...which is why Verhoeven is a genius and Bay is just a hack.
― latebloomer: Do I have a large frog in my hair? (latebloomer), Monday, 28 November 2005 12:45 (eighteen years ago) link
― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Monday, 28 November 2005 12:47 (eighteen years ago) link
Verhoeven knows how low he's going and RELISHES it. He's like a scuba diver swimming in shit to uncover lost ruins.
― latebloomer: Do I have a large frog in my hair? (latebloomer), Monday, 28 November 2005 12:48 (eighteen years ago) link
― THIS IS THE SOUND OF ALTERN 8 !!! (noodle vague), Monday, 28 November 2005 12:52 (eighteen years ago) link
xpost
― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Monday, 28 November 2005 12:53 (eighteen years ago) link
― latebloomer: Do I have a large frog in my hair? (latebloomer), Monday, 28 November 2005 12:53 (eighteen years ago) link
Which to finish my point means the movie works as a satire not about theoretical Fascism but about very real Manufactured Consent.
― THIS IS THE SOUND OF ALTERN 8 !!! (noodle vague), Monday, 28 November 2005 12:54 (eighteen years ago) link
― latebloomer: Do I have a large frog in my hair? (latebloomer), Monday, 28 November 2005 12:54 (eighteen years ago) link
― TOMBOT, Monday, 28 November 2005 14:41 (eighteen years ago) link
― 'you' vs. 'radio gnome invisible 3' FITE (ex machina), Monday, 28 November 2005 14:56 (eighteen years ago) link
* The most brilliant scientific mind in the universe belongs to TWO MARTIANS (who combine to form a single, giant martian) - not a member of the human race, as Bill & Ted had assumed!
* The Grim Reaper sucks hard at inane family games like Clue and Twister!
* Hell is nothing like their album covers!
I think perhaps the most telling thing about Bill & Ted is the way they just shrug off the innumerable paradoxes created by all their traveling back and forth through time and from the afterlife into the world of the living, and then just out of the blue become heroes, nay, leaders and unifiers of the entire world, with presumably no real qualifications - it's exactly their completely aloof approach to reality that makes them the greatest candidates for the job! Bill & Ted ought to make people who see today's world as being dystopian think hard about why they feel that way all the time instead of kicking back with a Pepsi and some Megadeth.
― TOMBOT, Monday, 28 November 2005 15:06 (eighteen years ago) link
― nabiscothingy, Monday, 28 November 2005 16:29 (eighteen years ago) link
Don't ask me why I know that this film exists
― TOMBOT, Monday, 28 November 2005 16:34 (eighteen years ago) link
PS I clicked on this thread by accident.
― Allyzay must fight Zolton herself. (allyzay), Monday, 28 November 2005 16:35 (eighteen years ago) link
for what it's worth, the screenwriter of "starship troopers" mentioned "kiss of the spider woman" at some point--i can't recall the exact context.
i taught this film a few months ago.
xp
gee, ally, thanks.
― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Monday, 28 November 2005 16:40 (eighteen years ago) link
Why does ST get so much credit for doing what loads of other war films already do, but with bold WINKY WINKY stamped all over it? Especially since the source material is already 4000x more challenging and incisive than anything in the film?
― TOMBOT, Monday, 28 November 2005 16:43 (eighteen years ago) link
i think the book was written pre-war. and he and bardeche were fascists, right? not playing with fascist imagery, actually being fascists.
― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Monday, 28 November 2005 16:44 (eighteen years ago) link
― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Monday, 28 November 2005 16:45 (eighteen years ago) link
Karl Rove: BELCH
― TOMBOT, Monday, 28 November 2005 16:46 (eighteen years ago) link
DOOGIE HAUSER IN A FUCKING BLACK LEATHER SS COAT.
― 'you' vs. 'radio gnome invisible 3' FITE (ex machina), Monday, 28 November 2005 16:49 (eighteen years ago) link
i've had this thought too. i haven't decided how i feel.
th: you're right, brassilach was executed as a collaborator. it's bardeche (his brother in law) who revised and extended the pre-war history of cinema. i got confused because it's those post-war revisions that are probably best known. weird for a book half-written by an executed fascist collaborator to have been a strong seller.
xxp
― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Monday, 28 November 2005 16:52 (eighteen years ago) link
― 'you' vs. 'radio gnome invisible 3' FITE (ex machina), Monday, 28 November 2005 16:54 (eighteen years ago) link
― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Monday, 28 November 2005 16:55 (eighteen years ago) link
I admit, that is a valid point being raised here.
― Allyzay must fight Zolton herself. (allyzay), Monday, 28 November 2005 17:00 (eighteen years ago) link
― 'you' vs. 'radio gnome invisible 3' FITE (ex machina), Monday, 28 November 2005 17:01 (eighteen years ago) link
http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/thumb/f/f3/180px-CabaretNeilPHarris.jpg
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 28 November 2005 17:04 (eighteen years ago) link
― Allyzay must fight Zolton herself. (allyzay), Monday, 28 November 2005 17:10 (eighteen years ago) link
Perhaps part of the idea with Starship Troopers is something like ... well, our standard movie familiarity with fascism comes in the form of sneering cold-eyed Europeans doing horrible things to small children. Part of what Verhoeven might be playing with is how a fascist threat might look if it weren't coming from the outside -- how it would look if it came, as it now seems more likely to do, from the inside. Outside = cold-eyed Germans. Inside = wholesome well-muscled blondes trooping off to save the day in a glorious no-consequences enemy-isn't-human battle-for-humanity! (I mean, notice how much the high school at the beginning resembles an episode of Dobie Gillis, some kind of apple-pie 50s aw-shucks dream?) I think you're expected to have Molina's consciousness when watching this, the ability to completely fall for the over-the-top camp beauty while still seeing through it and understanding the hollowness. The subtext frees the movie to totally revel in the adventure camp way more than a "real" movie in this genre could get away with -- plus the subtext charges all of that revelry, since it's always meaning something more than it says, both in terms of your intellectual reaction to it and in terms of the film's meaning.
How much of this is about Verhoeven's intent is probably pointless to think about; I don't want to read interviews about it, or anything, and learn what he was "actually" shooting for.
― nabisco (nabisco), Monday, 28 November 2005 17:56 (eighteen years ago) link
― s1ocki (slutsky), Monday, 28 November 2005 19:55 (eighteen years ago) link
― s1ocki (slutsky), Monday, 28 November 2005 19:56 (eighteen years ago) link
― nabisco (nabisco), Monday, 28 November 2005 19:59 (eighteen years ago) link
― nabisco (nabisco), Monday, 28 November 2005 20:00 (eighteen years ago) link
― s1ocki (slutsky), Monday, 28 November 2005 20:01 (eighteen years ago) link
the screenwriter is extremely sophisticated and articulate about all the points you've brought up, n. verhoeven on the other hand has a more rudimentary understanding of the different levels of meaning--i think he was more interested in making the bugs look really cool and scary. which sounds like a veiled insult, but it's not. i think something about verhoeven's earnest interest in sci-fi and skill with cartoonish visuals combines with the screenwriter's more writer-ly ambitions to form something more interesting than either would have come up with separately.*
*this seems somewhat borne out by verhoeven's films made without neumeier, and neumeier's films made without verhoeven.
― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Monday, 28 November 2005 21:49 (eighteen years ago) link
― Erick Dampier is better than Shaq (miloaukerman), Monday, 28 November 2005 21:53 (eighteen years ago) link
― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Monday, 28 November 2005 21:53 (eighteen years ago) link
― I Fucking Said That 20 Posts Ago (noodle vague), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 02:28 (eighteen years ago) link
― gear (gear), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 02:31 (eighteen years ago) link
OTM.
― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 02:32 (eighteen years ago) link
― We Are the Dregs of the Motherfucking Earth (noodle vague), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 02:50 (eighteen years ago) link
― nabiscothingy, Tuesday, 29 November 2005 02:54 (eighteen years ago) link
― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 03:08 (eighteen years ago) link
― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 03:13 (eighteen years ago) link
what about tom of finland, reclaiming fascist aesthetics, when he was actually under the threat of death by fascists?
can you start a thread about this?
― anthony easton (anthony), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 07:30 (eighteen years ago) link
― anthony easton (anthony), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 07:32 (eighteen years ago) link
― Gravel Puzzleworth (Gregory Henry), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 07:46 (eighteen years ago) link
― gear (gear), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 08:03 (eighteen years ago) link
― The Jargon King (noodle vague), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 08:04 (eighteen years ago) link
there's too much looseness wrt fascism for me to take this seriously, the whole 'aestheticization of politics' thing is such a tiny sidebar issue within fascism i don't even think it's particularly relevant. it's a bit like associating the russian revolution with constructivist poster art. i don't think the appeal of fascism in general has all that much to do with 'hollow beauty' and aestheticism. perhaps it appealed in that way to a few aesthetes. but is molina an aesthete?
you jump around from one thing to an irrelevant other: if this is 'fascism from within', what does the 'apple-pie 50s aw-shucks dream' have to do with anything? unless 50s americana is fasicst...
The subtext frees the movie to totally revel in the adventure camp way more than a "real" movie in this genre could get away with -- plus the subtext charges all of that revelry, since it's always meaning something more than it says, both in terms of your intellectual reaction to it and in terms of the film's meaning.
i don't know what you're on about. there's a subtext that this film is celebrating 'fascist' heroism and so 'the movie' does the revelling. how so? i don't understand how a movie can mean more than it says 'in terms of the film's meaning'.
― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 09:43 (eighteen years ago) link
50s America pretty much was fascist wasn't it? (This is from the perspective of a Brit and also someone who'd have been dangling from a tree for having the wrong skin colour; so what do I know?) Anyway, one could argue that any art that lauds that period or looks back on it with rose-tinted spectacles is also a celebration of a certain kind of fascist aesthetic.
― Stone Monkey (Stone Monkey), Tuesday, 29 November 2005 11:16 (eighteen years ago) link