Bless This Mess

[AkaDad]

So, you like it because you agree with it?

Question: would you be similarly amused (or at least accepting) with a movie revolving around killing MSNBC hosts, NPR "reporters," Al Sharpton, fanatical atheists like Dan Savage, and everyone who wants to kill North Carolinans? What do you think the metascores for the two would be, all other things being equal - and is it even remotely acceptable if one side gets savaged when the other gets a free pass? I'm inclined to think not.

So, have you ever listened to NPR? I'm asking because it seems like anyone wants to hold something up as the liberal equivalent to Fox News they go to NPR without ever actually listening to it.

Eeeeyup. Although a more accurate counterpart would be MSNBC, as both seem determined to out-bias the other.

NPR is as follows: Democrat says something? "Let's bring him on and let him talk about it!" Republican says something? "But as Dina Temple-raston reports, that's not actually true. So we've brought on someone to discredit it."

I feel like you can't really compare that to Fox News's "Shout at anyone who I disagree with until their segment is over then pretend I won the argument" tactic.

Which is why my Fox comparison was with MSNBC. NPR was there mainly as a counterpart to "right-wing talk radio hosts" - again, not as strong, but what can I say? Republicans own talk radio.

The thing is, this movie isn't about bias in news but about people acting like assholes. The only left-wing figure I can think of that are on the same level as the right wing pundits is Bill Maher.

It's rather interesting that you think right-wing pundits in general are on the level of Bill Maher. We have our own share of asses, but no more frequently than the left. Any impression you may have otherwise is more than likely the result of your own perspective.
Examples to the contrary: Dan Savage (not a pundit, but a public speaker; had a rather impressive angry meltdown at an anti-bullying talk), MSNBC host Tim Carney, who (just today/yesterday) cut off someone who was trying to defend Romney vs. the "bullying" escapade. There's plenty more where they came from; it's just not quite as obvious when you're ostensibly on the same side.

Dan Savage had an angry meltdown? What on earth are you talking about? The only people who came close to melting down there were the people who got up and walked out because Savage was criticizing their religion.

 

[Ironic Pirate]

God Bless America is the second best movie I've seen all year, Avengers being the first.
And yeah the thing is preachy as hell with its message, but its a message that NEEDS to be given in our "modern" world.

Why did you put quotes around the word modern? Unless you have some kind of time travelling matrix theory, the modernity of the world isn't in question.

 

[Missing SHODAN]

fanatical atheists like Dan Savage

Lulz. Truly, that Dan Savage, a fanatic. Remember that time when a bunch of atheists in his fanatical organization crashed airplanes into the WTC? Or when he gathered a bunch of atheists to protest at the funerals of our soldiers? When he sanctioned the torturing Christians and executing ones who refused to denounce Christianity and proclaim themselves atheists? When he called for atheists lead a series of Crusades on Italy to recapture the pasta land? When atheists in his organization burst into a hotel in India and committed a grotesque massacre of civilians in the name of their lack of a god?

Yeah, I don't remember any of those times either. Funny that.

So what makes Mr. Savage a fanatic? Do you think that maybe fanatic might be a bit overkill? Or do you just label anyone who doesn't agree with your religion a fanatic? Are you comfortable with people calling you a religious fanatic, equating you with the Taliban, just because they don't agree with your religion?

If not, maybe we could turn the rhetoric down a notch. Maybe call him just an 'asshole atheist', so that we still have a few words left that we can use to distinguish between someone who is in a Taliban equivalent and someone who attends (or perhaps doesn't) a religious service on occasion.

One of my pet peeves aside...

This movie doesn't sound like my kind of thing. I agree with the basic message that the major media outlets have become little more than highly partisan scream boxes, and I'm not a big fan of reality TV, but I'm kind of thinking that "MURDER EVERYONE" might not be an appropriate response. "I see you're crazy and raise your crazy" is a pretty fucking childish response, like going "Well if you're not going to act like an adult, then I'm just going to shit myself." It's not constructive and it's not helping, it's just escalating. So, boo on that. What we need is for both sides to come down and be reasonable, not to push the rhetoric to maximum crazy.

Hrm, guess the movie is also in the same box of my pet peeves after all.

TL;DR. Not impressed with the movie (at least, based on the review), nor impressed with the idea that it's in any way 'helping', and lulz to you, "fanatical atheist" declaring guy.

 

[Marik2]

Can someone help me out here?

I thought this movie was suppose to have a national release by May 11th and yet no theater in my city has it....

 

[hooksashands]

<3 this movie.

It is a giant middle finger to redundant North American culture.

 

[BreakfastMan]

Wow. This thread... might just be the most interesting thing I have read all week. Really makes me think. And not for the reasons you might think.

OT: Interesting. I had originally planned on checking this movie out someday, but it was certainly interesting to see a professional reviewers take on it. Even if it turns out crap, I appreciate that it is taking chances and risks in the modern, risk-averse film industry.

 

[BreakfastMan]

This is what happens when you give a director a small pile of money and say "make something you feel like making..."

To be fair, Inception is what we got when a director was given a metric fuck-tonne of money and told "make something you feel like making". And Inception makes my willy go standy-uppy.

More like what happens when you give a good directer a pile of cash to remake one of his favorite anime films. /ohsnap

 

[LGC Pominator]

I watched this film a few weeks ago, If it makes it to the cinemas over here in the UK I am definitely going to see it again there!

I loved it from start to finish, pretty much everything that happened in it had me either laughing my head off like a crazy person or genuinely pissed off that I knew my fair share of the sort of people that were being dispatched.

Something that was overlooked (I think) was just how well the movie went into the process of deconstructing Frank and Roxy as not being your basic Ubermensch who is completely right 100% of the time (as seen in other films with this sort of nature), Frank is literally one of lifes losers who seems to legitimately struggle to get any happiness out of the daily rigmaroll (and seems to be enjoying his murdering a bit more than the average psycopath). Roxy also gets pretty well called out as being just as attention seeking and, ultimately, self absorbed as the sort of people she hates, however this is slightly more forgivable due to her childish nature.

When watching it with a friend of mine who is on the other side of the political spectrum, his biggest complaint was that he percieved the movie as being leftist propaganda, and noted that no so called "lefty liberal arseholes" got what was coming to them, which amused me to no end when I asked him to name one person in the public eye who makes as much noise as the tea party and the westboro guys, or anyone as well known and as vitriolic as Bill O whatsisface who actually advocates violence and hatred against people who disagree with their message... the answer, that he eventually reached was "the guy who made this film clearly!" Methinks the point was lost on the fellow

Anyway, yeah I had never heard of Bobcat Goldthwait before (I always thought bobcat was the name of one of the pickup trucks from GTA III, didn't think it was an actual person name), but Imma be keeping my eye on this one from now on, I loved this film and I think it should certainly be more widely known about.

 

[Cheesepower5]

The same question was posed to Roger Ebert when Outfoxed was released. He gave it a positive review and every political pundit asked him, "would you do the same thing for an anti MSNBC documentary?" After a week of hearing this, his response was simple and elegant: At this point I don't know because I have not seen it yet. Make the movie, let me watch it, and let me get back to you." The next year three anti- MSNBC documentaries came out and, long after any controversy was forgotten, he gave them all positive reviews. Was not to cover his ass, but because he enjoyed the movies.

I'm inclined to think that Bob would say the same thing and to think anything else is only meant to look for a fight.

I think that might be true of Bob, but read this

HEY NOW! Kim Kardashian uses her ass for FAR nobler ends than "Rev" Phelps ever used a bible.
Hell I could use a bible to wipe my ass and I'd STILL be going more good with it than Phelps ever could. Did I mention I REEEEAAAALLLLLLLLLLLYYYYY like the premise of this film?

and this

My first thought when I saw the trailer was "Wow. Americans are finally catching on to how stupid their own poular culture is." I NEED to see this movie, if only to see totally-not-Miley-Cirus get blown away.

and this

I thought the movie was awesome. I agree with Frank's sentiment too, "Why can't you just be nice?". The American, hell the WESTERN world is too obsessed with other people's business, and each new reality show has to be even more outrageous than the last. Remember when eating bugs on Fear Factor was shocking? That is nothing now, and all it does is breed idiots.

I think the movie IS wish fulfillment, just not the director's.

and this

A two-man war against every douchey asshole in America.......... this interest me.

And that's just a page worth of comments before your or mine in this thread alone, and I think it's safe to say that some people would not be saying this if the film was about stuff that they like or hold dear.

If Jack Thompson decided to shoot a bunch of people who play violent-video games for instance. I don't think we'd get past the message to judge the movie on quality alone (Bob may or may not, his reviews of the Fast and Furious and American Pie have been negative just because they are designed to be liked by the sort of people he doesn't like) so I wouldn't say I've known him to not less bias get in the way.

Roger Ebert on the otherhand is a genius who brings such a delightful sentiment to every review and it's no disrespect to say that Bob has not yet reached those heights. But even Roger Ebert flinched a bit at this films message.

I wanna see the Jack Thompson revenge film made. If it's not actually outwardly satisfying in seeing the people who get violent and profane in games to make up for weakness in real life, or to just tack on to their already douche-baggy lifestyle or not, it still has a good chance of being fracking hilarious.

 

[BrotherRool]

I wanna see the Jack Thompson revenge film made. If it's not actually outwardly satisfying in seeing the people who get violent and profane in games to make up for weakness in real life, or to just tack on to their already douche-baggy lifestyle or not, it still has a good chance of being fracking hilarious.

Wait you want to see a Thompson revenge from the perspective of Thompson?

I guess it could be funny in the same way as those old films you hear about with DnD satanists and the like Would be cooler as a meta parody of Thompson than just straight up hypocrisy though ^^

 

[Cheesepower5]

I wanna see the Jack Thompson revenge film made. If it's not actually outwardly satisfying in seeing the people who get violent and profane in games to make up for weakness in real life, or to just tack on to their already douche-baggy lifestyle or not, it still has a good chance of being fracking hilarious.

Wait you want to see a Thompson revenge from the perspective of Thompson?

I guess it could be funny in the same way as those old films you hear about with DnD satanists and the like Would be cooler as a meta parody of Thompson than just straight up hypocrisy though ^^

Either way 98% of the people who see it will take it as a meta parody, even if it was intended to be real. But yeah, if they're really having fun with it it'd make it turn out a lot better.

 

[bificommander]

I liked Falling Down. Based on the trailer, I don't think I like this. IMHO D-FENSE was just a confused, sad man who snapped. He didn't set out to create a massacre, nor did he seek out 'assholes', he just ran into them. I disagree with the commenter who said that only the last 5 minutes said we shouldn't agree with him. The fact that he had no idea what he was doing and was terrifying ordinary people was there from the start.

If you wanna complain about pundits and protesters demonizing their opposition, making a film where their likenesses are gunned down is not the way to go. Not that the WBC is getting any sympathy with me when they complain this movie is offensive to them obviously, but it doesn't make me like this director either.

 

[Mechanix]

I want to see this movie so bad, but I don't know where I can find it. God Bless America > The Avengers, clearly!

 

[Valkyrie1981]

This movie was about as useful as mold covered donuts, and the director's hypocritical and one sided message was a vomit of stupid blind hate. He has no idea what he is talking about and it is a pure far left political foaming of the mouth jerk off movie. That it makes you want to take a shit on the first liberal you see.

The director a left-wing nut himself, tries to paint this as a none political movie shows he thinks his core audience (Other Left-wing nuts) are stupid (Which most of them are) and will believe him. It is typical Double Speak right out of the Ministry of Truth from Airship One (1984 reference for the idiots out there)

Sure everyone wants to punch a stupid reality TV star in the mouth. I would be first in line to kick the shit out of that leader of the Westboro Baptist Church, but those are just distractions for his real target, the right. If he had any balls at all he would stop with the double speak and just say it, I hate anything that isn't being said by a Marxist loving Socialist, or their lovable little brother known in America as Liberals.

I would of respected this movie much more if they simply called it what it was, a film about killing anyone who isn't a liberal and people who annoy the piss out of us. To see the director be such a coward and say it isn't political is a insult to the audience.

 

[bificommander]

The director a left-wing nut himself, tries to paint this as a none political movie shows he thinks his core audience (Other Left-wing nuts) are stupid (Which most of them are) and will believe him. It is typical Double Speak right out of the Ministry of Truth from Airship One (1984 reference for the idiots out there)

I don't like this movie either, but if you're gonna call everyone who does a Marxist idiot, don't screw up your references 'for the idiots out there'. That's Airstrip One, not Airship One.

 

[bificommander]

Removed, double post