Life Is Cheap In Red Dawn

There's a 2-Disc special edition of Red Dawn coming, and one of the special features is suitably tacky. Viewers will be able to turn on a subtitle track called 'The Carnage Counter' that tots up any deaths, maimings, injuries, explosions, acts of politically dubious indulgence and daft stunts. (DavisDVD ran the news, but don't have individual page links, so I can't send you over).

Not only is Red Dawn cheap and shoddy action filmmaking, it is utterly transparent and tedious propoganda - everything 300 was accused of being but only partly was. I'll take Triumph of the Will any day of the week.

Sam Raimi may have made two small contributions to Bush during the '04 elections, which will anger many (his other donations, at other times, to Democrat causes will anger others) but at least he knows how to make a truly cracking action film, eh?

Ferry Facing Marks And Sparks Boot For Liking Leni Riefenstahl

I think Triumph of the Will is a superb film, really. Much better than Birth of a Nation. In a recent-ish interview with Welt am Sonntag, Bryan Ferry admitted he liked the films of Leni Riefenstahl and the buildings of Albert Speer. Now the furore has crossed the continent and, according to the tabloids, good ol' British institution Marks and Spencer are talking about axing their current ad campaign and all in-store POS that features Ferry.

I'm quite a Riefenstahl fan, I have to admit. I don't agree with any of Hitler's nationalist paradigms one iota but I respect the skill and crafstmanship of his most famous film propogandist. She was very good at what she did - surely that's the key point here? I feel about Triumph much like the way I feel about Bill Paxton's Frailty, say - in each case, the film's underlying message and belief system is quite ridiculous, and I don't agree with a word of it, but I'm really quite in love with the film in many other ways. And the belief system in Frailty is not only more clearly defined, it's more relevant to the overall experience of watching the film and the message that most people will take away.

I don't think there's any difference there - Riefenstahl shouldn't somehow be put beyond appreciation by association with the Nazis.