Hands-down, my favorite movie of all time is Jeremiah Johnson.
The recent series "The Last of Us" is blowing it. Too much homo-eroticism featured. I get that it's part of the human condition and will say that the mature gay partnership featured in the first season was well constructed and represented and was actually a very touching portrayal of a loving relationship that survived the worst imaginable... until Ellie and Joel came along. But the new season is feeding Bella's need to broadcast her real-world sexual proclivities to a pornographic level. Done with it. Whenever a zombie movie turns into a soap opera about young love, forget about it. Boring. I've read that she refuses to work on a set that is not 100% electrified... another needy St. Greta disciple -- she should have been dumped upon her first demand -- she ain't that good. Pedro Pascal was the entire show.
Agreed, I'm done with the series. Watching with my wife, adult daughter and her husband, we all let out an audible groan when the highly improbable love scene unfolded because it was a "jump the shark" moment for us. I don't know anything about the video game, but it doesn't seem like something that would have come from that and not anything I'm interested in seeing. Too bad, because the rest of the series seems to be holding up strong, in spite of the incredibly annoying Bella.
I didn't watch last night's episode, was reading Sasha's first post yesterday and forgot about it. Anymore, I watch it to root against the extremely annoying Bella! She is a terrible actor and her portrayal of a gay know it all teenager character is not endearing. I hope that when she recently got bit by the "smart" schroom head she loses her immunity and goes away.
Does she not realize that most electricity is still generated using fossil fuels? Just demanding an "all electrical set" doesn't do it. BTW, how long has Hollywood been using coal powered spot lights?
There were two episodes in season one that dealt with gay relationships. Neither episode did anything to drive the plot forward. Pure virtue signaling.
Reminds me of Designated Survivor- great season one - season two was a horrible gay / trans everything departure - dropped it after episode 1 of season two.
And The Umbrella Academy. Ellen (I will not call her Elliot) Page made a big deal about becoming trans. The writers put in a throwaway scene where she says something like "I'm a male now." The other characters said "Oh, OK." And that was it. Nothing related to the plot at all. I don't know what happened after that since I stopped watching.
Sorry to be a dumb ass. What is "100 % electrified" mean? Regarding your broader thesis of over sexualization in film, I totally agree. I think it is very effective as two people who are really attracted to each other but not yet making the move because of myriad possible reasons but the sexual tension grows and becomes unbearable. They (the couple) do not even need to lay a hand on each other. Eye ball to eye ball can be a lot more erotic than two people doing the couch dance. Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed did this this very effectively in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE.
There are few real actors anymore. Instead there are figures who spew lines and move around. I think that may be my biggest criticism of modern films. There is no depth to characters. They are very shallow in scope and dialogue as a means of revealing the story is almost non-existent. If you go back and watch "Casablanca" or "All About Eve" or "Dial M for Murder" there's always implications that are unspoken except via excellent action and terse, specific dialogue. Now those key factors are missing subbed in with CGI and whatever the current woke thing may be.
I grew up watching those and other old B and W movies. I’ve seen every western and war movie with my dad and every glamorous movie with my mom (Sunset Blvd, Arsenic and Old Lace, The Philadelphia Story, etc.). These movies gave me the idea that all New Yorkers were smart and glamorous until I got cable TV and it was revealed that they are just as stupid and inbred as the rest of us.
Then there were the 80’s movies (Alien series, Rambo series, Die Hard series, Predator, The Rock, etc.). I am obviously a lowbrow :)
I don’t look forward to movie releases any more. It’s the same old woke/trans/lecture crap. It even ruined the Star Wars series and for that I will never forgive them.
Yes, that's right! Be respectful of the audience rather than graphically indulging in the base urges. When Ellie slid her hand down the front of Dina's pants, it was just too much. It moved into pornography-level crassness.
The last movie I watched in the theater was Maverick. My stepson said the new Marvel movie Thunderbolts was good. I grew up with Marvel comics and liked most of the movies until they went woke and Avengers Endgame was probably the last one I saw. He also said Sinners was good, so I may go to see them after I read up on reviews.
Here's an alternate view of Trump's tariffs on foreign made films. I think he is trying to put the death nail (knell) in Hollywood's coffin. You can't really afford to make a movie in California now because of taxes and unions/guilds. If he makes foreign films untenable with a tariff, then studios will have to go to other states in the U.S. to make profitable movies, which will kill Hollywood or force California to change some things. Genius! I hardly watch TV now. Internet is much more entertaining.
He will because there is no relevant difference; seppuku is the more formal or ceremonial version. The difference between ritually killing yourself in front of people or in the privacy of your home is not really relevant here, although to the extent that it is seppuku would be somewhat more appropriate given it usually connotes a wider audience.
As a produced and working screenwriter, this is all too sad and true. I’m a huge Mamet fan and learning just now that he’s getting push back is disheartening. He’s a legend and a gift of a writer, but Hollywood doesn’t care or see it, not if it means supporting a Trump voter. Talented actors who’ve moved to Atlanta for work are seeing a slowdown there too. L.A. with its taxes and permits and unions, all which you’ve pointed out, will be its ruin. No different than the labor unions forcing car companies out of Detroit.
My veteran manager advised me - & this was pre-covid - to “load everything up & escape L.A.” She said nothing was going to be happening out there anymore.
Blaming Labor Unions is really all wrong in my book. The car manufacturers left Detroit and abandoned all of America because of GREED. They HAD to HAVE MORE. It wasn’t enough that nearly everyone was doing OK - that we had a strong middle class. NO. That had to be destroyed for GREED while blaming it on “the Unions”.
Now blaming Hollywood Unions - especially Below-The-Line workers really infuriates me.
Once again it’s GREED coming from the “top” that only cares about “the bottom line” and alleged cost cutting by screwing the workers while paying the stars and “above the line” obscene fees.
I find it particularly insulting to all the workers and crafts men and women whose hard work and genius over the last 125 years built Hollywood - and is the backbone of a once great industry - to be blamed for the fall of the industry.
Apparently the Studio heads & stars deserve mansions and private jets but the “evil union” workers should just drop dead so that the Head Honchos can have MORE.
I'm a grip/electric, and the unions have wrecked the industry. It used to be that unions were hard to get into and guaranteed reliability and skill; but now any drug-addled idiot can get into the union as long as they pay. The union leaders just want the money, and so they've destroyed the whole point of the union.
In a free market, producers used to pay a little more for union people because they knew they were getting good workers who would show up on time and not drop lights on the actors, but that's just not true anymore. Now, they hire union people because they HAVE to or else the shoot will get shut down.
And the unions will demand all sorts of additional, unnecessary people get hired, too; so the cost of the production skyrockets.
So the productions just leave.
I think The Left's insane reaction to COVID didn't help either. Hiring an extra 15 "COVID Compliance Officers" on every set and turning every set into a level 4 hazmat scene because everybody in California thought they would die (because none of them would just turn off CNN!) made working in California a nightmare.
PS: I dared to speak against the shot mandates in my union - dared to try to speak on behalf of those members who lost work due to refusing the shots or were injured, etc. You’d have thought I was a murderer. The insane anger against me at one meeting was totally scary… made me think of the Salem Witch Trials…
I was going to raise money to shoot an indie feature in Colorado when the Covid madness hit. Not only was I never going to get the jab, I didn't want to force anyone else to get it, and I was never going to spend 10% of a budget on ridiculous testing and mitigation b.s.
"It used to be that unions were hard to get into and guaranteed reliability and skill; but now any drug-addled idiot can get into the union as long as they pay. The union leaders just want the money, and so they've destroyed the whole point of the union.”
Correct! I’ve been a member of 2 unions-neither in the entertainment industry-but the problems are the same. In the public sector, many ask for more and more pay, benefits and restrictions but refuse to have their members put forth an extra ounce of effort for jobs that they have successfully negotiated to require a minimum of production and effort. It's done little to help the cause in promoting the concept of efficiency, reliability and excellence. My recent federal union job from which I retired amassed annual losses of 8-10 billion...yes, that’s with a B. The P.O., while in its heyday, decided to become self sufficient in the 70’s. It was one of a series of bad decisions made with a lack of foresight that helped bring it to its current state. Now that mail volume has plummeted and hiring (which used to require taking a civil service exam and a background check) has become open to anyone, the results have been devastating. I look for it to become federally subsidized again. They are leaning that way now with the $10b bailout they recieved recently. That money will disappear quickly. A good DOGEing is long overdue.
Unions should be so fantastic that no person would want to work any other way. Yet so many people don't join unions. Why is that?? When an entity has too much political power, they tend to overuse that power to the detriment of everyone else. It is human nature. Unions made the mistake of choosing a political party instead of being apolitical and finding ways to use their hoards of cash to make life better for union workers. Things like universal healthcare, trade schools, universities, buying groups for everything (Union discounts), union funded pensions, etc. What an opportunity squandered. But that is the human way when there is no pushback. No checks on power. Grifting runs wild. The human condition.
Imagine all the things that could have been paid for with all the money Unions gave to politicians over the LAST CENTURY.
When my union, the Writers Guild of America, bragged about Adam Schiff joining the picket line during the last strike (and featured a photo of him), it made me sick.
I thought that was just from the PAC they formed, and not from the actual union... although the union continually supports terrible people like Schiff in their PR and member emails and any way they possibly can.
What is the original concept? If the labor unions offered real value, everyone would join. Think of AARP, AAA, etc. Of course the other side of it is that the labor unions would "police" it's members. In my mind they should work to ensure the labor meets the needs of the employer and get rid of those (re-educate??) who are a net negative.
My union, the Writers Guild of America is so woke that they keep sending out emails about resistance... and when I sent a follow up to the union heads in reply to theirs about the evils of censorship asking why they didn't object to the censoring of the Hunter Biden laptop, I got no reply. It's a very sad time for screenwriters.
Yeah, I did an "honorable withdrawal" from my union (IATSE) because every email I got was a fundraiser for the Democrat Party. Luckily everything I work on now is non-union, so screw-em. They'll never get another dime from me.
I am grateful to the writers who came before me and gained benefits for us all, like health care and pensions... I was even a strike captain in 2007 out of that gratitude. Unfortunately, things have deteriorated for writers in Hollywood, in spite of those efforts and another strike. Maybe they should protest the oligarchs, like Soros, Bezos, Zuckerberg, Pritzger et al... instead of trotting out losers like Schiff.
Not how I recall it, having lived it with family in the industry. The pension plan alone (which was pushed through by GREEDY UNIONS) almost destroyed GM.
exactly correct. i grew up in a union town (flint,mi) and i can tell you that gm closed all those plants to stop the unions from destroying the company.
I'll be honest, unions had their purpose. Removing kids from the labor force-great. Getting rid of the company store-terrific. But unions have pushed beyond workers' rights to become government agents, almost always for Democrats. The NEA has utterly destroyed public schools over woke policies. They take rank and file dues and channel them to captive congresscritters and lobbyists rather than helping members defray the cost of insurance or daycare. Did anyone's kids benefit from Weingarten insisting schools stay closed during COVID despite no real evidence children were in danger?
My Dad started out as a labor arbiter. He worked for a large industrial company. They made rubber products. At first in this eastern state there was a shoe factory. Things went fine and years later they built a tire factory. With an economy downturn, the shoe factory was shut down and the molds and designs sold to stay afloat. Union leaders for the rubber workers union insisted that since the shoemakers had union seniority, newer union employees at the tire factory had to be laid off to provide the seniority with jobs. The tires became poorly made, lost market share and never became the competitor to today's tire companies as it was.
This really happened back in the 1960's. I'm telling you this because it is how unions work. They don't work to perpetuate jobs outside of union leadership. They don't work to keep companies alive. They always assume there's money to grab even when the cupboard is obviously bare. If you don't believe this, look at what the $20 minimum wage is doing to push automation into California fast food places.
That is a great analysis. I learned about the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire when I was growing up in NYC. So many people gave their lives (not willingly) to creating safe working conditions and fair wages. But like so much that has come to light lately, corruption can infiltrate any institution.
THe funny part is that the left is talking about "black lists" that they believe they are now on. When those are the only lists that they themselves know how to put together!!
Communism for thee, lucre for me. Always the way. Otherwise wouldn't it be a huge source of charity with very little profit? They would all make $50K or so and nobody goes much above that number. Of course there are plenty of people in Hollywood not making big bucks, but shouldn't they all be making "middle class" bucks with a top limit of maybe $60K? Real estate prices in CA would never have been high because nobody would have ever had the money to pay for it.
I heard that the new hot spot for film making (and music) is Nashville.
Tyler Perry and his massive studio complex are still working in Atlanta, but wokeness has definitely tamped down the formerly thriving industry and driven business elsewhere. (I live in the Atlanta area)
Personally, my husband and I see a movie in a theater about once every year or two. If I want in-your-face insults, anti-Americanism, homosexuality glorified, racism, eco-lunacy and DEI on full display, I can save $40 and watch that on any “news” channel.
A good deal of production is going wherever the tax incentives are most favorable. Why pay 30% more to shoot in L.A. along with the excessive permitting and restrictions when you'd draw more profit elsewhere?
Dear Orenv. If you aren’t aware of the original concept of Labor Unions then you must not know the history of how, early in the last century…and continuing…, workers literally fought and died to achieve an 8 hr work day. Unions were formed with the blood and actual deaths of workers who fought for decent wages and working conditions when they were literally being treated as slaves. You might want to read up on it… a good film to watch about Why Unions is Barbara Kopple’s Harlan County.
Mamet is only the most recent. The treatment Clint Eastwood has gotten for his excellent films is disgusting. And whatever people think about Mel Brooks, the man can make a movie.
I live in Atlanta (home of Tyler Perry!) not far from the Assembly project in Doraville. It was meant to be a location/filming/gaming development with its multiple building fronts and filming interiors. The movie business has slowed considerably in Georgia so most of its business is video game development. I really hope things pick up. I am not in the industry but really like the fact that it’s here (for now).
In the not so distant past. My late wife and I would have a date night and go to a local theater and see a movie. We might see 2-3 movies a month. In the last 10 years I can count the number of times I have gone to a theater to see a movie and it’s less than my 10 fingers.
Same. I am a huge movie fan. I used to hit the theatre at least 2-3x a month, waiting on the new releases to come out. The last movie I saw in theater was Top Gun Maverick, which was what 3-4 years ago??? The streaming services, are even worse, just putting out total dreck, AI written scripts and casts that only exist to check DEI boxes. Now I’m like the author, I watch old movies over and over again, TCM is my new favorite channel, watching a lot of older movies I had never seen before, and rewatching the ones I love.
I used to live walking distance to three movie theaters and would go frequently, not only with friends, but by myself. Since moving out of New York a year before lockdowns, I went to the movies once. The theater didn't survive the shutdown.
I also used to go to the theater regularly, although much less frequently due to the expense, but still several times a year. I also haven't seen a play since the lockdowns.
Sometimes, I wonder if I'll ever do those things again.
If they produce some quality entertainment, you will go back. I know I would. The theatre may be worse off than the movies, they embraced the COVID madness 1000%…have been completely captured by group think. There is definitely a market for quality out there, eventually someone has to tap into it.
Foreign competition is not killing Hollywood. Hollywood is killing itself to a large degree, and technology is killing whatever remains. It doesn't help that they pay ludicrous salaries to people who create films that insult the bulk of their audience, or former audience.
But, even if they suddenly decided to try common sense, big budget studios cannot compete with AI and small production companies with no more than a few thousand dollars worth of tech. The same circumstances apply to cable "news" programs. There are tens of thousands of people with little more than a cell phone and laptop creating live news and commentary, many of them are exceptionally good, and many of them do it for free. This begs the question, how are these organizations staying afloat financially? Because it sure isn't via the legitimate advertising model.
Watch anything on TV, the ads are 70-80% big pharma companies, or PSA’s about every type of problem you can imagine. And I only watch live sports on tv anymore.That’s all they have left of advertisers. Gone are the car and beer ads that used to dominate sports programming. If RFK jr. actually does what he says and bans pharma ads the entire broadcast tv system would collapse, so it will never happen. Cable news would be gone as well.
Probably so. But the "news" channels are getting revenue from somewhere, it is not all Pharma ads. They are all on the payroll, and we know from DOGE there are literal money machines in DC that simply credit accounts with whatever is needed. No tags, no accounting, no Federal Reserve or Treasury involved. Just counterfeiting operations run by the deep state. I guarantee the cable "news" scumlords are all on the paylist, all of them. Fox "News" is the controlled opposition of the group. All bullshit all the time. Fortunately no one under 60 takes them seriously, except a percentage of the brainwashed left with MSDNC and CCPNN.
Hollywood will blame Trump, of course. The industry is so myopic and drenched in their self-imposed adherence to progressive ideology, that they are blind to reality.
Yes Sasha, even the worst of films in the past seem stellar to what Hollywood is offering us now.
Hollywood rose to prominence on the back of great policy and freedom to create. As much as the woke agenda hurts Hollywood, the uber progressive laws, bylaws, statutes, fees, permissions, declarations, insurance, fines, etc… destroys Hollywood. It’s death by a thousand taxes.
Even if - especially if - the wokeness was fixed tomorrow, Hollywood would be damned because it exists as a physical place in California that is run by absolute lunatics. 0% chance to fix this because they (politicians/leaders) cannot reverse course financially. Which is why they will double down and run the rest of the neurotic dirtbags in the industry out and we will be watching AI generated versions of Love is Blind perfectly synched to our subscription cycles in the near future. The ‘dream’ as we used to call it back when I worked this garbage industry.
communist ideology,,you can easily see it if you review the horrors of the 20th century in Russia Germany North Korea Cambodia and now Venezuela,,these places murdered their culture by removing freedom,,how can art breathe?
Some of the most creative work comes from restrictive regimes because it forces artists to be more creative, and results in only those works that "truly needed to be made" to get made. I'm talking about my homeland's film legacy (see other comment).
The regime just changed from communism to the money men.
I had a great experience that lasted 26 years in Hollywood... but I'm glad I left when I did (2014). Studios were expecting more and more free work from writers, so I was always writing, but only sometimes got paid. At least back then, the paychecks were big to cover the other times. Now people are in development hell for ages with no pay. So sad.
Lucky me. I moved to another state and continued to work in Hollywood on a non-woke show for a couple of seasons. Thank God for my pension... that's something I'll be eternally grateful for.
My SIL worked for a well known sitcom franchise for a couple of years in the 80's. She said it was fun, but even then the underside was seamy. She eventually moved back to Texas after a few incidents with entitled actors behaving badly.
The only thing worse than gratuitous sex scenes are gay and lesbian sex scenes. And does every show really have to have the obligatory gay or lesbian or trans? Half the time they just appear for no discernible reason
my nephew, who was kept quite busy in Hollywood for 25 years came to visit here in NorCal 2 weeks ago. told me that 80% of the other freelance guys he worked with 2 years ago, have given up and left town. he is in Romania right now shooting in a studio. no location work there, just in studio. cheaper and easier to fly to Romania to work in a studio rather than shoot here in Cali or the u.s. I guess? dave
I just keep watching Shawshank Redemption and Pretty Woman that seem to come on TV fairly often. I used to love Dirty Rotten Scoundrels too but haven't seen it for awhile. I did see Top Gun in an actual theater because I know Tom Cruise won't let me down. Other than that, what are movies? There are no fabulous women or sexy built men anymore, everyone is just blah and need to go to the gym to get a discernible shape. I don't need to be woke or learn about DEI, been there, done that, give me some fantasy or a good love story or even something kind of Alfred Hitchcockish. Even AI could do better than what's out there, or so I've heard. I don't go.
We were so bored for a good series to watch we are rewatching the 24 series. Even back then in 2001 they were just starting to do conditioning of the viewer minds about things related to government and politics and how they should perceive things, and while it was less in your face back then it was easy to see it now. But no where near as openly offensive as they are today so we can still enjoy the suspense - so far. We recently watched a new series with Kiefer called Rabbit Hole and we were astonished at how much more brazen and obvious their brainwashing is today. It’s a good show but the politics in it are so insidiously flipping the script on reality as if trying to convince the public that the conservatives are the evil ones. Everything the left is guilty of actually having done already they planted the fear that the right “is going to” do it. Like preparing people to know who to blame when they finally see it.
So the other night we just flipped on Seinfeld and laughed our butts off. The humor is still on target today, and it appeals to any side. Nothing is off limits to make fun of. And they weren’t trying to indoctrinate anyone.
I recommend any of the Taylor Sheridan series.... Yellowstone, Landman, 1883 and 1923. I have watched and re-watched all of them... even purchased DVD to continue!
Taylor Sheridan's talent for script writing and dialog are hard to beat and really tell a story - and in most cases, several stories within one.
We enjoyed Yellowstone and Landman immensely and most of his other work. We stopped watching 1923 because I just don’t want my money, not a cent, to end up in Harrison Ford’s pocket. I know it’s good writing, but I care who my money supports. I can’t wait for the next season of Landman.
Probably the only two series we watched regularly were "Blue Bloods" and "NCIS." Blue Bloods has ended, but past shows are still great. "NCIS" maybe has a year left I think. Instead I find myself watching old Perry Mason episodes or even "In The Heat of the Night"-which has some pretty decent acting. We did enjoy, for a hoot, "The Big Bang Theory" as well as "Scrubs" and "Chuck" from earlier in the 2000's. But honestly I'm watching more British productions because they don't talk down to their audience. "Midsomer Murders" is a great series. So is "Sherlock" with starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman. The list of Britcoms is too long to list here, but starting with "Monty Python's Flying Circus" going to "Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin" to "IT Crowd" "Moone Boy" and "Upstart Crow" these shows are far funnier and better written than most of the dreck from Hollywood now being produced.
Sherlock was so masterfully done, we watched it three separate times already. Cumberbatch was my favorite depiction so far. To Anderson, “be quiet, you’re lowering the IQ of the entire neighborhood.”
My husband and I were just talking about rewatching 24 over the weekend! We loved it when it first came out. Would go to blockbuster on a Friday and get a dvd (or two) of 4 episodes and watch them over the weekend. Dang, I really miss Friday nights at blockbuster.
It sure seemed that way this time around. The problem is they never found an actual candidate that came close to the president they wrote, but they sure nailed the entire dem party with his wife. 🤣
We go back and watch "Some Like it Hot" or "Cheyenne Social Club" for a laugh or madcap comedies. We watch classics like "The Searchers" or "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" or any of the numerous films from 1930 on. Even "Duck Soup" holds up better than anything from the last five years.
“Arsenic and Old Lace” Is hilarious. Cary Grant finds out his two old maiden aunts have been killing hobos and burying their bodies in the basement. You would think from that description it would be dark and horrible but it’s very funny.
I am wondering: how do we break through & reach these people? The people on the Left, who live in another world and who are so distanced from reality. How do we help them reach common sense?
when they feel the pain of their own ideology, it will be automatic...problem is the truth.is always kept in the dark and the truth is that...communism does not swell up from poor people...It always 100percent always begins with rich spoiled elitists. And a power group like academia or media or just government people mingling with business
To reach out requires them to also reach. They will not do this. It would require them to admit they are drowning. “None are so blind as those who will not see.”
We went to a wedding in Oregon last fall. Truly an eyeopener. What is hilarious is what they label as "diversity" is almost always sexual. There are so few people of color up there other than Native Americans, who largely keep to themselves. The wedding itself was a tribute to the spectrums of LGBTQ-ness. The groom was a nice enough guy, going along to get along with his wife and her uber-woke friends, but six months later I have heard they have already split. I'm not sure they have a grasp that the rest of the nation is not like the PNW.
Sasha you are my favorite read/watch lately! Thank you for all the great content and the thought and visuals you use. Your talents are much appreciated!
I don’t care how good they get at story telling again. As long as “stars” continue to look down their nose and denigrate half the country as “undesirables” I hope they continue to drift into obscurity.
At this point, we generally only go to the movies to see something from Angel Studios or 5/2.
We also went out for Top Gun Maverick. We also pay attention to what older movies are being shown again on the big screen for a limited time.
Christian media has gotten a lot better with the Chosen and House of David. The movies coming out of Angel rival what the Big studios used to do. Great cinematography and storytelling.
It’s not hard to figure out why Hollywood is a ‘ghost town’ at this point. It’s truly sad to see as someone who loves great movies and stories.
I bought a TV a month ago and basically bought it for YouTube - music to be exact. Movies haven’t interested me in over a decade and sure I’m not alone. Everything Hollywood appears demonic; red carpet, red shoes (aka blood shoes) and interesting signs revealing evil has taken over. I see the fall is just around the corner.
Hollywood committed seppuku. After 2014, they spurned American audiences to pursue the woke agenda. They used to make magic that projected our culture with soft power - we need to make America fun again: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/make-america-fun-again-tech-culture-golden-age
Hands-down, my favorite movie of all time is Jeremiah Johnson.
The recent series "The Last of Us" is blowing it. Too much homo-eroticism featured. I get that it's part of the human condition and will say that the mature gay partnership featured in the first season was well constructed and represented and was actually a very touching portrayal of a loving relationship that survived the worst imaginable... until Ellie and Joel came along. But the new season is feeding Bella's need to broadcast her real-world sexual proclivities to a pornographic level. Done with it. Whenever a zombie movie turns into a soap opera about young love, forget about it. Boring. I've read that she refuses to work on a set that is not 100% electrified... another needy St. Greta disciple -- she should have been dumped upon her first demand -- she ain't that good. Pedro Pascal was the entire show.
Few remember mine, Zachariah.
Is that the one with Margot Robbie?
I don't think so, whoever s/he is.
wikipedia.org/wiki/Zachariah_(film)
An early Don Johnson flick.
I think it was his 1st film.
Definitely not, since she hadn't been born yet, being 35.
Agreed, I'm done with the series. Watching with my wife, adult daughter and her husband, we all let out an audible groan when the highly improbable love scene unfolded because it was a "jump the shark" moment for us. I don't know anything about the video game, but it doesn't seem like something that would have come from that and not anything I'm interested in seeing. Too bad, because the rest of the series seems to be holding up strong, in spite of the incredibly annoying Bella.
I didn't watch last night's episode, was reading Sasha's first post yesterday and forgot about it. Anymore, I watch it to root against the extremely annoying Bella! She is a terrible actor and her portrayal of a gay know it all teenager character is not endearing. I hope that when she recently got bit by the "smart" schroom head she loses her immunity and goes away.
Evidently, it's not a portrayal.
So glad I took a pass on this series. Thanks, everybody!
What does 100% electrified mean in this context?
No fossil fuel powered engines or appliances, I reckon.
Huh. I guess they would be running generators at some sites. Now they gotta take solar panels or a windmill with them?
Clearly, there's a limit to accommodating her demands.
Wouldn't it lovely to tell her to pound sand.
Does she not realize that most electricity is still generated using fossil fuels? Just demanding an "all electrical set" doesn't do it. BTW, how long has Hollywood been using coal powered spot lights?
Even not watching the show I knew it was going to suck eventually (if it didn't out the gate.) This s#it isn't hard to sniff out.
There were two episodes in season one that dealt with gay relationships. Neither episode did anything to drive the plot forward. Pure virtue signaling.
Reminds me of Designated Survivor- great season one - season two was a horrible gay / trans everything departure - dropped it after episode 1 of season two.
And The Umbrella Academy. Ellen (I will not call her Elliot) Page made a big deal about becoming trans. The writers put in a throwaway scene where she says something like "I'm a male now." The other characters said "Oh, OK." And that was it. Nothing related to the plot at all. I don't know what happened after that since I stopped watching.
Sorry to be a dumb ass. What is "100 % electrified" mean? Regarding your broader thesis of over sexualization in film, I totally agree. I think it is very effective as two people who are really attracted to each other but not yet making the move because of myriad possible reasons but the sexual tension grows and becomes unbearable. They (the couple) do not even need to lay a hand on each other. Eye ball to eye ball can be a lot more erotic than two people doing the couch dance. Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed did this this very effectively in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE.
There are few real actors anymore. Instead there are figures who spew lines and move around. I think that may be my biggest criticism of modern films. There is no depth to characters. They are very shallow in scope and dialogue as a means of revealing the story is almost non-existent. If you go back and watch "Casablanca" or "All About Eve" or "Dial M for Murder" there's always implications that are unspoken except via excellent action and terse, specific dialogue. Now those key factors are missing subbed in with CGI and whatever the current woke thing may be.
I grew up watching those and other old B and W movies. I’ve seen every western and war movie with my dad and every glamorous movie with my mom (Sunset Blvd, Arsenic and Old Lace, The Philadelphia Story, etc.). These movies gave me the idea that all New Yorkers were smart and glamorous until I got cable TV and it was revealed that they are just as stupid and inbred as the rest of us.
Then there were the 80’s movies (Alien series, Rambo series, Die Hard series, Predator, The Rock, etc.). I am obviously a lowbrow :)
I don’t look forward to movie releases any more. It’s the same old woke/trans/lecture crap. It even ruined the Star Wars series and for that I will never forgive them.
Yes. I’ve always thought that the dance scene in Witness was one of the most sensual in movie history.
That was a great movie.
Yes, that's right! Be respectful of the audience rather than graphically indulging in the base urges. When Ellie slid her hand down the front of Dina's pants, it was just too much. It moved into pornography-level crassness.
Especially the ending, which I believe Redford adlibbed.
The last movie I watched in the theater was Maverick. My stepson said the new Marvel movie Thunderbolts was good. I grew up with Marvel comics and liked most of the movies until they went woke and Avengers Endgame was probably the last one I saw. He also said Sinners was good, so I may go to see them after I read up on reviews.
Here's an alternate view of Trump's tariffs on foreign made films. I think he is trying to put the death nail (knell) in Hollywood's coffin. You can't really afford to make a movie in California now because of taxes and unions/guilds. If he makes foreign films untenable with a tariff, then studios will have to go to other states in the U.S. to make profitable movies, which will kill Hollywood or force California to change some things. Genius! I hardly watch TV now. Internet is much more entertaining.
I would have described Hollywood as having committed harakiri, which was self-inflicted.
I would have googled "seppuku" to find out it is the same thing :D
and likely you would have learned the difference
Which you are going to keep to yourself to spite your face.
He will because there is no relevant difference; seppuku is the more formal or ceremonial version. The difference between ritually killing yourself in front of people or in the privacy of your home is not really relevant here, although to the extent that it is seppuku would be somewhat more appropriate given it usually connotes a wider audience.
So the question is being shifted to relevance, which is entirely subjective?
WOW. Who knew a casual comment would excite such responses
They are the same thing
They died not from seppuku, they died from an overdose of trank.
Actually their egos got filled with methane for believing their crap and they exploded.
LIke Michael Jackson?
At least seppuku is honorable
As a produced and working screenwriter, this is all too sad and true. I’m a huge Mamet fan and learning just now that he’s getting push back is disheartening. He’s a legend and a gift of a writer, but Hollywood doesn’t care or see it, not if it means supporting a Trump voter. Talented actors who’ve moved to Atlanta for work are seeing a slowdown there too. L.A. with its taxes and permits and unions, all which you’ve pointed out, will be its ruin. No different than the labor unions forcing car companies out of Detroit.
My veteran manager advised me - & this was pre-covid - to “load everything up & escape L.A.” She said nothing was going to be happening out there anymore.
So right she was.
A booming business in LA is the distribution of clean needles and condoms and tents for the homeless. Zero down financing is also available.
You any relation to the great Sam?
right as rain dutch.
Blaming Labor Unions is really all wrong in my book. The car manufacturers left Detroit and abandoned all of America because of GREED. They HAD to HAVE MORE. It wasn’t enough that nearly everyone was doing OK - that we had a strong middle class. NO. That had to be destroyed for GREED while blaming it on “the Unions”.
Now blaming Hollywood Unions - especially Below-The-Line workers really infuriates me.
Once again it’s GREED coming from the “top” that only cares about “the bottom line” and alleged cost cutting by screwing the workers while paying the stars and “above the line” obscene fees.
I find it particularly insulting to all the workers and crafts men and women whose hard work and genius over the last 125 years built Hollywood - and is the backbone of a once great industry - to be blamed for the fall of the industry.
Apparently the Studio heads & stars deserve mansions and private jets but the “evil union” workers should just drop dead so that the Head Honchos can have MORE.
Disgusting.😡🤬😡
I'm a grip/electric, and the unions have wrecked the industry. It used to be that unions were hard to get into and guaranteed reliability and skill; but now any drug-addled idiot can get into the union as long as they pay. The union leaders just want the money, and so they've destroyed the whole point of the union.
In a free market, producers used to pay a little more for union people because they knew they were getting good workers who would show up on time and not drop lights on the actors, but that's just not true anymore. Now, they hire union people because they HAVE to or else the shoot will get shut down.
And the unions will demand all sorts of additional, unnecessary people get hired, too; so the cost of the production skyrockets.
So the productions just leave.
I think The Left's insane reaction to COVID didn't help either. Hiring an extra 15 "COVID Compliance Officers" on every set and turning every set into a level 4 hazmat scene because everybody in California thought they would die (because none of them would just turn off CNN!) made working in California a nightmare.
PS: I dared to speak against the shot mandates in my union - dared to try to speak on behalf of those members who lost work due to refusing the shots or were injured, etc. You’d have thought I was a murderer. The insane anger against me at one meeting was totally scary… made me think of the Salem Witch Trials…
I have long believed that decades and centuries from now, the Covid Era will be looked back on as a time of mass hysteria a la Salem.
As will the woke cancel culture.
They drank the Kool-Aid. Wonder how many regret it.
Thank you for fighting the evil covid insanity.
I was going to raise money to shoot an indie feature in Colorado when the Covid madness hit. Not only was I never going to get the jab, I didn't want to force anyone else to get it, and I was never going to spend 10% of a budget on ridiculous testing and mitigation b.s.
I totally agree with you. The state of unions in Hollywood - especially below the line unions - has deteriorated due to greed at the top…😡
"It used to be that unions were hard to get into and guaranteed reliability and skill; but now any drug-addled idiot can get into the union as long as they pay. The union leaders just want the money, and so they've destroyed the whole point of the union.”
Correct! I’ve been a member of 2 unions-neither in the entertainment industry-but the problems are the same. In the public sector, many ask for more and more pay, benefits and restrictions but refuse to have their members put forth an extra ounce of effort for jobs that they have successfully negotiated to require a minimum of production and effort. It's done little to help the cause in promoting the concept of efficiency, reliability and excellence. My recent federal union job from which I retired amassed annual losses of 8-10 billion...yes, that’s with a B. The P.O., while in its heyday, decided to become self sufficient in the 70’s. It was one of a series of bad decisions made with a lack of foresight that helped bring it to its current state. Now that mail volume has plummeted and hiring (which used to require taking a civil service exam and a background check) has become open to anyone, the results have been devastating. I look for it to become federally subsidized again. They are leaning that way now with the $10b bailout they recieved recently. That money will disappear quickly. A good DOGEing is long overdue.
Come to Texas. They're building training and industrial platforms for film here.
Unions should be so fantastic that no person would want to work any other way. Yet so many people don't join unions. Why is that?? When an entity has too much political power, they tend to overuse that power to the detriment of everyone else. It is human nature. Unions made the mistake of choosing a political party instead of being apolitical and finding ways to use their hoards of cash to make life better for union workers. Things like universal healthcare, trade schools, universities, buying groups for everything (Union discounts), union funded pensions, etc. What an opportunity squandered. But that is the human way when there is no pushback. No checks on power. Grifting runs wild. The human condition.
Imagine all the things that could have been paid for with all the money Unions gave to politicians over the LAST CENTURY.
When my union, the Writers Guild of America, bragged about Adam Schiff joining the picket line during the last strike (and featured a photo of him), it made me sick.
What's harder to take is knowing the money WGA gets from me, goes to support candidates like Schiff.
I thought that was just from the PAC they formed, and not from the actual union... although the union continually supports terrible people like Schiff in their PR and member emails and any way they possibly can.
I agree with you - yet i still support “the original concept” of How a union should work.
What is the original concept? If the labor unions offered real value, everyone would join. Think of AARP, AAA, etc. Of course the other side of it is that the labor unions would "police" it's members. In my mind they should work to ensure the labor meets the needs of the employer and get rid of those (re-educate??) who are a net negative.
So do I
"failed politicians too boot oren.
My union, the Writers Guild of America is so woke that they keep sending out emails about resistance... and when I sent a follow up to the union heads in reply to theirs about the evils of censorship asking why they didn't object to the censoring of the Hunter Biden laptop, I got no reply. It's a very sad time for screenwriters.
Yeah, I did an "honorable withdrawal" from my union (IATSE) because every email I got was a fundraiser for the Democrat Party. Luckily everything I work on now is non-union, so screw-em. They'll never get another dime from me.
And the Democrat party, which I belonged to for decades, used to champion the working class. How things have switched.
The shunning of Sean O’Brien at the DNC was the nail in the coffin for me.
So much resisting. How about living your best lives and helping others???
I also get those WGA emails and can't believe the lack of critical thinking.
You bringing up the media-wide censorship of the Biden laptop, must've caused so much cognitive dissonance to whoever read it. Good for you!
The sad reality is the WGA supported the Biden campaign, it's no wonder they didn't respond to you.
I am grateful to the writers who came before me and gained benefits for us all, like health care and pensions... I was even a strike captain in 2007 out of that gratitude. Unfortunately, things have deteriorated for writers in Hollywood, in spite of those efforts and another strike. Maybe they should protest the oligarchs, like Soros, Bezos, Zuckerberg, Pritzger et al... instead of trotting out losers like Schiff.
Time to go free lance.
Soooo sorry to hear it.😢
Not how I recall it, having lived it with family in the industry. The pension plan alone (which was pushed through by GREEDY UNIONS) almost destroyed GM.
exactly correct. i grew up in a union town (flint,mi) and i can tell you that gm closed all those plants to stop the unions from destroying the company.
I'll be honest, unions had their purpose. Removing kids from the labor force-great. Getting rid of the company store-terrific. But unions have pushed beyond workers' rights to become government agents, almost always for Democrats. The NEA has utterly destroyed public schools over woke policies. They take rank and file dues and channel them to captive congresscritters and lobbyists rather than helping members defray the cost of insurance or daycare. Did anyone's kids benefit from Weingarten insisting schools stay closed during COVID despite no real evidence children were in danger?
My Dad started out as a labor arbiter. He worked for a large industrial company. They made rubber products. At first in this eastern state there was a shoe factory. Things went fine and years later they built a tire factory. With an economy downturn, the shoe factory was shut down and the molds and designs sold to stay afloat. Union leaders for the rubber workers union insisted that since the shoemakers had union seniority, newer union employees at the tire factory had to be laid off to provide the seniority with jobs. The tires became poorly made, lost market share and never became the competitor to today's tire companies as it was.
This really happened back in the 1960's. I'm telling you this because it is how unions work. They don't work to perpetuate jobs outside of union leadership. They don't work to keep companies alive. They always assume there's money to grab even when the cupboard is obviously bare. If you don't believe this, look at what the $20 minimum wage is doing to push automation into California fast food places.
That is a great analysis. I learned about the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire when I was growing up in NYC. So many people gave their lives (not willingly) to creating safe working conditions and fair wages. But like so much that has come to light lately, corruption can infiltrate any institution.
Are you reading the same post as I am?
you don't know what your even posting about. you must be a chick.
Wow… Nice… You must be a jerk.
sweet segue from chick to personal ad hominem.
Because you meant “chick” as an insult.
All off-shoring was rewarded with federal subsidies.
THe funny part is that the left is talking about "black lists" that they believe they are now on. When those are the only lists that they themselves know how to put together!!
The ultimate irony is that 70 years later it seems Hollywood IS full of communists and always was.
Communism for thee, lucre for me. Always the way. Otherwise wouldn't it be a huge source of charity with very little profit? They would all make $50K or so and nobody goes much above that number. Of course there are plenty of people in Hollywood not making big bucks, but shouldn't they all be making "middle class" bucks with a top limit of maybe $60K? Real estate prices in CA would never have been high because nobody would have ever had the money to pay for it.
I heard that the new hot spot for film making (and music) is Nashville.
Tyler Perry and his massive studio complex are still working in Atlanta, but wokeness has definitely tamped down the formerly thriving industry and driven business elsewhere. (I live in the Atlanta area)
Personally, my husband and I see a movie in a theater about once every year or two. If I want in-your-face insults, anti-Americanism, homosexuality glorified, racism, eco-lunacy and DEI on full display, I can save $40 and watch that on any “news” channel.
Agreed 100% with all of what you wrote.
A good deal of production is going wherever the tax incentives are most favorable. Why pay 30% more to shoot in L.A. along with the excessive permitting and restrictions when you'd draw more profit elsewhere?
Exactly!
Dear Orenv. If you aren’t aware of the original concept of Labor Unions then you must not know the history of how, early in the last century…and continuing…, workers literally fought and died to achieve an 8 hr work day. Unions were formed with the blood and actual deaths of workers who fought for decent wages and working conditions when they were literally being treated as slaves. You might want to read up on it… a good film to watch about Why Unions is Barbara Kopple’s Harlan County.
Yes, it's too bad they all had to become political and corrupt.
Mamet is only the most recent. The treatment Clint Eastwood has gotten for his excellent films is disgusting. And whatever people think about Mel Brooks, the man can make a movie.
I live in Atlanta (home of Tyler Perry!) not far from the Assembly project in Doraville. It was meant to be a location/filming/gaming development with its multiple building fronts and filming interiors. The movie business has slowed considerably in Georgia so most of its business is video game development. I really hope things pick up. I am not in the industry but really like the fact that it’s here (for now).
In the not so distant past. My late wife and I would have a date night and go to a local theater and see a movie. We might see 2-3 movies a month. In the last 10 years I can count the number of times I have gone to a theater to see a movie and it’s less than my 10 fingers.
Same. I am a huge movie fan. I used to hit the theatre at least 2-3x a month, waiting on the new releases to come out. The last movie I saw in theater was Top Gun Maverick, which was what 3-4 years ago??? The streaming services, are even worse, just putting out total dreck, AI written scripts and casts that only exist to check DEI boxes. Now I’m like the author, I watch old movies over and over again, TCM is my new favorite channel, watching a lot of older movies I had never seen before, and rewatching the ones I love.
TCM is so good, the hosts are just so much fun to listen to, especially Ben.
I’ve discovered Cinevault, and it’s tremendous. No hosts, but greatly entertaining.
I used to live walking distance to three movie theaters and would go frequently, not only with friends, but by myself. Since moving out of New York a year before lockdowns, I went to the movies once. The theater didn't survive the shutdown.
I also used to go to the theater regularly, although much less frequently due to the expense, but still several times a year. I also haven't seen a play since the lockdowns.
Sometimes, I wonder if I'll ever do those things again.
If they produce some quality entertainment, you will go back. I know I would. The theatre may be worse off than the movies, they embraced the COVID madness 1000%…have been completely captured by group think. There is definitely a market for quality out there, eventually someone has to tap into it.
The cinema nearest to me is permanently closed. It never reopened after the government shutdown.
Foreign competition is not killing Hollywood. Hollywood is killing itself to a large degree, and technology is killing whatever remains. It doesn't help that they pay ludicrous salaries to people who create films that insult the bulk of their audience, or former audience.
But, even if they suddenly decided to try common sense, big budget studios cannot compete with AI and small production companies with no more than a few thousand dollars worth of tech. The same circumstances apply to cable "news" programs. There are tens of thousands of people with little more than a cell phone and laptop creating live news and commentary, many of them are exceptionally good, and many of them do it for free. This begs the question, how are these organizations staying afloat financially? Because it sure isn't via the legitimate advertising model.
Watch anything on TV, the ads are 70-80% big pharma companies, or PSA’s about every type of problem you can imagine. And I only watch live sports on tv anymore.That’s all they have left of advertisers. Gone are the car and beer ads that used to dominate sports programming. If RFK jr. actually does what he says and bans pharma ads the entire broadcast tv system would collapse, so it will never happen. Cable news would be gone as well.
Sports broadcasting has become nothing more than a long commercial for gambling apps
Probably so. But the "news" channels are getting revenue from somewhere, it is not all Pharma ads. They are all on the payroll, and we know from DOGE there are literal money machines in DC that simply credit accounts with whatever is needed. No tags, no accounting, no Federal Reserve or Treasury involved. Just counterfeiting operations run by the deep state. I guarantee the cable "news" scumlords are all on the paylist, all of them. Fox "News" is the controlled opposition of the group. All bullshit all the time. Fortunately no one under 60 takes them seriously, except a percentage of the brainwashed left with MSDNC and CCPNN.
100%
Hollywood will blame Trump, of course. The industry is so myopic and drenched in their self-imposed adherence to progressive ideology, that they are blind to reality.
Yes Sasha, even the worst of films in the past seem stellar to what Hollywood is offering us now.
I think I'd exclude "Humanoids from the Deep" from the list of movies from the past...
And possibly Two Lane Blacktop...
I never saw that movie that but it sounds horrid.
I'm sure I spoke too broadly and there were many other old movies that would not qualify as stellar in comparison.
Hollywood rose to prominence on the back of great policy and freedom to create. As much as the woke agenda hurts Hollywood, the uber progressive laws, bylaws, statutes, fees, permissions, declarations, insurance, fines, etc… destroys Hollywood. It’s death by a thousand taxes.
Even if - especially if - the wokeness was fixed tomorrow, Hollywood would be damned because it exists as a physical place in California that is run by absolute lunatics. 0% chance to fix this because they (politicians/leaders) cannot reverse course financially. Which is why they will double down and run the rest of the neurotic dirtbags in the industry out and we will be watching AI generated versions of Love is Blind perfectly synched to our subscription cycles in the near future. The ‘dream’ as we used to call it back when I worked this garbage industry.
communist ideology,,you can easily see it if you review the horrors of the 20th century in Russia Germany North Korea Cambodia and now Venezuela,,these places murdered their culture by removing freedom,,how can art breathe?
Some of the most creative work comes from restrictive regimes because it forces artists to be more creative, and results in only those works that "truly needed to be made" to get made. I'm talking about my homeland's film legacy (see other comment).
The regime just changed from communism to the money men.
I had a great experience that lasted 26 years in Hollywood... but I'm glad I left when I did (2014). Studios were expecting more and more free work from writers, so I was always writing, but only sometimes got paid. At least back then, the paychecks were big to cover the other times. Now people are in development hell for ages with no pay. So sad.
You left right when the insanity knob got turned to 11, after sitting at 10 for several years.
Lucky me. I moved to another state and continued to work in Hollywood on a non-woke show for a couple of seasons. Thank God for my pension... that's something I'll be eternally grateful for.
Sounds as if you have had an interesting career, Sibyl.
My SIL worked for a well known sitcom franchise for a couple of years in the 80's. She said it was fun, but even then the underside was seamy. She eventually moved back to Texas after a few incidents with entitled actors behaving badly.
The only thing worse than gratuitous sex scenes are gay and lesbian sex scenes. And does every show really have to have the obligatory gay or lesbian or trans? Half the time they just appear for no discernible reason
See "The Last of Us". The turn to woke sex themes is boring and unimaginative.
I've been watching "The Last of Us". Yes, it's a bit over-woke for my tastes, but it's still well done enough to hold my attention.
my nephew, who was kept quite busy in Hollywood for 25 years came to visit here in NorCal 2 weeks ago. told me that 80% of the other freelance guys he worked with 2 years ago, have given up and left town. he is in Romania right now shooting in a studio. no location work there, just in studio. cheaper and easier to fly to Romania to work in a studio rather than shoot here in Cali or the u.s. I guess? dave
I admire your true grit and perseverance.
I just keep watching Shawshank Redemption and Pretty Woman that seem to come on TV fairly often. I used to love Dirty Rotten Scoundrels too but haven't seen it for awhile. I did see Top Gun in an actual theater because I know Tom Cruise won't let me down. Other than that, what are movies? There are no fabulous women or sexy built men anymore, everyone is just blah and need to go to the gym to get a discernible shape. I don't need to be woke or learn about DEI, been there, done that, give me some fantasy or a good love story or even something kind of Alfred Hitchcockish. Even AI could do better than what's out there, or so I've heard. I don't go.
We were so bored for a good series to watch we are rewatching the 24 series. Even back then in 2001 they were just starting to do conditioning of the viewer minds about things related to government and politics and how they should perceive things, and while it was less in your face back then it was easy to see it now. But no where near as openly offensive as they are today so we can still enjoy the suspense - so far. We recently watched a new series with Kiefer called Rabbit Hole and we were astonished at how much more brazen and obvious their brainwashing is today. It’s a good show but the politics in it are so insidiously flipping the script on reality as if trying to convince the public that the conservatives are the evil ones. Everything the left is guilty of actually having done already they planted the fear that the right “is going to” do it. Like preparing people to know who to blame when they finally see it.
So the other night we just flipped on Seinfeld and laughed our butts off. The humor is still on target today, and it appeals to any side. Nothing is off limits to make fun of. And they weren’t trying to indoctrinate anyone.
I recommend any of the Taylor Sheridan series.... Yellowstone, Landman, 1883 and 1923. I have watched and re-watched all of them... even purchased DVD to continue!
Taylor Sheridan's talent for script writing and dialog are hard to beat and really tell a story - and in most cases, several stories within one.
We enjoyed Yellowstone and Landman immensely and most of his other work. We stopped watching 1923 because I just don’t want my money, not a cent, to end up in Harrison Ford’s pocket. I know it’s good writing, but I care who my money supports. I can’t wait for the next season of Landman.
I understand your thoughts, but technically, he has already been paid.
The love story of Spencer & Alexandra was so compelling and beautiful ❤️
Don’t they get royalties??
I think they're filming in Fort Worth right now.
Probably the only two series we watched regularly were "Blue Bloods" and "NCIS." Blue Bloods has ended, but past shows are still great. "NCIS" maybe has a year left I think. Instead I find myself watching old Perry Mason episodes or even "In The Heat of the Night"-which has some pretty decent acting. We did enjoy, for a hoot, "The Big Bang Theory" as well as "Scrubs" and "Chuck" from earlier in the 2000's. But honestly I'm watching more British productions because they don't talk down to their audience. "Midsomer Murders" is a great series. So is "Sherlock" with starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman. The list of Britcoms is too long to list here, but starting with "Monty Python's Flying Circus" going to "Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin" to "IT Crowd" "Moone Boy" and "Upstart Crow" these shows are far funnier and better written than most of the dreck from Hollywood now being produced.
Sherlock was so masterfully done, we watched it three separate times already. Cumberbatch was my favorite depiction so far. To Anderson, “be quiet, you’re lowering the IQ of the entire neighborhood.”
My husband and I were just talking about rewatching 24 over the weekend! We loved it when it first came out. Would go to blockbuster on a Friday and get a dvd (or two) of 4 episodes and watch them over the weekend. Dang, I really miss Friday nights at blockbuster.
What is 24? I don't recall that, what year(s) was that?
Kiefer Sutherland. 9 seasons beginning 2001-2002. He’s an agent for the CTU: Counter Terrirism Unit
Each episode was one hour and each season made up one day. Clever. Lots of action.
Was it on Netflix or where? I like him, it sounds great.
It was on Prime I believe
Oh wait, that was Rabbit Hole
We are watching 24 on Hulu because they have all the seasons.
You may be able to find it for free on Tubi or Pluto. I've found far more things for free there than you'd believe.
24 was used to condition the populace for accepting obama.
It sure seemed that way this time around. The problem is they never found an actual candidate that came close to the president they wrote, but they sure nailed the entire dem party with his wife. 🤣
I knew “24” was going to be good when Jack Bauer killed someone (who deserved it), looked around and said “Anyone got a hack saw?”.
I love Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
We go back and watch "Some Like it Hot" or "Cheyenne Social Club" for a laugh or madcap comedies. We watch classics like "The Searchers" or "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" or any of the numerous films from 1930 on. Even "Duck Soup" holds up better than anything from the last five years.
“Arsenic and Old Lace” Is hilarious. Cary Grant finds out his two old maiden aunts have been killing hobos and burying their bodies in the basement. You would think from that description it would be dark and horrible but it’s very funny.
I am wondering: how do we break through & reach these people? The people on the Left, who live in another world and who are so distanced from reality. How do we help them reach common sense?
when they feel the pain of their own ideology, it will be automatic...problem is the truth.is always kept in the dark and the truth is that...communism does not swell up from poor people...It always 100percent always begins with rich spoiled elitists. And a power group like academia or media or just government people mingling with business
You can’t. It’s a religion to them & they’ll die on that hill.
To reach out requires them to also reach. They will not do this. It would require them to admit they are drowning. “None are so blind as those who will not see.”
Nobody knows
We went to a wedding in Oregon last fall. Truly an eyeopener. What is hilarious is what they label as "diversity" is almost always sexual. There are so few people of color up there other than Native Americans, who largely keep to themselves. The wedding itself was a tribute to the spectrums of LGBTQ-ness. The groom was a nice enough guy, going along to get along with his wife and her uber-woke friends, but six months later I have heard they have already split. I'm not sure they have a grasp that the rest of the nation is not like the PNW.
they are victims of ideological demoralization. it is not reversable. there is no cure. we can either decide to go on as we are, or separate.
Sasha you are my favorite read/watch lately! Thank you for all the great content and the thought and visuals you use. Your talents are much appreciated!
Um, do I want to know what an "intimacy coordinator" is? Somehow I get the feeling that I really don't.
It takes a lot of on-the-job training in Hollywood to become one…
I don’t care how good they get at story telling again. As long as “stars” continue to look down their nose and denigrate half the country as “undesirables” I hope they continue to drift into obscurity.
At this point, we generally only go to the movies to see something from Angel Studios or 5/2.
We also went out for Top Gun Maverick. We also pay attention to what older movies are being shown again on the big screen for a limited time.
Christian media has gotten a lot better with the Chosen and House of David. The movies coming out of Angel rival what the Big studios used to do. Great cinematography and storytelling.
It’s not hard to figure out why Hollywood is a ‘ghost town’ at this point. It’s truly sad to see as someone who loves great movies and stories.
I'm not at all religious, but "The Chosen" and "House of David" are excellent and both tell a remarkable story.
They are VERY well produced and acted, by people not tinged with Wokeism. Produced in Texas, so I've heard, a galaxy far, far away from California.
We are a whole ‘nother country!
I bought a TV a month ago and basically bought it for YouTube - music to be exact. Movies haven’t interested me in over a decade and sure I’m not alone. Everything Hollywood appears demonic; red carpet, red shoes (aka blood shoes) and interesting signs revealing evil has taken over. I see the fall is just around the corner.