The WGAW – that’s the West Coast (largest) branch of the union of screen and television writers – has formed its own Political Action Committee (PAC). As a member, I found this out inadvertently a couple of weeks ago when I received a “WGAW PAC Donation Form” along with my normal quarterly guild dues mailing. The guild sends out a regular mailer to all current members for them to record their recent work for dues purposes. [Isn't attaching a solicitation for a PAC to a regular union mailing illegal under federal law?-ed. I'm not sure but it certainly doesn't pass the smell test. Maybe some readers will know.]
An excited letter came along with the donation form, trumpeting the success of the PAC. Members of the PAC had already “attended events and met directly with some of our country’s most influential elected leaders, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senator Jay Rockefeller, Congressman Henry Waxman, and Senator Diane Feinstein.” You will be “shocked” that not a single Republican was mentioned, not even for cosmetic purposes.
But wait – there’s more. In the very next graph, they proudly announce “Our PAC made a contribution to Writers Guild member and media issue champion Al Franken in his quest to become a Senator from Minnesota.”
Well, it wasn’t my money (although my dues certainly went into sending out the solicitation).
Every time I begin to think conservatives should quit complaining about being discriminated against in Hollywood and just go try to make movies, something like this happens.
That’s why the stuff coming out of Hollywood is such dreck! It’s all politics, all the time. No art.
Who writes Pelosi’s script?
Why does this not surprise me? Sadden me, yes. But surprise me? Not at all. F
I thoroughly enjoyed the 1964 movie, “Dr. Strangelove.” It raised legitimate questions about the possibility of the tensions between the United States and the former Soviet Union resulting in a nuclear holocaust. I had no problem with the theme whatsoever. The more recent movies, however, are rarely thought provoking. They are instead usually over the top productions advocating a hardline leftist position. America is deemed to be the ultimate aggressor and its enemies mere victims of our imperialistic aims. I have seen enough of these films—and I am very hesitant to take a chance on future releases. And I am obviously not an exception.
I love movies, but I realized recently that I’ve bought very few movies newer than 2000: some science fiction, a few animated movies, a number of “fun” movies, and one or two “lots o’ stuff blows up” movies.
But dramas? Particularly anything that remotely smells political? My mom forces me to watch those on PPV at her house, but I certainly don’t cough up money to buy them, even at the Walmart bargain bin.
4. David Thomson:
I was a Pilot in SAC when that movie came out, and the “gallows humor” in it was a source of great merriment among my colleagues and me. We were pretty amazed at the accuracy of the details, especially the message authorization procedures, but I never encountered a Pilot who was remotely like Major Kong (played by Slim Pickens)!. We all wondered if the movie producers had gotten ahold of some top secret information, but in retrospect they were probably able to glean it from published sources.
James Earl Jones (who played the B-52 Navigator/Bombardier) published an op-ed in the WSJ in 2004 commemorating the 40th anniversary of the movie, and here it is:
http://www.opinionjournal.com/la/?id=110005898
1. Lee Merrick:
Not to worry. Per Phyllis Chesler, our President has issued a memorandum to Congress “in the national interest” to relocate Palestinians from Gaza to southern California at the expense of the American taxpayer. Surely given the “richness of their experience” some of these soon-to-be Palestinian Americans have a movie treatment or a script in their baggage.
Life and art in America are about to improve.
There are good scripts and even low budget movies being made just never getting a chance on the big screen, Hollywood and the inflated chest of those running the studios seem bent on helping Washington destroy the country and the future for our children. Education is in the burner with all the talk over the last forty years of empty promises to improve it. Young creative minds hear words of hope but are never given the chance to create or achieve these goals. The WGAW, is a strong whip in the hands of the major studio,s as we that had in the past enjoyed good story line films, can see. They give
us over priced, over budget films with no story line only political subliminal mind messages. Across America most towns do not have theaters that are not sudio contoled and films of quality can only be hopefully seen on channels such as Sundance etc. and then during night and early morning hours.
In 2007 a film called “Starting Out In The Evening” was on Sundance between 3 and 4:30 LA time, it was well written and the acting was great, more than likly very low budget and with the producers attached funding was very Independent, but the messages were visual because the director was a “Director”
with a good script and PAC not on his back. The Art Forms were not intended to be Political Organized Fund Raisers, unfortunately they have sold out talent for the biggest Gold Cash Register they can own.