Why does this cocksucking piece of shit write for The New Republic, supposedly one of our magazines?
Of course, I encourage you to read this and judge for yourself. Entitled "TAKE OUT THE GORE AND KILL BILL IS AN EPISODE OF "MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS"", the piece is a bunch of handwringing over violence in movies. Won't somebody think of the children and all that. Say, doesn't this sound like their side's position in the culture wars? Funny enough, it is.
Is Quentin Tarantino the single greatest phony in the history of Hollywood?
That, kids, is what's known as hyperbole. What Easterbrook means to say is "I think QT's overrated," but that's less hooky.
All of Tarantino's work is pure junk. How can you be a renowned director without ever having made a film that's even good, to say nothing of great? No film student in 50 years will spend a single second with a Tarantino movie, except to shake his or her head.
I would love to take a bet with douchebag on this one. Maybe Tarantino isn't his thing, hey, that's cool, de gustibus non est dispuntandum and all that. But. Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction in particular have huge amounts of praise lurking out there in the film dialogue. Critics adored these films, and they went on to be quite influential. Their stylistic influence on the rest of the 90's cinema assures them a place of importance. But there's more. Pulp Fiction's status as an enormously successful independent film had a real impact on the business side of film, both in proving the potential of the indie and, very directly, by being a gi-normous financial boon to Miramax in particular. Miramax has a pretty big film lineup, and it's first one out of the park was Pulp. Miramax's current importance makes Pulp important. This is not to mention the fact that Pulp had an enormous impact on a generation. This film really connected with people. Maybe Gregg (two g's? Fucking douche!) doesn't like the films, but the large amounts of existing criticism, the number of films clearly influenced, the change in the business all mean that you can't just forget it. It's like Easy Rider, man...maybe you're not into hippy road-trip movies, but you can't just dismiss it out of hand.
Tarantino does nothing but churn out shabby depictions of slaughter as a form of pleasure--and that, for decades, has been what the least imaginative and least talented of Hollywood churn out.
Apparently, he's never seen ANY SINGLE ROMANTIC COMEDY released from, oh, say, 1992 to the present.
Nothing about Hollywood is more hackneyed or trite than preposterous violence--and that's all Tarantino has ever put onto film.
Watched those films on mute, eh? Well, since Greggg apparently has, I'd just like to point out that QT is also well-praised for his dialogue.
He also, interestingly, has a fetish for depicting, on screen, the source of incidental music. That is, when Uma and John are listening to Dusty "What Have I Done to Deserve This?" Springfield, Uma actually goes up to a big ol' tape machine and plays it. This trick happened to then show up in Kubrick's last film. I mention this for three reasons. 1-Kubrick is god. 2-In Eyes Wide Open, the guy who wrote EWS with Kubrick mentioned that Stan "the Man" was quite impressed by Pulp Fiction. 3-It's shit like this, whether you care for it or not (I find it to be interesting, if non-essential trivia), is EXACTLY the reason that they'll be watching Pulp Fiction in film school in 50 years
But, as specific to Kill Bill, I'd also like to point out that the violence depicted in the film is completely UNLIKE anything produced by Hollywood. The style of action is pretty solidly Asian in origin. Plus, there's that whole, you know, anime section. Dat shit be Japanese. Which is, like, Asian, like, too.
Oh, and I'll get to Gregg's antisemitism in just a second.
Set aside what it says about contemporary Hollywood culture that the supposed liberal progressives of this city now ceaselessly mass-market presentations of butchering the helpless as a form of entertainment, even, as rewarding self-expression.
Ah, what would a read in a nice liberal magazine be without some gratuitous liberal bashing. Fucking traitorous fuck. Anyway, regarding Kill Bill, the vast majority of the slaughter in the film, as is actually the case in Pulp Fiction, is not of the helpless.
The Kill Bill Helpless Death Tally
I fucking hate True Lies, but Arnold's line, "Yeah, but they were all bad" is pretty applicable here. Also notable is that the slaughter of the 8 in the wedding party happens off-screen. With the exception of one marine's wife, in fact, there is virtually no on-screen slaughter of the helpless.
In fact, Easterbrook's point here is going to become important, cos he takes it to some fucking weird places, so I want to hammer on this point - he argues that the slaughter of the helpless has become commonplace in Hollywood films. I just don't think this is so. Is there violence? Sure. Are there deaths? Sure. But of the helpless? Well, there are a lot of villains killed, be they vampires, werewolves (of London ah-oooooo!, sorry), zombies, or arms dealing North Koreans (last James Bond flick). Are there exceptions? Sure. But the wholesale slaughter of innocents just doesn't take place on the scale Easterbrook suggests. Violence against other violent actors is the norm in action movies. I mean, the bad guys shoot and Bond, he shoots back. Pierce Brosnan doesn't unload an AK into a schoolbus of developmentally-challenged children (though I think we all know what dark motivations lie in Pierce's heart).
Why is Easterbrook making such a retarded point?
Why do we suppose that, with Hollywood's violence-glorifying films now shown all around the world to billions of people--remember, mass distribution of Hollywood movies to the developing world and Islamic states is a recent phenomenon--young terrorists around the globe now seem to view killing the innocent as a positive thing, even, a norm?
Oh, that's why. Quentin and Osama are best buds. Gregg's connection...well, to call in tenuous would be misleading, as tenuous actually implies a connection. Note, please, that Gregg's point has now shifted from being about the slaughter of the helpless to the slaughter of the innocent. Of course, my objections still apply. The slaughter of the innocent is also rare in Hollywood. Furthermore, I would think that any number of factors, from, say, the rise of militant, whacko, fundamentalist Islam to poverty to America's role in backing the Afghani resistance to Russia, far outweigh Easterbrook's entirely imaginary role of Hollywood on potential terrorists.
Additionally, as a liberal I am outraged that this asshole is writing for a liberal magazine. Red-baiting is of the right, douchebag. You're doing the exact same thing, just these days you replace "pinko" with "towelhead." This is a despicable tactic.
But let me tell you what will really happen with a global cinema. In x years, some Iranian dude's gonna make a movie with a bunch of crazy Iranians shooting each other, but told all out of sequence and with snarky dialogue. And then people will say, "Oh cool, the Iranian Pulp Fiction!" And global cinema will become just that more global.
I would suggest checking out Amores Perros to prove this point, but I find that movie unimaginably dull, so I'll just tell you that the same fucking thing happened, and now people in the US give a shit about Mexican movies.
Set that concern aside. Tarantino's films are simply trite as regards adoration of violence. In Hollywood, nothing could be less original.
Again, seen any romantic comedies lately? The shifty logic here is troubling as well. First it's "slaughter as a form of pleasure," then it's "revel in violence," on to "butchering the helpless as a form of entertainment, even, as rewarding self-expression," finally ending up as "adoration of violence." He's not talking about the same thing here. On the one hand, there is definitely violence in movies. And yes, absolutely, that violence is a part of the entertainment. From a certain point of view (one, I might add, shared by Bill Bennett), I could see a fellow calling this "revel(ling)." "As a form of pleasure?" Well, you're sort of walking off the deep end with your rhetoric there. Yes, there is a positive aesthetic response to entertainment which has violence, but I don't know that I would say that there's some slaughter aesthetic, meaning that the death is the thing that pleases and does so intrinsically and without context. Adoration? Well, this isn't the same thing, either. When there's an eye-gouging in King Lear, is that an adoration of eye-gouging? No, it's using eye-gouging for an aesthetic response, and to call it pleasing is to use a very broad sense of the word. As for the helpless/innocents, this is a point which I've touched on earlier. Suffice it to say that Easterbrook's talking out his ass. Rather, he's talking off of William Bennett's notes, which is a fair equivalent.
And his supposed innovative screenplays? Spare me. The out-of-sequence technique Tarantino uses is praised as ingenious, yet every first-year film student is taught this device.
And yet so few films use them. And yet so few films with grosses in the hundreds of millions of dollars use them. In fact, I can't think of any recent mainstream film that ends in its chronological middle, certainly nothing mainstream. As for this technique's influence, well, without Pulp, no Memento.
By the way, there's also the dialogue in the film. That's also in the screenplay. I think they writes them words down.
OK, Gregggg sets up some more retarded straw men regarding QT's reknown which would be less entertaining to me to rebut, so I'll just say that the points he makes are retarded, and if you want to sully your mind with such things, you can follow the link way up above.
And then Greg sez:
Tarantino must draw his prominence in Hollywood, and among film-buff culture, from the very fact of his phoniness.
Holy fallacy of false bifurcation Batman! If Greggggg doesn't understand why people like QT's films, it must be because he's a *phony*.
First, his career says that you can do nothing but wallow in preposterous violence--Hollywood's cheapest and least original aspect--and still be revered.
Since Easterbrook doesn't see the artistic merit in the films, it must not exist. Pathetic reasoning. Other people see merit in these films. To say you don't is not to deny that such merit exists or, and this is the kicker - that other people might disagree with you and find merit in what you think is trash. Way back up there I said some shit in Latin, which I'll kindly translate here as "there's no debating matters of taste."
Second, his career validates the idea that you can accomplish nothing at all in any meaningful sense and yet acquire fame. The idea that you can get celebrity, money, and women through the movies without having any merits whatsoever is at the core of the Hollywood's conception of itself.
This is the most defensible point in this tripe. Yes, fame is a socially-constructed thing, and if a lot of people in the right positions think that your movie-making skills are dope, that your movies are awesome and super-cool, you will get recognition. So that far I agree with Senor Douchebag. Unfortunately, Easterbrookk unfortunately continues to think that his own personal dislike of QT translates to a universal truth of the lack of value in QT's films. He's really got a problem with this...
Tarantino is its ultimate expression of this phoniness. Please don't tell me that makes him ironically postmodern.
Ok, since I've interrupted the flow of Greg's, erm, thought, I'd just like to make the thesis of this paragraph clear to you. Gregg's saying that Quentin Tarantino is revered because he's revered without reason. Yup, it's just that bad. OK, I'd like first to point out that Greg's on some tautological grounds here, and second...
Oh my god. Gregg excludes from his thought the possibility that others might find merit in Tarantino's films, which would then create the reputation that QT has. No, instead, we're all characters in some absurd play in which kitsch is apparently really popular and we've all collectively decided to pull a giant Andy Kaufman prank on the world at large. He's seriously saying that QT is respected because he is completely undeserving of respect. Gregg is fucking insane.
By the way, I'd explain here the pomo elements of QT's films, but given Greggg's intellectual leanings, I'm sure he'd interpret any hint of postmodernism as a sign of godless devilry and amoral violent terrorist Islam. Which is to say, he's a shithead.
And he's an anti-Semite. Yeah, I'm getting to that. I'm taking his shit in order, and the ode to der fuhrer comes near the end of the article, after more shit like this:
Corporate sidelight: Kill Bill is distributed by Miramax, a Disney studio. Disney seeks profit by wallowing in gore--Kill Bill opens with an entire family being graphically slaughtered for the personal amusement of the killers--and by depicting violence and murder as pleasurable sport.
Corporate?! Corporate?! Ah, a little liberal drag to make it seem less like Gregg's on the side that says "god hates fags." Interestingly, he's still completely wrong. The film *doesn't* begin with an entire family being graphically slaughtered. In fact, such a scene doesn't exist in the movie. Not at all. We see 8 dead people, but they're all lying in chalk outlines on the floor. No murders depicted. At all. Not to mention that the motive isn't explained in the film, much less given as "the personal amusement of the killers." As for depicting violence as sport, well, I've covered that already. Short form: It doesn't, you fucking right-wing nutjob.
Disney's Miramax has been behind a significant share of Hollywood's recent violence-glorifying junk, including Scream, whose thesis was that murdering your friends and teachers is a fun way for high-school kids to get back at anyone who teases them. Scream was the favorite movie of the Columbine killers.
I do not know whether Scream was their favorite movie. I suspect that it wasn't, given that Gregg goes out of his way in other writing to avoid saying this same thing. Go ahead, check that William Bennett piece I linked to up there a ways. In that, The Hustler quotes another Easterbrook piece (and delights in pointing out that TNR is a liberal mag, a detail which should make every liberal's blood boil) in which he says more of the same bullshit, but doesn't make the claim that Scream was the Columbine thumbs-up.
I do know that Gregg's never seen Scream, because the thesis of the film is most definitely not that killing people who tease you is cool. In fact, that doesn't even come up in the movie. The two killers aren't outcasts, they're just kinda nihilists. Their motivation has nothing to do with teasing or getting revenge, they're just sadistic. Gregg's inventing a movie to prove his point. What a cocksucker.
Set aside what it says about Hollywood that today even Disney thinks what the public needs is ever-more-graphic depictions of killing the innocent as cool amusement.
Ever-more-graphic? Huh? This is just "back in the old days..." bullshit. Although there is rather a lot of violence in Kill Bill, is it more or less graphic than, say the ending of Bonnie and Clyde? It's a hell of a lot less real. What about, say, Sanjuro? Throne of Blood? MacBeth? I hear that a bunch of people get fucked in Hamlet, too. Why, you miserable piece of...
Disney's CEO, Michael Eisner, is Jewish; the chief of Miramax, Harvey Weinstein, is Jewish.
Nigga what!
Yes, there are plenty of Christian and other Hollywood executives who worship money above all else, promoting for profit the adulation of violence.
But what?! But what?! Oh no, you've got to be kidding me!
Does that make it right for Jewish executives to worship money above all else, by promoting for profit the adulation of violence?
Holy shit, he just blamed the money-grubbing Jews for the decline of culture. I can't fucking believe it.
Recent European history alone ought to cause Jewish executives to experience second thoughts about glorifying the killing of the helpless as a fun lifestyle choice.
If Auschwitz didn't teach those hook-nosed bastards a lesson, maybe Gregg Easterbrook will. Oh, and by the way he's again conflating pleasure and...uh...helpless...and...uh....He seriously just wrote that it's the money grubbing Jews that're the problem. Seriously, he wrote that shit.
He fucking thinks that it's the Jews that are a problem. Holy shit.
But history is hardly the only concern. Films made in Hollywood are now shown all over the world, to audiences that may not understand the dialogue or even look at the subtitles, but can't possibly miss the message--now Disney's message--that hearing the screams of the innocent is a really fun way to express yourself.
Oh, and you'll note a return of the fallacies which, above, I....holy shit! He just said that the fucking jews are to blame! Because they're greedy bastards! Holy sweet fucking jesus! He seriously blames the jews!
He blames the Jews!!!! Because they "worship money above all else!" The JEWS!!!!
Holy shit, that's some dumb-ass-motherfucking-shit right there. This dickless fuckface who wouldn't know logic if it ejaculated all over his face just seriously tossed off Nazi propaganda like it weren't nothing. I can't believe it.
Now, I've said a lot so far about being offended by such a blatant cultural conservative having a place in an ostensibly liberal magazine, but this shit ain't got nothing to do with right and left. This shit has to do with being a motherfucking bigoted piece of shit spewing his crap all over the place.
I'm, well, somewhat disturbed by this.
Posted by mattb at October 13, 2003 10:47 PM