Wednesday, May 12, 2004
Politics The Day After Tomorrow
The new Twentieth Century Fox film The Day After Tomorrow already seems to have whipped up a political storm in the US before it has graced a single screen. The SFGate reports that former US democrat Vice-President (and rightfully elected president!) Al Gore has been using the CGI images of climate-change and resulting environmental disaster in the ecocidal film to push environmental policy in the face of the current Bush administrations "the environmental, it's fine" policies. The NY Times expands and points out that the film promoters seemed concerned about overly politicising their film. They attempted to pull premiere invitations from known spokes-celebrities for environmental movements, only to re-issue them a day later after much protest. This marks a disturbing trend in terms of distributors trying to control and muffle discussion about films:
The new Twentieth Century Fox film The Day After Tomorrow already seems to have whipped up a political storm in the US before it has graced a single screen. The SFGate reports that former US democrat Vice-President (and rightfully elected president!) Al Gore has been using the CGI images of climate-change and resulting environmental disaster in the ecocidal film to push environmental policy in the face of the current Bush administrations "the environmental, it's fine" policies. The NY Times expands and points out that the film promoters seemed concerned about overly politicising their film. They attempted to pull premiere invitations from known spokes-celebrities for environmental movements, only to re-issue them a day later after much protest. This marks a disturbing trend in terms of distributors trying to control and muffle discussion about films:
Mr. Kennedy, an environmental lawyer, said on Tuesday that Fox's attitude toward environmentalists seemed comparable to other instances of self-censorship by media corporations in a politically charged climate. "This is part of an unfortunate pattern that fits in with CBS canceling the Reagan mini-series and Disney refusing to distribute Michael Moore's film" "Fahrenheit 9/11," he said in an interview before his invitation to the premiere was reinstated. He was referring to recent controversies over political considerations affecting entertainment decisions. "This is like back to the 1950's and 60's, where people in Hollywood were scared to death of Joe McCarthy, censoring artists, not distributing films, blackballing people," he said. "It's a classic thing that you're supposed to avoid in democracy, the merger of state and corporate power."The parallel with McCarthyism might be a bit strong, but politics and film seemed to be enmeshed far more than usual in the US election year.
[Posted by Unknown] [9:05 am]
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