Arts & Ammo

Hollywood: Tedious and Woefully Uninteresting

Andrew Breitbart writes about the perils of being Republican in Hollywood. Tolerance has its limits.

Convicted murderer? Has anyone optioned the rights to your story?

Avowed Marxist? Viva la revolucion!

Scientologist? Do you take Visa or Mastercard?

Syphilitic drug abuser? Let’s talk!

Conservative? You should go.

One would think that the entertainment industry would entertain. Instead, it seems hell bent on assuming the role of re-education czar and hectoring half of the electorate about their supposed political shortcomings. Ford and Nike cheerfully sell their products to liberals and conservatives alike – no questions asked. Amazon stocks books written for a variety of audiences. However much Hollywood used to be associated with conspicuous wealth, it now seems to place is misguided principles above the pursuit of income.

More than a dozen box office failures vilify the troops without a single counterperspective seeing the light of day. Yet one positive Iraq war film, “Brothers at War,” dares to tell the story of a noble and patriotic American family – but it can’t find a distributor.

The only thing more vilified than a Republican, Breitbart notes, is a practicing Christian. So naturally no one wanted any part of Mel Gibson’s Passion, and Gibson was forced to keep the profits himself. Breitbart concludes:

The litany of negative consequences to the ideological rigidity of modern Hollywood is virtually limitless. The lack of tension between competing ideas has made the arts increasingly tedious and rendered the celebrities woefully uninteresting.

Hollywood hasn’t figured out that the party is quickly coming to an end. The film business is fragmenting. The gate-keepers and king-makers in all forms of entertainment are fading from the scene. But the myopic powers in Hollywood are wedded to producing expensive films, heavy on special effects, short on drama, with story lines that either caricature or offend large segments of their market.

July 14th, 2008 Posted by Fitzroy | Film, Politics | no comments