Change: First Lady Wants Hollywood to Excrete Even More Pro Military Propaganda
June 15th, 2011Reel Power: Hollywood Cinema and American Supremacy by Matthew Alford:
Hollywood is often characterized as a stronghold of left-liberal ideals. In Reel Power, Matthew Alford shows it is in fact deeply complicit in serving the interests of the most regressive U.S. corporate and political forces. Films like Transformers, Terminator: Salvation and Black Hawk Down are constructed with Defense Department assistance as explicit cheerleaders for the U.S. military, but Matthew Alford also emphasizes how so-called radical films like Three Kings, Hotel Rwanda and Avatar present watered-down alternative visions of American politics that serve a similar function. Reel Power is the first book to examine the internal workings of contemporary Hollywood as a politicized industry as well as scores of films across all genres. No matter what the progressive impulses of some celebrities and artists, Alford shows how they are part of a system that is hard-wired to encourage American global supremacy and frequently the use of state violence.
Via: CNBC:
Michelle Obama wants to see more stories of military families on TV and in movies, so she came to Hollywood to do something about it.
The first lady met with members of the writers, producers, directors and actors unions at the Writers Guild Theater to discuss Joining Forces, an initiative aimed at increasing public consciousness and support of military families.
Obama said she created the initiative with Jill Biden to help the nation understand “that when our country goes to war, we have families that are serving right along with them.”
During Monday’s hour-long program, Obama shared the stage with a National Guard pilot, a retired soldier and the wife of an Army officer. Writer-director JJ Abrams, whose film “Super 8” topped the weekend box office, moderated the discussion.
Research Credit: afterhours
I feel better about perpetual global conflict already!
I’ll be taking a look at that book Kevin.
I think it’s still hugely underestimated how the power of Hollywood movies can entrain the populace (especially in the US) to support things as a herd mentality reflex. We have what amounts to powerful archetypal aimagery beamed into our brains in our living rooms and at the cinema as well as the constant drip drip drip of subliminal imagery in magazines, metro stations and the like. It really does pay to be far more discerning about what we permit to enter our minds. It’s not just the propaganda but the visual triggers used. I think it’s pretty sophisticated theses days.
Films that have been effectively created with Pentagon support ALWAYS have a sickly, fake feel where the script is incidental and the images and effects serve the underlying agenda which seeps through to give you a very unsatisfying film. Genuine creativity seems to be missing only to be replaced by an efficient mimickry of creativity. Slick, technically flawless but the soul is absent, we might say.
Leaving aside the legion of obvious war films made with Pentagon support, some others that come to mind that I found cringe_making examples of this type of entrainment are Next, Deja Vu, Knowing, Dark Knight and very recently Battle Los Angeles and Source Code the latter of which was one of the worst I’ve seen for War on Terror cheer-leading both in story, visuals and script.