Here's a profile of Peter Berg, a not hugely distinguished but often competent director (e.g., Hancock and Friday Night Lights -- he's FNL author Buzz Bissinger's cousin) and actor (he was Linda Fiorentino's mark in The Last Seduction). He's currently directing Mark Wahlberg in Lone Survivor, a true story about SEALs fighting Taliban in Afghanistan.
Berg is fairly representative of contemporary filmmakers in a variety of ways: e.g., he comes from an upscale mixed Christian-Jewish background. And, like so many directors, he's a macho guy who loves the U.S. military, boxing, and football.
Berg had been trying to make “Lone Survivor” for five years. “I’m a patriot,” he said. “I admire our military, their character, code of honor, belief systems. I lived with the SEALs, their families, went to their funerals. I went to Iraq. Did you ever see anyone killed? I did.” Berg is infatuated with heroes, military, sports and, sometimes, because of his teenage years, misfits.
It's partly the personality demands of directing -- a film crew consists of a large number of people who need ordering about, many of them beefy guys who lift machinery for a living. And it's partly the subject matter of current movies -- blowing stuff up. So, you end up with authoritarian personalities as directors.
But, it ought to be rather obvious that one consequence of this is that the creative people in movies and the nice liberal dweebs who explain what their movies are about to us aren't always in sync. The NLDs seldom notice, however.
On another note, here's an interesting description of the real SEALs who are technical advisers on Berg's film, which pretty much matches what Zero Dark Thirty showed:
The SEALs stood off by themselves, eating standing up, in silence. They were ordinary-looking men in baseball caps, T-shirts, jeans. Many of them were big, well over 6-foot-2, 230 pounds. Wahlberg was 5-foot-8, maybe 155 pounds. Yet he looked more like a SEAL than they did, at least a film version of a SEAL.
Berg said that what defines SEALs is their “extraordinary competitiveness. It’s not that they’re stronger or more violent, it’s that if you ask them to throw rocks at a hill, they’ll do it until they drop. It’s about will.” I asked how they were adjusting to helping make a movie. “They’d prefer to be anonymous,” he said. “They don’t covet attention. They even resist a project that glorifies them.”
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| Okay, terrorists, try to figure out which SEAL is which |
That's exactly how Zero Dark Thirty portrayed SEALs: as a bunch of major league first basemen-sized guys who are hard to tell apart. As SEALs, Kathryn Bigelow cast Chris Pratt, the first baseman in Moneyball, plus a whole bunch of guys who look like Chris Pratt. I thought this haziness of identity was to confuse and depress Al Qaeda terrorists looking for clues about whom to take retribution upon, but maybe that's just what SEALs are like.
It's interesting that commandos tend to be such big men these days. Other military specialties often aren't. For example, Marine drill instructors are not generally tall, imposing figures like Lou Gossett Jr. in An Officer and a Gentleman. Instead, they tend to be wiry bantamweights whose knees can stand up over the years to all the running that boot camp recruits and their DIs must do.
But, SEALs tend to be tall and wide, probably due to all the gear they must carry.
The Pentagon is currently working on whetherthey can have the first female SEALs by Obama's last year in office. If SEALs tended to be Mark Wahlberg-sized, this would still be a bad idea, but since the ideal SEAL is built more like Liam Neeson, this women SEALs plan is that much more derisible.
The Pentagon is currently working on whetherthey can have the first female SEALs by Obama's last year in office. If SEALs tended to be Mark Wahlberg-sized, this would still be a bad idea, but since the ideal SEAL is built more like Liam Neeson, this women SEALs plan is that much more derisible.
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61 comments:
But, SEALs tend to be tall and wide, probably due to all the gear they must carry.
That's incorrect. It may be that tall and wide guys are get out more, but the vast majority of SOF personnel, not just SEALS, are under 6 feet tall, around 5'10" or shorter and between 165-175 lbs. Bigger bodies usually don't have the endurance and have much higher caloric needs to pass through selection.
One of the guys at my childhood XC ski club is a former SEAL, and he's medium tall - around 6'1" or 6'2" - and thin. He used to bring other SEALS up for ski training, and I don't remember them being particularly large or beefy. They were more like triathlete types, which makes sense given their training requirements. Nice guys, generally, but I could ski circles around them -- it was fun to show up special forces guys as a kid. We all had a laugh over it.
As for SEAL women, the athlete comparison is a good one. As far as I know, there's nothing preventing women from playing major league baseball or football. If a woman could hold her own as a first baseperson (heh), she'd get the job, but this has never happened. What makes these politicians think that the best of the best warriors are somehow exempt from the same laws of nature that apply to pro athletes? Totally stupid. There is not a woman alive who could hold her own as a Navy SEAL under current standards.
All this is really just a ploy to break down and subordinate the traditional US military, which is hostile to the Obama administration. It's akin to Stalin's purges of the 1930s. I'm amazed that our elites are going along with all this. You'd think they'd be smart enough to realize that their dominance in global capitalism is largely based on American military might.
"Wahlberg was 5-foot-8, maybe 155 pounds."
He looks significantly more muscular than that.
"Kathryn Bigelow cast Chris Pratt, the first baseman in Moneyball..."
Wow, I just saw him do a pretty funny/outrageous comedy turn in 'The Five-Year Enagagement' and I only remember a very mild-mannered, hesitant character from 'Moneyball' so I guess he's got some range.
I too question your statement that SEALS are 'big beefy types.' I've been in the military for 25 years (though not around SEALS-I accept the limited accuracy of my view, below).
The common 'types' are the two you have described: thin, wiry, tough guys (usually shorter, but not always), and the big, beefy weighlifter guys. (note that this doesn't imply that everybody is like this: the third category, which may very well be a third of all military folks, would include everybody else: slightly-but not grossly-overweight, thin suburban looking guys, physically unimpressive but hardworking guys, etc-really, a collection of various 'everyman's).
In my experience, (few special forces now and then, few marines, and so on), the thinner tougher guys are more predominant than beefy guys. The big beefy guys are more scattered about (in combat arms as well as all specialties-whether logistics or intelligence and so on). They are big and beefy because they lift weights for fitness-not because their job demands beefiness.
Anecdote from a former marine friend who worked with SF a bit: he described them as the kind of guy that simply went forward with a task and had unquestioning confidence that they could (or would figure out how to) get it done. His story was, if you told an SF guy to jump of a cliff, he'd do it, and feel confident that he'd figure out the solution to the problem on the way down (the point being that they're not unthinking, but that they are not constrained by either fear or lack of information the way most of us would be).
Kind of similar to that director's 'willpower' argument.
anon
Berg is fairly representative of contemporary filmmakers in a variety of ways: e.g., he comes from an upscale mixed Christian-Jewish background. And, like so many directors, he's a macho guy who loves the U.S. military, boxing, and football.
Berg had been trying to make “Lone Survivor” for five years. “I’m a patriot,” he said. “I admire our military, their character, code of honor, belief systems.”
Here we see (I guess) the intersection between Israel Firstism and Hollywood hedonism. And what are those US military "belief systems" anyway? Radical feminism? Gay rights? Anti-racism? The worldwide supremacy of consumer capitalism?
Most of the SOTF guys I've seen out in theater aren't especially beefy. There are some beefy ones, but more are wiry. And sure, some are in the 6' range but there are plenty of non 6' guys. The one thing that I've noticed that differentiates them from regular forces is that most of the ones I've met are quite sharp when compared to personnel from the regular forces. That's about the only thing that I'd say that could describe them as a group. The personalities differ as much as any other large group of people might differ.
Re Bill's question:
"What makes these politicians think that the best of the best warriors are somehow exempt from the same laws of nature that apply to pro athletes?"
The progressive/liberal mind is largely indifferent to the effects these policies (recruiting women to the elite military will wind up, inevitably, as a kind of affirmative action,with lower performance standards for the preferred group) will have on the organization, whether it is fire departments or SEALS. They simply do not care.
I would not have believed this before taking on my present job (for 8 years I have worked in a government civil rights department with progressive leadership and staff, as you might expect), but to a progressive, the degradation in the performance of the organization, if they even acknowledge it, is inconsequential compared to the Social Justice of it all.
Many are foolish and naive people, in my opinion.
I question just how big SEALs are.
Orr Kelly's book "BRave Me, Dark Waters" and former SEAL Denny Chalker's book "One Perfect OP" both say the average height for a SEAL is 5 ft. 9 in, and the average weight is 180 pounds.
Vietnam era SEAL Dick Couch has written several non-fiction books about the SEALs. When he was on Brian Lamb's show a few years ago, Lamb pointed out he wasn't a very large man and asked if that was typical for a SEAL. Couch said he was pretty much average size for a SEAL of his era. He said in terms of height (he's 5 ft. 7 in.) he'd be pretty typical even today. But today's SEAL's are more muscular than the ones' of his era.
Chalker said BUD/s, the SEAL school, tends to select for average size men. Smaller men can't handle the inflatable boats. Larger men have their knees and hips torn up running on the sand. Cellulitis and hip injuries are the most common reasons why men are medically dropped from BUD/S.
One thing that several sources, including Kelly and Chalker have claimed, is that extremely ripped, very low body fat guys rarely make it through BUD/s. They don't have enough body fat to provide energy for the hours of exercising they do each day, and when they get in the chilly waters off Coronado, they lack of insulation sends their body temperatures plunging.
Yes. Like Woody Allen, Tim Burton. David Lynch, David Fincher and Joss Whedon. Hollywood is dominated by Alphas that are obsessed with the military, that's just axiomatic, Steve. I would mention Gilliam, but ironically he managed to get himself blackballed because of politics...studio politics.
There are certainly exceptions -- more-restrained Michael Bays (well, Michael Bay's military fetishism, minus the trailer trash anti-culture), as a new subset -- but there are for more directors that retain the worldview of people like Godard and Felliini, (post)Structurlists that largely were influential and influenced by the movements that lead back to Dada -- at its base, anti-war and anti-bourgeoisie.
The irony of Hollywood as Film Capital is in how many important movements have originated in Europe rather than LA. But these movements do not tend toward idealistic support of the nation-state.
Then, of course, there are the leftists like Cameron, who fetishizes tech -- and largely does it through a militaristic worldview -- while throwing in liberal platitudes-as-narrative. This is, as I mentioned in the Elysium thread (or tried to), at the heart of Hollywood: the little people, the Bourgeois upper-middle class, are the true enemies, seen as the cultural oppressors of the Third World.
I hope this one isn't too offensive, Steve. Rather curious that my last comment couldn't make it through comment control (whim, indeed): was the offense mentioning the Holodomor, Constructivism (Soviet "art", and its connections to the film output of today) or the underlying worldview of people like Damon and, possibly (likely?) Blomkamp within the Hollywood system? Maybe it was a trifecta.
I suppose we wouldn't want to offend all the Important Poeple that *secretly read your blog* with such Crazy Talk in the comments section.
"But, SEALs tend to be tall and wide, probably due to all the gear they must carry."
That's the silliest, most uninformed thing I've ever seen you write (you don't do it often). SEALs and other special forces operators don't tend to be particularly big. It's all about endurance, which tall and wide people tend to lack. As Bill above wrote, they tend to resemble triathlete types.
"Berg said that what defines SEALs is their “extraordinary competitiveness. It’s not that they’re stronger or more violent, it’s that if you ask them to throw rocks at a hill, they’ll do it until they drop. It’s about will.”"
Which is pretty much what determines out of the pool of bright scholars in a decent medical or graduate program, who will wind up with the paper at the end. This is probably true for many fields.
""Wahlberg was 5-foot-8, maybe 155 pounds."
He looks significantly more muscular than that. "
- Yeah, for the same reason everyone assumes Tom Cruise is bigger than he is- they fill in all the extras around him with shorter guys.
"Berg said that what defines SEALs is their “extraordinary competitiveness. It’s not that they’re stronger or more violent, it’s that if you ask them to throw rocks at a hill, they’ll do it until they drop. It’s about will.”
It is 99% about will but the key thing is they're not extremely competitive with other people (as illustrated by some of the other points made in the article) - they're extremely competitive with *themselves*.
"That's incorrect. It may be that tall and wide guys are get out more, but the vast majority of SOF personnel, not just SEALS, are under 6 feet tall, around 5'10" or shorter and between 165-175 lbs."
I'd agree with that normally. I've known some UK and Anzac equivalents and they were mostly just on the beefy side of a beefy / wiry dividing line but
http://www.standlikearock.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/navyseals.jpg
Maybe nothing but if there is a difference with SEALs it may be something to do with the Naval/diving background with mass less of a handicap underwater?
Just a wild guess though.
Hey, you wrote derisible when I'm sure you meant desirable, right?
A word to the wise: that's the sort of typo that you get you in real trouble!
"So, you end up with authoritarian personalities as directors."
Leftism and authoritarianism are partners. Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Tito, Honecker, Ho Chi Minh, Mao, Castro, Che, etc were all very authoritarian and very leftist.
And they demanded their people to be tough, hard, ruthless, aggressive, disciplined, committed, and well-organized. So, North Vietnam defeated South Vietnam.
Leftism is about government power, statism, and the collective agenda. The military is a government organization. Military is both hierarchical and egalitarian. Soldiers must salute superiors and follow orders, but it doesn't matter where you came from. In the barracks, you're equal with everyone of your rank. And even the high commanders must take orders from the state for the common good. It's no wonder that communism attracted so many military-authoritarian types who were braver and tougher than the mercenary types attracted by rightwing third world nations.
Also, SEAL guys may be competitive but ultimately for what purpose? For the sake of individual glory or for teamwork to serve the common good as dictated by the state? They compete to be the best comrade, not to be Donald Trump. (They're like Soviet and East German athletes in the Olympics.)
They may be tough and know how to use big guns, but they have no will or habit of thinking on their own. They're geared and trained to follow orders, and in that sense, they hardly different from military dogs. If Obama tells them to attack country A, they will do so without any free debate or individual conscience/decision.
The notion that militarism and authoritarianism are automatically rightwing is an illusion.
And those 'nice liberal dweebs', in their hamfisted insistence on interpreting everything according to PC dogma and ruthlessly attacking everyone who disagrees, aren't so nice, naive, dweeby. They are very tough and authoritarian, willing to use any amount of lies to push their point of view.
Check this O'Hehir punk on facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/andrew.ohehir?fref=ts
He writes, "Since we can't do anything about gun control, maybe it's time to admit that Gabby Giffords -- and, in a different context, the Black Panthers -- are right. 'Pick up the gun.' If you give the people the right to bear arms, sooner or later they might use them for something besides killing each other."
O'Hehir is saying that liberals should arm themselves against George Zimmermans of the world when he knows full well that white liberals, if they had to use a gun to defend themselves, would likely use it against the Trayvons of the world.
He wants a gun to defend himself from black thugs but justifies it by making believe that he needs it against potential Zimmermans(because short 'white hispanics' are stalking and attacking white liberals all over America). He is a liar, and he knows he's a liar. But he lies just like communist tyrants because he's an authoritarian asshole who will go to any lengths to justify and promote himself.
And the PC academia and media has been militant-ized to attack all enemies and purge all heretics. Look at Richwine and Sanchez. Stephanie Grace.
We wish Libs were 'dweeby'. They carry on with a facade of 'niceness' but they are brutal, unrelenting, and ruthless just like the SEAL in going after Osama. Just ask Paula Deen and Don Imus. If libs are so dweeby, why do so many cons shudder and wet their pants when Libs go on a crusade of destruction of their enemies? Homo cabal is as ruthless as the old commies, and homo/Jews have waged WWG against Russia.
If anything, it's the cons today who are accommodating, compromising, defensive, dweeby, eager to be nice. Cons are now even caving to homos. GOP politicians are total whores of the likes of Adelson, and military guys blindly obey Obama and AIPAC.
Berg is fairly representative of contemporary filmmakers in a variety of ways: e.g., he comes from an upscale mixed Christian-Jewish background. And, like so many directors, he's a macho guy who loves the U.S. military, boxing, and football.
Macho? My experience with these types (they're prominent in major cities, especially in the northeast) is that they're really into sports as spectators but not macho at all. Like his cousin, Buzz Bissinger.
"The one thing that I've noticed that differentiates them from regular forces is that most of the ones I've met are quite sharp when compared to personnel from the regular forces."
Yes, i keep hoping iSteve can somehow find out what their average IQ is or has been in the past from US army testing. I think most people would be surprised at how high the average is.
(They couldn't pass the physical without well below average genetic load so...)
Working muscle looks a lot different from cosmetic muscle. I grew up on a farm and knew other farmers. Hard physical work was a fact of life, but nobody had the body of a Hollywood star who has bulked up via juice and gym. I also know some guys who make a living moving furniture - that's very physically demanding work and they're tough, strong guys. Again, they don't look anything like the Entertainment Industries notion of what a "strong man" looks like. I can well believe that real life SEALs look rather ordinary by Hollywood standards.
Homo cabal is as ruthless as the old commies, and homo/Jews have waged WWG against Russia.
Ironically, the gay juggernaut may have met its Stalingrad in attacking Russia.
The Anonymous who's chiding Steve for not taking into account the David Lynches and Woody Allens of the filmmaking world is making two goofs. One is that the Lynches and Allens are exceptions. The people making most of the business' entertainments aren't personal-expression types. The second is that even the personal-expression filmmakers tend to be highly willful, disciplined Alphas.
Also: While it's certainly true that SOME people in the filmmaking world are/were/have been inspired by art and art-movie traditions, that's becoming less and less true with every passing year. More and more, young filmmakers have been inspired by the popcult of their youth: comic books, videogames, lad magazines, etc. I've run into some young filmmakers (and filmmaker wannabes) who've never heard of Godard and Fellini.
And even the arty, personal-expression guyz and galz are pretty damned tough characters. Kubrick was obsessed with Napoleon; Robert Altman was the dominant male in any room he was in. In an interview with Viriginia Madsen I was reading the other day she was talking about how much she loved being directed by Alexander Payne in "Sideways." Hard to beat "Sideways" (and Payne) in the sensitive-personal-expression stakes. But Madsen's main reason for loving working with Payne? "He’s a real alpha male. Everybody wants to follow him." Check it out:
http://www.avclub.com/articles/virginia-madsen-on-smelling-christopher-walken-get,100460/
99% of the time, you don't succeed in show business, let alone as a director, by being a shy, sensitive person.
The one Navy SEAL I know is 5'11 180 lbs. I once saw him do 80 consecutive pull-ups.
Scroll about haflway down the page. Those Seals look pretty muscular.
http://planetsave.com/2013/06/10/oarfish-spotted-in-gulf-of-mexico-giant-sea-serpent-facts-habitat-videos-and-information/
"Yes. Like Woody Allen, Tim Burton. David Lynch, David Fincher and Joss Whedon. Hollywood is dominated by Alphas that are obsessed with the military, that's just axiomatic, Steve. I would mention Gilliam, but ironically he managed to get himself blackballed because of politics...studio politics."
Don't judge a book by its cover. Allen is very alpha. Sure, his shtick is rather like that of Charlie Chaplin. He's supposed to be hapless clueless shlemiel in many of his movies, but look at Allen the comedian. He was aggressive, fierce, and stood his own against anyone, and he did it without breaking a sweat.
Allen runs circles around Buckley here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNErWi_lTig
In his own way, he's as aggressive as Alan Dershowitz but to get the bigger laugh than to win court cases.
Alphas are not necessarily tall and manly looking like Pierce Brosnan in NOBLE HOUSE. They can be small and runty... like Ross Perot and Woody Allen. Because lots of Jews seem whiny, they are seen as beta, but Jews don't just whine but whine with fangs. Consider the Albert Brooks character in BROADCAST NEWS. He may be self-pitying but he is also a lot fiercer than the William Hurt character who just coast by as a smooth operator.
Zuckerberg doesn't look like an alpha but he's a far more ruthless operator than the Winklevoss twins who do look like alphas. Mentalphas use brains and in the end beat the physicalphas. It's like Michael Corleone was less of a physical alpha than Sonny, but Michael was a lot more dangerous cuz he had the power of the mind.
Given the rise of the 'auteur' cult of filmmaking, the role of director came to be more defined by 'creative' types. Creative types tend to be eccentric, neurotic, and even reclusive. So, many such types might do well with writing or painting, but they do not make good film directors since a film director has to command so many people and things. But there are creative types who are both weird/eccentric and tough/strongwilled, and they do make interesting film directors.
Before the rise of auteur cult of the director in the late 60s and early 70s in America, Hollywood's classic idea of the director was someone who could kick butt and get things done. Hollywood wasn't looking for 'creative' or 'personally expressive' types but tough hombres who could give orders and do the heavy lifting, which is why so many of the early directors were real men like Demille, Griffith, Walsh, Ford, Hawks, Huston, and other tough hombres. They were men, not fanboys.
But with the rise of film school nerdism and auteur theory, Hollywood began to seek out the 'creative' types. The problem is many 'creative types' don't have the guts/balls to be directors who must be commanders on the set, even for small productions. But there are some creative types who are both nerdy/brainy and ballsy, and Coppola was much admired for this unlikely combination when he made THE GODFATHER and APOCALYPSE NOW. He was a film nerd, personal artist, and dictator-commander, the full package, and in a way, he set the template for others, including Scorsese and Oliver Stone.
Don't judge a book by its cover. Many people saw Ebert and Siskel as too funny looking, comical, endearing, friendly, and cuddly movie nerds on TV, but it was an act.
Both were very competitive, irascible, and egotistical.
Ebert and Siskel unplugged and uncensored:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkwVz_jK3gA
People who knew Siskel said he always had to more about everything than everyone else.
Same's been said of Walter Jacobson. Very competitive and ego-driven people.
And if most people love sports as a spectator, many Jews watch that stuff like a chess game for strategy.
Peter Berg directed last year's Battleship, which was actually quite entertaining. I've seen it about a dozen times in cable. A couple of interesting choices he made with it:
- he cast a real life Army officer and double amputee in a major role.
- he had gotten an MRI before making the movie and suggested his composer sample scary MRI sounds for the score, which worked well as the aliens' leitmotif.
Re SEALs, Berg ads a throw-away scene where an officer asks the protagonist if he's ready to get out to Coronado and train with the "big boys", while the camera focuses on the SEAL insignia on the officer's uniform.
Re military body types, I don't know about the Marine Corps, but being a drill sergeant in the Army used to be something select NCOs would do for a 3 year tour, with 2 week light duty breaks between training cycles. It's just exhausting. But I saw all kinds of body types in my basic training, from the 6'6", 300lb+ 1st Sergeant yanking recruits off the bus by their lapels with one hand, to 6'6" bantam weight guys. I don't think I ever saw the big 1st Sergeant run though. He might have ridden in the truck.
I never saw a SEAL in person, but I did meet some army rangers. They tended to be bigger guys - maybe 6' average with some muscle on them, but none were ripped like Wahlberg. They usually had a healthy layer of fat over their muscles.
An Anonymous wrote:
"Orr Kelly's book "BRave Me, Dark Waters" and former SEAL Denny Chalker's book "One Perfect OP" both say the average height for a SEAL is 5 ft. 9 in, and the average weight is 180 pounds. "
I haven't had any personal contact with any Navy Seals, but at a job I one had I saw some out the window for a couple of days.
Not sure what they were doing, but you would see them out there, three or four of them, wearing those reversible blue/gold shirts and shorts.
I was told they were Seals, so I've always believed they were.
Out the the three to five guys I saw over a couple of days, none were really tall. They weren't wiry or skinny either. They had bodies like boxers or wrestlers, not the lightweight ones, the 175 pound and up ones.
I'd say the ones I saw were anywhere from 5'5" to 5'10." Barrel chested, with incongruously skinny legs.
Casting Mark Wahlberg is pretty much a guarantee that the movie will be anti-SEAL, anti-War, and anti-American. Since that's Wahlberg's politics and there is not much difference between him and Damon.
Most Directors are indeed, hard-left and often connected through school and family ties to other cronies already in the business. Example: Jennifer Siebel Newsom. Aka Mrs. Gavin Newsome. Who has some Kickstarter project on gender and "equality for all" issues or something. An indie documentary. Sofia Coppola comes to mind, as does James Whitmore Jr. or Judd Apatow.
As for SEALs they are selected for aptitude in cold water for hours and hours on end, that's what they do mostly. As well as being highly integrated teams (they move six men as one) with much cross-training. SEALs sneak into places, mostly by water, and blow stuff up and then get out again, fast. They are not stand up and fight heavy infantry.
I would think the best way to describe SF guys is the sort that you see in the street that are about average looking, but there's something about their affect, be it carriage or that "steely glare", that tells you this guy isn't to be trifled with.
"If SEALs tended to be Mark Wahlberg-sized, this would still be a bad idea, but since the ideal SEAL is built more like Liam Neeson, this women SEALs plan is that much more derisible."
This should be a home run for Team Obama- he can increase employment and help the African American community by giving all those unattractive big black women who can't find a man or a job something prestigious to do with their time. And at the same time reduce the burden of the AA community on the US as they won't spend their days making babies with random gangbangers.
Well, I think we have to keep in mind that use of anabolic steroids has gone way up in the military in the past 20 years. SEALs are probably a lot beefier than they were back then.
Casting Mark Wahlberg is pretty much a guarantee that the movie will be anti-SEAL, anti-War, and anti-American. Since that's Wahlberg's politics and there is not much difference between him and Damon.
I didn't know Wahlberg had politics. He's like the dumber, less talented version of Damon.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Hardwicke
"She said the border area was wild: in high school, "her principal was stabbed three times. A friend’s father was shot in the back, and another friend was murdered."
That'll make you tough.
Not SEALs.
But according to this site, the average height of the men who have competed in the Army's Best Ranger contest is 5 ft. 10. The average weight is 165 pounds.
http://www.bestrangercompetition.com/about-best-ranger/facts/
http://www.catherinehardwicke.com/video/puppy-does-the-gumbo
Pretty good stuff.
Woody Allen's onscreen persona is a complete put-on. In real life, Allen is a confident, competitive motherfucker.
Also, "Casting Mark Wahlberg is pretty much a guarantee that the movie will be anti-SEAL, anti-War, and anti-American. Since that's Wahlberg's politics and there is not much difference between him and Damon."
That's stupid even for Whiskey. Wahlberg has no politics. He's a Boston Irish knucklehead with some native acting talent who beat a Vietnamese guy nearly to death in his youth for kicks.
Ironically, the gay juggernaut may have met its Stalingrad in attacking Russia."
Haha! Nice.
Are Hollywood directors really that authoritarian? I doubt it.
I would say they have a more diplomatic managerial style. After all you have to deal with actor/actress tantrums, unions, difficult creative types(writers,set designers), demanding producers and studio bosses and so on. One cant ride rough shod to get his vision through even the very influential top tier directors
There was a time when directors had more power from the studios to do as they pleased(it also helped that studio bosses held their actors private and public persona in check so Montgomery Clift would be a gay junkie in private but not public ala Lindsay Lohan) but those days slowly got eroded way in the 70s and 80s and finally ended when Michael Cimino botched Heavens Gate.
The movie studios in the old world still had the authoritarian attitude.
Ridley Scott was hated for his heavy handed approach on the sets of Blade Runner(1982) that he was accustomed to in UK.
The crew members took to wearing T shirts which captioned "Will Rogers never met Ridley Scott"!
So I would say a movie director is more like Eisenhower than Patton,despite unlike Eisenhower,directors are very much on the field
Jerry Bruckheimer related a funny story in the commentary of Black Hawk Down where they were shooting in Morroco.Apparently the military support(soldiers,pilots,engineers,black hawks,humvees,weapons) they had at their disposal for making the movie was more than that of the Morroccan military. This compelled the military loving Ridley to muse "we could fucking invade this country mate"!
Peter Berg is a Michael Mann protege.That explains much of his penchant for movies about armed forces.
Though Michael Mann is more a cop (Heat,Collaterel had police consultants as extras and actors went through extensive fire arms training) and urban warfare guy(the botched bank heist and shoot out in Heat)
I have met quite a few Navy Seals and many of them looked quite ordinary.
It is the Special Forces(particularly Ranger) who were always strongly built though not neccesarily tall.
My former boss,Lee Van Arsdale who was Deputy Head of Operations for in Mogadishu in 1993(the Black Hawk incident) was a highly decorated Special Forces officer and a Mensa member
Marines are also on average,more muscular than SEALs.SEALS I suppose prioritize other skills and abilities above muscular strength
You'd think they'd be smart enough to realize that their dominance in global capitalism is largely based on American military might.
Apple, McDonald's and Pfizer wouldn't be such a big deal without 11 aircraft carriers? That's actually the reverse of reality. The reason we put up with trade barriers imposed on our products by ostensible allies is to preserve the worthless alliances that give us friends who will be there for us when they need us.
There is at least one documentary about BUD/S on YouTube that will show you what the guys getting through training are like.
I would venture to guess that the ones who are, for example, getting mixed up with the movie industry are after or near retirement. So, maybe they are beefier because of having aged a bit and hit the weight room a lot during their careers.
Leftism is about government power, statism, and the collective agenda. The military is a government organization. Military is both hierarchical and egalitarian. Soldiers must salute superiors and follow orders, but it doesn't matter where you came from. In the barracks, you're equal with everyone of your rank. And even the high commanders must take orders from the state for the common good. It's no wonder that communism attracted so many military-authoritarian types who were braver and tougher than the mercenary types attracted by rightwing third world nations.
And yet most military types lean right.
"If SEALs tended to be Mark Wahlberg-sized, this would still be a bad idea, but since the ideal SEAL is built more like Liam Neeson, this women SEALs plan is that much more derisible."
This should be a home run for Team Obama- he can increase employment and help the African American community by giving all those unattractive big black women who can't find a man or a job something prestigious to do with their time. And at the same time reduce the burden of the AA community on the US as they won't spend their days making babies with random gangbangers."
- I'd add, it would be a great way to show to the entire world that the emperor (and his BS ideologies) have no clothes by using Seal Teams comprised of proud black women to carry out missions. The 80 IQs, Hair extensions in the wind, glitter fingernails, arrogance to everyone, inability to work together or follow orders, and unwillingness to submit to the slightest hardship for the mission would make for a far more successful team than one that could ever be carried out by the traditional Seal teams dominated by racist-by-birth, Christian Southern white men.
Here's the deal about SEALs and other such forces.
Basically, they are guys who aren't f**kups in some regard.
You meet all sorts of guys in the military. Maybe in great shape, but shooting scores are a little low. Or maybe in great shape, shoots well, but is a weak swimmer. Or maybe is in great shape, shoots well, is a good swimmer, but is a little scared of heights...
And so on. Some guys fit all the above, but get shin splints from too much running. Or they get a DUI or let their girlfriend stress them out and they screw up somehow then.
I wasn't a SEAL, but I dealt with SEALS a lot, my sub was equipped with SDV shelter and we ran all sorts of missions with these guys. We also did same w/other SF, I suppose I could give my anecdotal opinion on the relative merits of the forces, but it would just be anecdotal.
I was also an enlisted Marine, in the infantry, then in scout/sniper. Nobody gets bulked up from this training, actually maintaining that sort of bulk in grunts is pretty hard w/all the humping, harsh living. Some guys can do it, but you see it a lot more among the pogues.
This stuff doesn't quite make you triathlete skinning, there is a little more premium on upper-boddy strength, think swimmer's physique. That is really the ideal SF/Marine, war-fighter's build.
The guys that do the best in arduous training, on the average, are average height/weight guys, just as evolution intended.
"I would venture to guess that the ones who are, for example, getting mixed up with the movie industry are after or near retirement. So, maybe they are beefier because of having aged a bit and hit the weight room a lot during their careers."
That seems very plausible now you mention it.
"I also know some guys who make a living moving furniture - that's very physically demanding work and they're tough, strong guys. Again, they don't look anything like the Entertainment Industries notion of what a "strong man" looks like."
Yeah, i did that as a teen and worked with a guy in his 60s who had a body like Bruce Lee.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cain_Velasquez
Seal material?
"Don't judge a book by its cover. Many people saw Ebert and Siskel as too funny looking, comical, endearing, friendly, and cuddly movie nerds on TV, but it was an act.
Both were very competitive, irascible, and egotistical. "
___________________________________
They NEVER came across on their show together as "endearing, friendly, and cuddly." They came across as just who they were--guys who loved film and who were intent on beating up the analyses of the other and out-doing the other as the number one movie critic of Chicago.
Siskel never seemed the nerd to me either. He was an ordinary looking guy, maybe even a good-looking guy in his youth; Ebert, another matter.
Still, that they were film critics leaves me reticent to even talk about them in terms of alpha/beta. How about saying they were simply extremely competitive in their chosen fields.
Someone with competitive instincts, the drive to be on top in something, will find a job suited to him just as a kid with some noted athletic abilities will find an outlet for his competitive instincts through sports.
And yet most military types lean right.
Yet there is no longer anything resembling a "right" in the US-despite the Moldbuggian BS about the "red empire."
Siskel & Ebert? Walter Jacobson?
Watched Siskel tell Ebert he was Anti-
Semitic for disagreeing that "Showa"
was the Greatest Movie Ever Made.
Watched Lil' Walter Jacobson on the night of Reagan's election; he was a crumpled rag by the nights end.
Whipped dogs have happier expressions. And more cheerfulness.
Chi-Town good times. We got 'em.
I spent seven years in the presteroid military and several of the above commentators really, really know what they are talking about. To add my 2 cents, I have huge respect for special forces, but there are lots of other tough, often even tougher, people spread throughout the regular divisions, regiments and fleets ...
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/08/18
Jews used to love people like Ellsberg who embarrassed the wasp elites.
Now, they want US government to kill gentile whistle blowers like Assange.
I believe you mean "Shoah," the Claude Lanzmann movie. "Showa" is the English transliteration of Emperor Hirohito's reign name.
I read Lone Survivor and came away wondering how much of it was actually true.
Now, that I think about it, I wonder if that was before or after I read The Long Walk: The True Story of a Trek to Freedom, which was great until they spotted the Yeti.
"They NEVER came across on their show together as "endearing, friendly, and cuddly."
They did too. In the 'uncensored' video, they're funny but real a**holes. Egotistical, insulting, impatient, irreverent, irascible.
They are not like Bert and Ernie but hurt and hernia.
"Ironically, the gay juggernaut may have met its Stalingrad in attacking Russia."
Buggernaut.
Are Hollywood directors really that authoritarian? I doubt it.
"I would say they have a more diplomatic managerial style. After all you have to deal with actor/actress tantrums, unions, difficult creative types(writers,set designers), demanding producers and studio bosses and so on. One cant ride rough shod to get his vision through even the very influential top tier directors"
They have to be auteuritarian. Work with others while making sure everyone knows who's boss.
Was a Ranger for a few years and worked with all the US SOF and many foreign/allied SOF units.
The "average" SOF member is a little taller, a little heavier, and quite a bit leaner than your average American man. Fit as can be without becoming a chemistry experiment, but certainly no monster. We had some small guys (135#-ish) who made up for lack of mass with motivation. We also had some bean poles who were cardio heroes. The biggest discriminator was motivation and intelligence (vis a vis non-SOF units), not size.
That said, there were some guys who hit the weights in addition to the requisite great PT. They were thicker and more muscular. I was only able to put on an extra 20lbs of muscle despite a power lifting and body building background. The bigger men were the ruck march beasts who could move more gear than anyone, faster than the rest.
The men who used steroids were able to put on a lot more muscle than a mere 20lbs. They could put in a 300 PT score and maintain their size. Generally, the more rarefied the unit, the more steroids use occurred.
Yeah, I don't get the impression that Hollywood directors are de facto authoritarian. Alpha males, sure.
Peter Berg also directed The Kingdom, which is IMO the best movie he's made. Most would agree it's superior to Hancock; some would agree it's better than FNL, which is more loved.
Anon said: "Generally, the more rarefied the unit, the more steroids use occurred."
This is completely untrue. Everyone knows that the pogues (a not-so-polite term for support personnel) were always the biggest guys around in terms of size and strength. They enjoy a day-to-day routine that those in the infantry/SO/whatever never get.
Nothing kills gains in the weight room like starving in the woods for weeks at a time.
http://www.anneapplebaum.com/2007/10/25/how-hitler-could-have-won/
Woody Allen was an excellent High School athlete, first picked in baseball for his strong arms, who was earning more than his parents at age 16. As someone noted, the Winklevoss twins look good but it is Zuckerberg who won the case and founded Facebook. It is Spielberg who is the richest director in Hollywood. The Jews are underestimated because they do not look like what an Anglo-Saxon alpha is supposed to look like. Not in Hollywood and not anywhere. No one ever sees them coming. In the Israeli army, it is true, Dayan and looked like an Alpha but the best Israeli armor general according to Trevor Dupuy was Bren Adan, small and wiry.
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