Monday, August 01, 2005
Call The Waaaaaambulance! - Part 2
From the Left Coast, overrated film director Oliver Stone blames young people for the factor that his film 'Alexander' was a big bomb at the box office. Stone believes that young people have a distorted view of history. He seems to think his "honest" and "accurate" depiction of ancient history didn't fare well because "kids" expect too much thanks to Mel Gibson.
"Because of Braveheart, I think kids see ancient times as, 'Hey man, that's violence!' They don't see it as separate cultures that in some cases had stronger values than ours. The Greek culture in its entirety is what I was going for, or the Persian culture."
Okay, perhaps Ollie should define "stronger values" for us. I'm sure he means something different than I do.
Let's examine the values of Greek culture this film exposes us to. Alexander's father, Philip, swings between spoiling him or belittling him. His mother, Olympias, instills his "get what you want at any cost" streak. Drunk, Philip beats and attempts to rape Olympias. Alexander later does the same thing to his wife. Philip implies that he thinks of his wife as a "beast." Alexander kills his friend while drunk. And I haven't even touched on all the implied homosexuality in the film.
The only redeeming values the film displays are Alexander's mercy to his enemies and the wisdom of his friends and mentors (Ptolemy & Aristotle) which he ignores. As for accuracy the movie ignores most of Alexander early career and many of his greatest victories. The first battle shown is his victory at Gaugamela (in modern-day Iraq) which crushes Darius' Persians and opens the door to Babylon.
Stone lamented, "My reputation has been battered to death so many times, I'm surprised I'm still alive."
Awww, poor man. I recall back in January when the film came out Stone whined that American homophobia was responsible for poor ticket sales.
"Americans don't read about ancient history like the Europeans. And in America there is a raging fundamentalism and morality," Ollie moaned. "From day one the Bible Belt people did not show up..."
Well, good for us "Bible Belt people"! ¶ Monday, August 01, 2005
"Because of Braveheart, I think kids see ancient times as, 'Hey man, that's violence!' They don't see it as separate cultures that in some cases had stronger values than ours. The Greek culture in its entirety is what I was going for, or the Persian culture."
Okay, perhaps Ollie should define "stronger values" for us. I'm sure he means something different than I do.
Let's examine the values of Greek culture this film exposes us to. Alexander's father, Philip, swings between spoiling him or belittling him. His mother, Olympias, instills his "get what you want at any cost" streak. Drunk, Philip beats and attempts to rape Olympias. Alexander later does the same thing to his wife. Philip implies that he thinks of his wife as a "beast." Alexander kills his friend while drunk. And I haven't even touched on all the implied homosexuality in the film.
The only redeeming values the film displays are Alexander's mercy to his enemies and the wisdom of his friends and mentors (Ptolemy & Aristotle) which he ignores. As for accuracy the movie ignores most of Alexander early career and many of his greatest victories. The first battle shown is his victory at Gaugamela (in modern-day Iraq) which crushes Darius' Persians and opens the door to Babylon.
Stone lamented, "My reputation has been battered to death so many times, I'm surprised I'm still alive."
Awww, poor man. I recall back in January when the film came out Stone whined that American homophobia was responsible for poor ticket sales.
"Americans don't read about ancient history like the Europeans. And in America there is a raging fundamentalism and morality," Ollie moaned. "From day one the Bible Belt people did not show up..."
Well, good for us "Bible Belt people"! ¶ Monday, August 01, 2005
