No Fuss? Make One!
I'm all for sensitivity. Really. Well, due sensitivity, anyway. I mean, you just don't go up and ask someone if they want to go back over puppies with you just after their dog has been run over. You don't ask a widow how single life is at her husband's funeral. And you certainly don't surprise a soldier fresh from Iraq with some leftover Black Cats from July 4th. Why? Because it's insensitive. And unduly so. Eventually, though, the dog owner will get over the loss of a pet, either through time or replacement, the widow will hopefully accept the loss (though respect for the dead is still a good plan) and, God willing, the soldier will not suffer long term trauma due to his service.
That said...you had to see that coming...I think Fox News needs to man up. While doing my daily Google news check on the WGA strike (I needs mah TV, mayn!), I came across an article about JJ Abrams new movie Cloverfield. Thanks to clever marketing, I was intrigued by the movie around the time the first trailers ran. I probably won't ever see the movie because Andria thinks it looks stupid and our movie watching time is limited anyway, so I try to subject her to as little crap as possible. I don't feel like this has lessened my enjoyment of anything, though. I'll just read the plot summary on Wikipedia and call it a day. What got me was how the article said, and I quote:
Like I said, I'm all for sensitivity, but is it really necessary that we call a moratorium on destroying New York because of what happened? I mean, if we follow that logic, shouldn't Peter Berg and the people at Universal be called insensitive for protraying an attack on Americans on foreign soil. I mean, the US embassy attack in Kenya happened in '98, only three year before the September 11th attacks. And I am Legend has WAY more dead New Yorkers than Cloverfield, if that's the bar for sensitivity that we're setting. I mean, ALL of them are dead except Will Smith. And The Bourne Ultimatum has Matt Damon, which is insensitive to Ben Affleck, because Matt still has an acting career.
Now, hyperbole aside, it's not like Abrams and Co. are pulling a Uwe Boll and making light of the attack. They just have a movie that a) is set in New York and b) due to the plot has scenes of New York's destruction. They could have set it elsewhere and nobody would've thought a thing about any relationship between the attack and the movie. The clouds of debris would be just that. Clouds of debris. If they'd been left out, someone, maybe even the writer of the same article, would've cried foul over the lack of realism in the mayhem. But, they didn't. NYC got the spotlight. Why? Because the city itself is an icon. No other city is as recognizable as "America". Not only is it culturally significant, though, but it's also geographically prime. The 1998 Godzilla movie also took place in New York and also featured he destruction of the city. Now, I don't expect that anyone should've been offended preemptively, but the reason New York was chosen as a replacement for Tokyo (once again, beyond the cultural significance) is that New York is on the coast. Unless something is coming from space and lands in a cornfield, it has to go through some coastal area. And if it's going through a coastal area, why not someplace where it can trash things? I'm not a monster, I don't know how they think (ok, how they WOULD think, since they're not real), but I assume that a monster worth its salt would probably bypass someplace like Holly Ridge, North Carolina, in favor of the Big Apple. What would it do, kick over the Faith Harbor United Methodist Church, trip over Danny's Welding and Crane Service, then head back out to sea, bored to death? Please!
I'm not presuming that Cloverfield will be a good movie. It's a giant monster flick made by a guy who couldn't keep people interested in a bunch of castaways long enough to match Gilligan's Island!
(Ok, Gilligan only made it three seasons and Lost will be starting number four soon, but Gilligan died so that Gunsmoke could live and Lost is really only on life support because JJ and crew promised to wrap up that mess in 2010)
What I am saying is that the victims and families of the September 11th attacks should be treated with respect. However, that doesn't mean that we should automatically shy away from telling a story just because a minority of people who MIGHT go into the movie completely unaware of its subject matter and be offended by it. If Hollywood would like to do something to keep a majority of people from being offended, instead, they should try to stop making crap.
That said...you had to see that coming...I think Fox News needs to man up. While doing my daily Google news check on the WGA strike (I needs mah TV, mayn!), I came across an article about JJ Abrams new movie Cloverfield. Thanks to clever marketing, I was intrigued by the movie around the time the first trailers ran. I probably won't ever see the movie because Andria thinks it looks stupid and our movie watching time is limited anyway, so I try to subject her to as little crap as possible. I don't feel like this has lessened my enjoyment of anything, though. I'll just read the plot summary on Wikipedia and call it a day. What got me was how the article said, and I quote:
Cloverfield also inadvertently disses New York for what happened on Sept. 11, 2001, by re-enacting scenes of buildings exploding and massive clouds of debris for fun and profit.
Does no one recall what was said following the World Trade Center disasters? There was such sensitivity about the huge human losses that images of the Twin Towers were erased from movie posters and excised from films.
Like I said, I'm all for sensitivity, but is it really necessary that we call a moratorium on destroying New York because of what happened? I mean, if we follow that logic, shouldn't Peter Berg and the people at Universal be called insensitive for protraying an attack on Americans on foreign soil. I mean, the US embassy attack in Kenya happened in '98, only three year before the September 11th attacks. And I am Legend has WAY more dead New Yorkers than Cloverfield, if that's the bar for sensitivity that we're setting. I mean, ALL of them are dead except Will Smith. And The Bourne Ultimatum has Matt Damon, which is insensitive to Ben Affleck, because Matt still has an acting career.
Now, hyperbole aside, it's not like Abrams and Co. are pulling a Uwe Boll and making light of the attack. They just have a movie that a) is set in New York and b) due to the plot has scenes of New York's destruction. They could have set it elsewhere and nobody would've thought a thing about any relationship between the attack and the movie. The clouds of debris would be just that. Clouds of debris. If they'd been left out, someone, maybe even the writer of the same article, would've cried foul over the lack of realism in the mayhem. But, they didn't. NYC got the spotlight. Why? Because the city itself is an icon. No other city is as recognizable as "America". Not only is it culturally significant, though, but it's also geographically prime. The 1998 Godzilla movie also took place in New York and also featured he destruction of the city. Now, I don't expect that anyone should've been offended preemptively, but the reason New York was chosen as a replacement for Tokyo (once again, beyond the cultural significance) is that New York is on the coast. Unless something is coming from space and lands in a cornfield, it has to go through some coastal area. And if it's going through a coastal area, why not someplace where it can trash things? I'm not a monster, I don't know how they think (ok, how they WOULD think, since they're not real), but I assume that a monster worth its salt would probably bypass someplace like Holly Ridge, North Carolina, in favor of the Big Apple. What would it do, kick over the Faith Harbor United Methodist Church, trip over Danny's Welding and Crane Service, then head back out to sea, bored to death? Please!
I'm not presuming that Cloverfield will be a good movie. It's a giant monster flick made by a guy who couldn't keep people interested in a bunch of castaways long enough to match Gilligan's Island!
(Ok, Gilligan only made it three seasons and Lost will be starting number four soon, but Gilligan died so that Gunsmoke could live and Lost is really only on life support because JJ and crew promised to wrap up that mess in 2010)
What I am saying is that the victims and families of the September 11th attacks should be treated with respect. However, that doesn't mean that we should automatically shy away from telling a story just because a minority of people who MIGHT go into the movie completely unaware of its subject matter and be offended by it. If Hollywood would like to do something to keep a majority of people from being offended, instead, they should try to stop making crap.
posted by Noise Monkey at 7:09 AM
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