pretty dull, like Kirk Douglas in SPARTACUS, a film where the villain Olivier, weasel Ustinov, and politico Laughton steal the show.
JFK would have been far more interesting if instead of presenting Kennedy and Garrison as shining ideals, they were portrayed as deeply flawed characters who still possessed qualities and a character that rose above the fray. But the angel vs devil dichotomy makes everything just so simple and stupid. And what did it all boil down to? Kennedy was killed by some curly haird gay guy?

NIXON is the much greater work for it's all about the darkness of power, the angel within the devil and the devil within the angel. And its somber and relatively austere style had a calming effect on Stone's penchant for mindless stylistic fireworks.

I don't have problem with JFK being 'full of shit', as Stone himself said the movie is not about the truth but is meant to serve as a'counter-myth' against the Warren Report.It is supposed to be paranoid, speculative, and even irresponsible. Stone never said everything in the movie is necessarily factual or the absolute truth. They were meant to trigger debate and rouse emotions, much like D.W. Griffith's BIRTH OF A NATION.

Also, JFK is how some of the facts, accounts, and theories all turned into vast interconnected puzzle and pattern in Stone's mind under the influence of hallucinogens. JFK is as much as about LSD as about the assassination of Mr. Camelot himself.
I recall the American Specator once wrote a hit piece on Stone, comparing him with Riefenstahl, but JFK is stylistically closer to the radical works of Soviet filmmakers like Eisenstein, whose OCTOBER also turned history into a myth. Of course, many dumb people saw JFK as the truth and nothing but the truth.

asfasfasdfa said...

"Incidentally, John Milius also sympathizes with certain aspects of black culture."

"So do you, you're the one who's always talking about how great black athletes are."

It's not sympathy but fear.

Truth said...

Kobe Bryant is going to take your lunch money?

Anonymous said...

Maybe Steve could write a column about why the JFK assassination brings out the kooks, cranks, and long-winded weirdos.

Guess what, Oswald was a Commie and he hated JFK for what he did to Castro. Stone and a lot of boomers don't want to hear that. So we get got 40 years of BS about a 2nd gunman. Guess when the Boomers die out, this will too.

Anonymous said...

Kobe Bryant is going to take your lunch money?

LMFAO!!!

Right on Truth! (Somebody needed to point this out to "Andrei");}

Anonymous said...

Oh and Dinner for Shmucks could join the pantheon of worst movies ever.


Dan inDc

adsfasdfasdf said...

"Kobe Bryant is going to take your lunch money?"

Before my family joined the white flight, I saw too many non-blacks--whites, asians, hispanics, etc--pushed around, insulted, robbed, and beaten by stronger blacks. And I heard similar stories from honest friends and acquaintances all over the country. And I've come upon or observed many instances of black violence and aggression where the non-black victims were paralyzed into inaction or fear. This happened on buses, movie theaters, college towns, weekend night outs in the city, you name it.

I don't much care about black performing well in sports. Let them make their millions. But, I do care about black violence in the streets and public places(largely due to black arrogance that they do whatever cuz they are tougher and no one's gonna do anything about it), and I don't like the impact this bio-social reality has on white male psychology which either spins into Ken-Burns-like Negro-worshiping liberalism or resentful caste-football-clinging white supremacism(to suppress feelings of inferioritism) of the far right.

I don't know how authentic the following video is but it is typical of so many racial incidents I observed and experienced:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2d9UdVpf0UM&feature=related

Truth said...

We don't see things the way they are
We see them the way we are.
-Ayn Rand

Anonymous said...

adsfasdfasdf said...

Stop being so mendacious and stop posting under like 10 different handles, "Andrei".

We all know your trademark, anti-White male schtick by now disguised to topically sound "pro-White".

Whatever problems you may have had with Black males, either socially or personally, please stop projecting them on Whites as a whole.

adfasdfsdf said...

We don't see things the way they are
We see them the way we are.
-Ayn Rand


Yes, and as we see it, we don't like being pushed around by louts.

Truth said...

"Whatever problems you may have had with Black males, either socially or personally,"

adfasdfsdf:
Now I ain't no genius, but I believe this young man's italicization of the word, "personally" was intended as a thinly-veiled prejorative insinuation on your manhood, Son; And by all accounts, he appears to be of the caucasoid persuasion.

asdfasdfasf said...

Stop being so mendacious and stop posting under like 10 different handles, "Andrei".

We all know your trademark, anti-White male schtick by now disguised to topically sound "pro-White".

Whatever problems you may have had with Black males, either socially or personally, please stop projecting them on Whites as a whole.


Did you enjoy "Andrei's" comment on the review of HUMAN CONDITON(at the Chicago Reader site which had long been pulled down for some reason)at least?

Victor/Victoria, Andrei/Andrea.

But really, my name is asdfasfa and my last name is darrenwhenwillyoustopstalkingmeyouccreepyhimmlerlovingfreak?

Anonymous said...

On a related note, the funniest Onion vid in a while:

http://www.theonion.com/video/overcome-stress-by-visualizing-it-as-a-greedy-hook,17828/