|
|
Joined: May 2003
Posts: 43,951 Likes: 6
Officially "too old for this shit" 15000+ posts
|
OP
Officially "too old for this shit" 15000+ posts
Joined: May 2003
Posts: 43,951 Likes: 6 |
'America' Review: Full-Throated Defense of U.S. in Time for the Fourth- America is like a Fourth of July sparkler held high in the night air. It's dazzling in its defense of this nation and patriotic to the core.
The docudrama, the second feature from the team behind 2016: Obama's America, finds the filmmakers expanding their scope to include the nation's past, present and future.
Sound ambitious? Oh, it is. America's willingness to take on so many liberal memes is commendable, but a sharper focus would have hit harder.
As it is, the film introduces arguments rarely acknowledged on screens big or small, reminds us of the selective outrage performed by far-left "heroes" and trumpets America as a noble idea. The latter point is delivered by a rock legend in a way that should get patriots cheering.
Dinesh D'Souza once more takes on a multitude of tasks, from co-writing and co-directing to personally guiding us on the film's journey. We start on a Revolutionary War battlefield, one in which George Washington is shot and killed. Could that shot have silenced America?
More importantly, would that please some of the far left who contend this country is a black stain on the world?
We then turn to America's most vocal critics who trot out the standard attacks. The country began with genocide and theft, and its capitalist system creates an unfair system of "haves" and have nots." We briefly see disgraced professor Ward Churchill, progressive icon Noam Chomsky and others detailing their claims against the country.
Churchill doesn't blink when he says America deserves a nuclear strike, one akin to what should have hit Germany at the start of the Second World War had the weapon been ready at the time. If you'd like to look into the black heart of the far left, there's as ugly a snap shot as you might find.
Conservatives will be squirming in their seats during this segment, but D'Souza lets his interview subjects have their say.
"We can’t just dismiss [them] with chants of liberty freedom and rah rah rah," the avuncular D'Souza cautions. He then takes each charge on in efficient fashion. The Sioux Indians who decry how America usurped their land pulled off a similar move to those who previously held it. It's part of the conquest ethic that hardly began with those early Americans. This country fought a war to abolish slavery, and the inhuman practice was hardly an American-only problem.
And so America goes, giving context to some of the country's sins in a fashion rarely heard in popular culture. Each rebuttal needs more time, more explanation, but for those weaned on Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States it will be eye opening.
The anti-American attacks speak to a bigger issue.
"Zinn wants a narrative of American shame. That’s why he leaves these stories out," D'Souza says of the broader history presented in the film. He's right, of course, and it's here where audiences will pine for more material.
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Sep 2003
Posts: 30,833 Likes: 7
The conscience of the rkmbs! 15000+ posts
|
|
The conscience of the rkmbs! 15000+ posts
Joined: Sep 2003
Posts: 30,833 Likes: 7 |
Really wish I could go see this today. Oh well.
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: May 2003
Posts: 43,951 Likes: 6
Officially "too old for this shit" 15000+ posts
|
|
OP
Officially "too old for this shit" 15000+ posts
Joined: May 2003
Posts: 43,951 Likes: 6 |
Pariah, we all bust your balls around here, and usually always with good reason, but happy Independence Day and thanks for serving your country, especially today.
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 19,426 Likes: 8
brother from another mother 15000+ posts
|
brother from another mother 15000+ posts
Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 19,426 Likes: 8 |
"My friends have always been the best of me." -Doctor Who
"Well,whenever I'm confused,I just check my underwear. It holds most answers to life's questions." Abe Simpson
I can tell by the position of the sun in the sky, that is time for us to go. Until next time, I am Lothar of the Hill People!
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Sep 2003
Posts: 30,833 Likes: 7
The conscience of the rkmbs! 15000+ posts
|
|
The conscience of the rkmbs! 15000+ posts
Joined: Sep 2003
Posts: 30,833 Likes: 7 |
Happy fourth, and thank you.
On that note: I just now read about the 1973 "The Americans" radio address on Newsbusters. I'm gonna try and track it down and listen to it for the occasion.
|
|
|
|
|
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 25,005 Likes: 29
brutally Kamphausened 15000+ posts
|
|
brutally Kamphausened 15000+ posts
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 25,005 Likes: 29 |
This is coming after the America theatre release, the DVD release, and a selective prosecution of Dinesh D'Souza.
I haven't seen the movie yet, but I saw "2016" in the theatre on opening day. While it was informative, I did find the overlapping music, graphics and spoken narrative to be at times distracting from each other, and making the overall presentation in parts difficult to follow. I prefer D'Souza's books, that you can absorb at a slower pace. But there are some elements that are better in documentary form, such as video and interviews of Obama, his family, his associates, and the places that shaped him in Hawaii, California, Illinois and Kenya, that have more impact in documentary form than in the printed word.
I'd always intended to purchase the America DVD when it was released, and this is a reminder to do so. Would that I stumbled on this topic earlier, and could have hinted at it as a Christmas present.
|
|
|
|
|
