Over on RMG, they’re discussing the National Review’s list of top conservative movies.
Festus/Frank has adeptly covered the sheer weirdness of the list: “Lord of the Rings”? “Forest Gump”? “Groundhog Day”? “Ghostbusters”?
My initial response was rather snarky — they left out “Birth of a Nation,” “Rambo,” and “Cruising.”
Then I started to wonder about the best progressive-themed movies. I don’t really think about movies that way, so I’m actually at somewhat of a loss.
Michael Moore’s “Blood in the Face” certainly influenced the way I think, but I’d hardly call it the “best” of anything. Robert Redford is certainly liberal, but I can’t even say “All The President’s Men” is a progressive movie, per se. Same with Mike Nichols, etc. NRO is claiming “Gran Torino” as conservative, but I saw it as a refutation of Dirty Harry. It’s actually fairly neutral, at least to me. Using the Goldberg Method I could pick “Star Wars,” but that’s really kind of silly.
So, I’ll throw it out there. What’s your favorite progressive-themed movie and why?
I too found the list rather hilarious. Although in some of the cases I can see how the argument can be made that the film espouses values that might be claimed as “conservative.” It’s a far cry from them actually being conservative movies, though.
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p>In that sense, here are some movies I thought of that espouse progressive values:
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p>Juno: A young woman, faced with an unexpected pregnancy, chooses to carry the pregnancy to term and give the child to adults who are unable to conceive. The girl lives with her father and his wife (not her mother). In the end (sorry to give it away), she gives the baby to the woman she was planning to, even though she and her husband are no longer together. This film shows the modern family unit in a variety of different forms, all of which are given credibility and value for being loving and responsible.
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p>Milk: An openly gay business owner in San Francisco successfully organizes a community and eventually becomes the face of a movement as he runs for elected office and fights back for rights for gay people.
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p>Wall-E: A robot in the future, responsible for clearing Earth of the mess humans have left behind, reawakens man’s desire to care for and cultivate our planet.
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p>12 Angry Men: One man stands alone against 11 others in a jury room deliberating the case of a young man charged with murder. Although the other 11 jurors, having pre-judged the defendant, wish to reach a speedy guilty verdict and go home, The lone holdout forces the rest of the jury to truly examine both the evidence of the case and their own prejudices before reaching a verdict. In the end, justice is truly served.
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p>Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb: On the brink of World War III, this farcical drama shows the futility of the Cold War and the inherent danger of an overly militaristic society.
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p>Lawrence of Arabia: The moral of this story? Stay out of Iraq.
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p>To Kill a Mockingbird: In the racially charged south, a young girl learns about honor through the actions of her father, an attorney defending a black man wrongly accused of raping a white woman.
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p>The Third Man: In post WWII Vienna, a free-market entrepreneur sells diluted polio vaccines on the black market, causing suffering and death in the name of making a buck.
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p>Wall Street: Left unchecked, greed is not always good, and there’s more to business than the bottom line.
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p>Pleasantville: Trapped in a 50’s-era TV show, Toby Maguire exposes those around him to love, lust, passion, anger, sorrow, and other heretofore-unacceptable feelings, but in the end everyone is better off because of it. Oh, and there are also racial parallels.
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p>Brokeback Mountain: Gay people can be just like straight people. Stories about their relationships can be equally boring.
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p>Million Dollar Baby: The right to live and die on one’s own terms should not be dictated by anyone else.
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p>V For Vendetta: This one is messy, morally speaking, but the basic point is that it’s important to stand up to a government that overreaches its power and uses fear to intimidate and control its people. Dissent is patriotic.
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p>Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner: Interracial relationships are okay. Especially if they’re with Sidney Poitier. He was a good looking guy in 1967!
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p>Frost/Nixon: Nixon was a power-crazed narcissist. Ergo, Republicans are bad.
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p>Now, unlike The New Republic, I understand that these are all gross oversimplifications of the values, lessons, and morals contained in each of these films. There are probably valid counter-arguments to be found in each film I listed (as I tried to demonstrate by starting with one of the films from the New Republic’s list, Juno). That being said, it’s still an entertaining exercise, and it makes me want to go re-watch some of these movies I haven’t seen in years.
That’s a very good list.
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p>Here’s my favorite description the conservatives gave:
That’s true. But he also left out the best part. The demigod Zuul is a false God worshipped in 6000 BC by the Hittites, Mesopotamians, and Sumerians as a minion of Gozer, the shape-shifting god of destruction. This is clearly a religiously themed movie about good Judeo-Christians in an epic battle on Judgment Day against false gods in the form of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.
I would be more inclined to say that Juno used a “conservative” philosophy.
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p>When it comes down to it, this movie shows a teenage girl, whose first experience with sex results in her being pregnant. Rather than her, or her family, suggesting abortion as an option, they casually (and I mean this in a good way) pick to go through with the pregnancy, and offer the child to another couple….an arrangement that is planned months prior to the birth.
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p>This is exactly what the anti abortionists have been encouraging for decades (and in the case of Juno, it really did work out for all involved parties). Rather than a pregnant teen having an abortion, she chooses to give the child up – in a classy, respectable way. – What is more, the young mother doesn’t go through those emotional second thoughts.
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p>Yes, it is progressive because it doesn’t depict that “traditional family” – in fact, all families shown seem to be “non traditional”.
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p>However, it is conservative because it never goes into the whole “abortion issue”. It doesn’t even mention it as an option. I think this was a big boost to pro-life crowd…but it also is a boost to all of us, because it shows there are other options out there.
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p>* A similar situation happened in Knocked Up, where a one night stand leads to pregnancy. The mother-to-be is ready to raise the child on her own (non traditional family), even as she has a career to deal with. The future mom is a career woman, who hides her pregnancy out of fear that she will lose her job, but eventually finds out that her company is welcoming of the pregnancy.
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p>This is all progressive because it teachs respect for women, and the burdens that befall them as they juggle motherhood and a career.
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p>HOWEVER, this once again is a movie where abortion is not considered an option. A career woman, whose pregnancy may jeopardize her job, may be stereotypically seen as a prime candidate for an abortion. BUT, this woman does not even consider abortion as an option. The only time “abortion” is alluded to is when the father-to-be, and his friends, are discussing the situation, and one of the friends says that he should just get a “shmashmortion”…but this conversation takes up only 30 seconds of the 2 hour movie – and the mother isnt even included in the discussion.
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p>Both of these movies depict non traditional families, but the entire plots of both are based on women choosing to keep their children. I don’t know which political philosophy can claim either of these movies, but I don’t think either movie hurt the social conservatives
The thing that I struggle with is the reasoning that if abortion isn’t investigated — or frankly, if it is considered than rejected — we must have a conservative-values movie here. This implies to a degree that a pregnancy movie is only liberal if the fetus is aborted. I don’t think you’ll find many progressives outside conservatives’ imaginations who want to see lots of abortions.
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p>I’m not really going to bother with either of these movies, but I wonder these questions:
What kind of support does the mother get — does she go to Planned Parenthood?
Do religious beliefs enter into the decision-making at any time?
Did the parents know about non-abstinence methods of birth control?
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p>To me, those are the questions that show the conservatism/progressivism of these movies.
While posting my opinion, I tried my best not to generalize (though somethings are easier to convey through speech, and difficult through text)
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p>NO ONE wants abortions, but you said it yourself
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p>This is exactly why conservatives would see theses as having a right leaning message.
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p>Further more, because abortion was never discussed in these movies, conservative principles were advanced. Conservatives (I know there are different types of conservatives, so I hope when I say this, you know that I am referring to a certain segment)do not believe that abortion should even be an option, so the fact that it wasnt even considered is a boost for them.
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p>Abortion as an issue in movies just generally happens to favor the conservative argument. The women in these movies were admirable because they went through with the pregnancy.
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p>Immagine if Katherine Heigl aborted the child to save her career?
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p>Or if Juno had aborted the child because she didn’t want to raise it?
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p>******
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p>I suggest seeing Knocked Up for the laughs…avoid Juno
I forgot that Juno does consider an abortion, and is met by a protester from her school when she enters the clinic.
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p>This movie was just so horrible that I blocked out parts (so I probably should avoid entering the specifics)
Silkwood
A Civil Action
Erin Brockovich
Norma Rae
The China Syndrome
The Russians Are Coming the Russians Are Coming
On the Beach
Johnny Got His Gun
Z
Missing
I personally see everything by Chuck and Steven as morality tales about the futility of violence and vigilantism as solutions to the world’s problems. Both are tragic figures, doomed to a life of testosterone fueled rage and loneliness.
An Aramaic speaking man is arrested, tortured, and killed for espousing views disliked by the religious rulers of the day. Said views include pacifism, feeding the poor, providing health care for the poor, turning the other cheek, opposing the death penalty, and paying taxes…
He and the Apostles shared everything and didn’t own anything.
Considering it was touted by the Religious Right. Speaking of Mel Gibson, the first time I saw Braveheart was at a college movie night sponsored by College Republicans and other conservative student organizations. When I asked one of the organizers what made Braveheart a conservative movie he said it was because fighting for freedom was a conservative theme – as if!
Big government creates this all controlling Skynet system, designed as the perfect system for all that’s wrong. Goes nuts, with epic unintended consequences. Hilarity ensues.
One man works with international contacts to fight against a reactionary, paranoid government that is based on exploiting racial hatred and fear.
Also Brazil
Great suggestions above. I would add:
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p>- Harlan County, USA — great documentary about efforts to unionize coal miners in KY.
– It’s a Wonderful Life — Mr. Potter would fit right in at the House GOP Caucus.
This is a sci-fi classic by John Carpenter. It sounds goofy, but its a great movie: The wealthy and ruling class are actually aliens trying to take over the world. The Homeless and marginally employed in California eventually figure out that the rich are aliens and mount a resistance. There is a great symbolic scene where the two protagonists, one white and one african american, have a prolonged fight with each other, thus distracting each other from the the campaign against the ruling class/aliens.
Shepherd Fairey is quoted as that being an influence on his art, you can read more about it here
Equilibrium on a progressive list, with its anti-authoritarian, pro-humanity [read: individuality] themes. Indeed, the machine-gun-as metaphor has never been writ larger on the big screen.
Every culture has its own absurdity and beauty, and your concept of the ‘true’ religion & cultural norms is randomly based on where you were born. Or, in the movie, which door you open in the forest. If you realize this, exploring the ‘certainties’ of other cultures can be exciting (if a tad bit dangerous).
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Matewan, Lone Star, etc.
Brother from Another Planet
Men with Guns
City of Hope
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p>I can’t think of a John Sayles movie that isn’t political. (Okay, maybe Secret of Roan Inish)
It’s A Wonderful Life, of course … but also Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.
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p>I’m a Frank Capra Dem.
…the repetition is reincarnation… and Bill Murray does it until he gets it right, achieves enlightenment and is at peace with the town that previous caused his misery. All Bill Murray’s suffering was in his own mind.