"The early 1980s marked both the period of my adolescent hunger for an urbane, grown-up life in New York and the dawn of VHS, enabling the obsessive consumption of movies, which in my case meant the obsessive consumption of movies by Woody Allen. In them, I found a vision of the future I wanted, a series of aspirations — to have opinions, to write, to go to book parties but also to make fun of people who approached those things too seriously. The hope was to inhabit the world the way Woody Allen did, as both conspirator and judge.... For all of its visual beauty and brilliant writing, the movie is a shell game in the end. Look over there, the director is telling us — it’s pretension and quaaludes and bad sitcoms that are really the problem. Feminists themselves were in on the game. One scene is set at fund-raiser for the Equal Rights Amendment in which the politician and women’s rights leader, Bella Abzug, makes a cameo. Reduced to its elements, 'Manhattan' is a movie about a guy who beds a sweet 17-year-old girl, breaks her heart when he leaves her for someone else and only comes crawling back when he gets dumped. It is not simply that so many of us were so besotted with the film for so long; it’s that we were perfectly content to look and see virtue."
Writes Ginia Bellafante in "Why My Teenage Self Gave Woody Allen a Pass/The urbane paradise of 'Manhattan' looks a lot different through the lens of the new HBO documentary 'Allen v. Farrow'" (NYT).
Yes, Woody Allen did create the image of a sophisticated world that a very young woman — like Bellafante, who was 14 when "Manhattan" came out — might want to grow up and inhabit. Movies have always provided dream material for the young. The Woody Allen dream that charmed Bellafante was one where smart people cared about writing, said clever things to each other, and thought they were superior to the people who made up the bulk of America. You know, the deplorables.
The problem Bellafante sees now is that Woody Allen was sexually attracted to young women, like the 17-year-old in the movie. Bellafante says "17-year-old girl," but 17 is and was the age of consent in New York. I guess if only the characters in the movie were more plausibly proximate in age, it would have been just fine to shape your life around high-level literary taste and look down at everyone who's not up there with you.
Posts
167 comments:
It was beautifully shot.
Rich, famous older man wants to bed young, hot women.
Stop the presses!
I've seen Manhattan a couple times. Liked it. But over the last few years, my wife has drifted into woke and one of the movie tropes she can't stomach anymore is the older man/younger woman romance. Yes, I get it, she's too young for him and none of his "sophisticated" friends seem to mind or even notice. But are we going to watch the movie or not? Because if we're going to watch it, then we need to accept that his girlfriend is too young for him.
If there's another version today and your fourteen year old is smitten by it, you screwed up.
My parents were big into Woody Allen movies; saw many of them in my teenage years. Rather than lusting after the urbane lifestyle, I was too busy thinking: "WHAT do those attractive young women SEE in Woody ALLEN???" To me, he looks like a worm with glasses. NEVER understood the attraction.
It's a generational thing. People I know loved and were influenced by Allen's movies and have trouble with him now.
Annie Hall was his peak, though. Manhattan was already problematic.
"Yes, I get it, she's too young for him..."
So Woody doesn't follow the 'half plus seven' rule?
Of course, no reason why he should.
Mariel Hemingway: she was one of the great ones. It was a womanly thing she did, that thing with the breast implants (for Personal Best and Star 80 and Playboy).
I was never into Woody Allen except his aphorism, "Half of success in life is just showing up."
I preferred John Wayne, like a lot of deplorables.
I just re-watched Star Wars for the umpteenth time and it just keeps getting more horrible: Obi Wan Kenobi's a compulsive liar, Luke could give a shit after his Aunt and Uncle are left literally smoldering in front of him, etc.
Mia Farrow is a NewAger. I've read actresses mention discussing astrology with her. I believe Woody based merely on that fact.
There was a feminist theme in the 90s where a few older women were making their way into the C suites of some old line corporations. These women were confused and frustrated that 20 something men weren't taking an interest in them the same way young women were attracted to their male peers. The women's magazines were writing think pieces shaming the young men. As if that would solve things...
Point being some older women really don't hate the older/younger romance, they're just mad they don't have one...
Back in the day, he was a comic and cinematic genius. Today, he is pariah. Sha! Shanda!
- Krumhorn
"Feminists themselves were in on the game."
Cuz liberation is about equality, you see: no more sex for commitment, let's have sex for sex. Althouse argued it just yesterday right here.
And of course Woody is the traditional good catch, hence worthy of teenage-girl fantasies: rich, famous, witty, though ugly. The kind of guy a rational attractive woman might put out for.
"it’s that we were perfectly content to look and see virtue."
Did you really see "virtue"? How do you define virtue? Of course, virtue here could mean: young women rationally trade sex for resources. And "feminism" makes the trade seem so much nicer. Feminism is the real fantasy.
"The problem Bellafante sees now is that Woody Allen was sexually attracted to young women"
Which is very strange and creepy! An older man was sexually attracted to young women: who could have imagined?
Michael K said...
I was never into Woody Allen except his aphorism, "Half of success in life is just showing up."
I showed up and then quackery happened.
Certainly rhhardin can name all the movies shaming older men with younger women. I bet he's great on trivia night...
The 17-year-old girl was Mariel Hemingway, Ernest's granddaughter, named after the port of Mariel in Cuba.
(remember the Mariel boatlift?)
She said the aptly-named "Woody" tried to seduce her too.
https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/03/woody-allen-mariel-hemingway-manhattan
I was already moving into the world of MANHATTAN by the time the movie came out, although I was moving into the lower-rent end of that world. The main thing about that world I didn't like was that so many of its denizens were "liberals," although that was a time when "liberals" still believed in free speech and hadn't gone completely bonkers. And it was nice that people in that world (in contrast to the Archie Bunker world of Queens where I grew up) valued some of things I valued most: chiefly, books, the arts, etc. And as a kind of a palate cleanse from all the lockstep "liberalism," I could hang out as often as possible at the old Laissez Faire Bookstore on Mercer Street where people were both culturally literate AND pro-freedom. Now I live in a Sun Belt cultural wasteland where people, if they read books at all, seem to read mostly books on Jesus or on how to get rich in Real Estate by the time you're thirty. Makes me miss my old MANHATTAN world.
The Crack Emcee said...Luke could give a shit after his Aunt and Uncle are left literally smoldering in front of him
They just got in the way of his dreams, anyway. Life was much more exciting once the Empire freed him from their shackles.
I just re-watched Star Wars for the umpteenth time and it just keeps getting more horrible: Obi Wan Kenobi's a compulsive liar, Luke could give a shit after his Aunt and Uncle are left literally smoldering in front of him, etc.
The Pitch Meeting for Star Wars is good. Well, all the pitch meetings are good..
I guess the age of consent at 17 is where the notion of age appropriate dating became the equation: Half your age + 7, such that 20 year-olds can date 17 year-olds.
As for Bellafonte; the fact that a woman between 14 and 19 wants to live in a world with an exploitative older man is why the latter exist. Young boys like to live in such worlds too with older women, but nobody creates #MeToo movements for young boys even though the social and moral harm is essentially the same. By the way, Disney loves to create these worlds and broadcast them on their cable channel for kids and, no, I'm not suggesting Disney does so to provide access and harm to the youths. Not all harm is sexual. Most of it is creating an expectation based on a fantasy that doesn't actually materialize at an older age.
Oh, and here is Mariel Hemingway (the 17 year old girl) views of "Manhatten" from last October. It's a bad read, because it decides to make the whole thing about Donald Trump, because unlike Mariel and her famous grandfather, Trump is a teetolaler. How dare Trump not have mental health addiction problems!
There was a spate of movies in the early 5os like "Sabrina" with hilarious May-December hookups and it warped my mind. Like Fred Astaire with Leslie Caron, William Holden with Audrey Hepburn. I can't remember them all.
Because of course you're not going to cast some old hag to work with this Big Male Star! Are you kidding? It seemed so normal back then. I think that's where Allen is coming from. Besides lust of course.
Are we still talking movies? When I bring home couple of lobsters for dinner they are always named Sid and Nancy...
Apparently I'm in a wandering, Ann state of mind today...
Bilwick said...Makes me miss my old MANHATTAN world.
Liberals would be pretty great people if they could just shut up about their stupid politics.
Leland said...nobody creates #MeToo movements for young boys
If Harold and Maude is ever cancelled, it will be because Maude is Jewish.
The entire premise of Manhattan is that his girlfriend is far too young for him. Legal, but far too young for him. If you can’t accept the premise, the movie is probably not for you.
As for Mia Farrow, my rule is to never believe allegations made during a bitter divorce unless the allegations are proved beyond a reasonable doubt — especially when the allegations are being made by a person named “Mia Farrow.”
The most amusing aspect of the movie to me is that the Mariel Hemingway character is the most balanced and least neurotic of all of them. She moves on from Woody at the end.
When I was 25, the guy I was dating and I met up with a former colleague (who was in his 30s) for a drink. He was with a date. She was still in high school. It was weird.
Re the rule that a guy can date a woman half his age +7:
Subtract one year from the woman/girl's age for every 100K in his retirement account.
It works out well for both parties.
"She said the aptly-named "Woody" tried to seduce her too."
Woody has an excuse (not that he needs one).
Mariel was crazy hot at 17 and every single day thereafter.
Do an image search and tell me I'm lying : )
Tim M said (10:23):
Liberals would be pretty great people if they could just shut up about their stupid politics.
Tim is conflating liberals and leftists.
There are very few liberals on the ground.
Liberals are/were people who believe in free speech, limited government, live-and-let-live.
These people are all on the right today; not to say that all on the right agree, but no one on the left is in that group.
"When I was 25, the guy I was dating and I met up with a former colleague (who was in his 30s) for a drink. He was with a date. She was still in high school. It was weird."
So you met Jerry Seinfeld?
I love Woody Allen movies. It never occurred to me that they should be taken as aspirational. Seeing them as aspirational strikes me as a very funny error.
There was a spate of movies in the early 5os like "Sabrina" with hilarious May-December hookups and it warped my mind. Like Fred Astaire with Leslie Caron, William Holden with Audrey Hepburn.
Not to mention Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn in Funny Face — Astaire seems almost elderly and Hepburn seems almost child-like. That’s the cinematic tradition Allen was celebrating and mocking as he celebrated and mocked his own desires.
Yes she was seventeen but that's 32 in Bogdanovich years...
Will Woody be Lincolnized or Churchillated? You know, the way the bright/dims do it now, where they take some undeniably great person from the past and then trawl through their life history and find something to second guess according to today's standards.
Here in Illinois ("Land of Lincoln") the bright/dims in Chicago are after the Lincoln statues because he wasn't nice enough to some murderous Dakota Indians in 1863. Well, since we like to trawl the past for horror, let's think about this: my wife's great grandmother was a survivor of one of those Minnesota Dakota Indian massacres. She was a six year old who saw her father, her mother, her grandfather, and her 8 year old brother killed when their ox-drawn wagon was attacked. She survived by hiding under the wagon seat, and she was covered in her father's blood. Her two year old brother was also overlooked and was left wandering through woods.
Wiser people than we leave the past alone, but if we want to revisit it, Lincoln did the right thing by hanging those murderers. And he did other great things, too.
A mid-50s Carey Grant wanted to marry 23-year-old Sophia Loren and she turned him down.
She married Carlo Ponti (45) instead.
You can't blame Grant for trying : )
take the money and run, bananas sleeper, you might put in annie hall there,
your father is a hulking beast, that murdered children, and was maimed by my hand, doesn't really work as much for motivation,
if the empire had seized the droids, they would have vaporized the rebels, not very edifying,
now lucas's notion that nixon was the emperor, that was silly, as mauler would put it,
" "Half of success in life is just showing up."
My favorite Woody Allen line is: "Those who can't do, teach. And those who can't teach, teach gym."
Mike K mentioned John Wayne.
In The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, a 55-years-young John Wayne loses out on the affections of 33-year-old Vera Miles, to a fresh-from-college 54-year-old James Stewart.
My theory is that all the directors, producers, etc. in Hollywood at this time were 54 years old.
They considered older men getting the young girls to be a romantic ideal.
I am not a big Woody Allen fan overall, but I loved "Manhattan" and "Annie Hall". Much of the rest of his films mostly bore me, though.
I don't care what he did in his personal life- I separate that from how I view the films he made. I did the same think for Roman Polanski, and his case is more definitive and extreme at the same time- in other words, "Chinatown" is in my top three favorite films of all time, and will likely stay there given the shit being produced today.
William Holden? You mean Humphrey Bogart.
half your age plus 7 works just fine.
almost exactly the ratio when I met my current woman (I was 41, she was about to turn 29).
"Seeing them as aspirational strikes me as a very funny error."
Woody's neurosis was comically on display. You didn't want to be like his characters or live in his world. HE didn't want to be like him, but he was stuck with it. And his "intellectualism" was so transparently shallow that we can only laugh at his characters and their ridiculous pretensions. "Love and Death"? He was making fun of a certain sort of person that he was pretending to be.
17 was age of consent so Woody cast a 16 year old.
Joe Smith said...
A mid-50s Carey Grant wanted to marry 23-year-old Sophia Loren and she turned him down.
She married Carlo Ponti (45) instead.
The studios had a problem with her when she first came to Hollywood because she didn't like having to shave her armpits. I'm sure it didn't bother Carlo.
That older men romance younger women, even 17 year olds is a part of the real world, Mary.
The documentary Allen v. Farrow changed my thinking about that situation. I used to think that Allen was innocent, but now I think he was guilty.
One he glommed onto Soon-Yi, his partner's adopted DAUGHTER, didn't wanna see him or his films. He's an asshole w/no self-control.
Mike Sylwester said...
"The documentary Allen v. Farrow changed my thinking about that situation. I used to think that Allen was innocent, but now I think he was guilty."
How? You're taking the word of a fantasist.
I can readily assume that Mia Farrow was vindictive and coached her daughter to make those charges. I can also readily assume that Woody Allen was capable of such desires and acting on them. It's kind of like Meghan Markle and the Royal Family. They're all guilty but you don't know who has the most guilt....Woody Allen made many movies that were worth seeing. He was probably some kind of perv, but, by and large, he was less of a perv than Charlie Chaplin. What's the word on Charlie Chaplin? Are his movies still worth seeing?......Let the free market decide: Lucas picked up several billion dollars when he sold the rights to Star Wars. Woody Allen never went hungry, but he never made that kind of money. If only Woody Allen had been into incest instead of child molestation.
That film always squicked me.
I was surprised more people around me did not notice.
And I agree with the poster above who never saw what other women did in Woody Allen.
Sexual turnoff. Which made the 17 and a senior in HS thing even more problematic.
"William Holden? You mean Humphrey Bogart."
Yeah. Even worse. Weren't they both in love with her in that flick?
The hollyweird producers were like, hey what's the problem? I mean Chaplin got away with it.
The Crack Emcee at 11:05 AM
You're taking the word of a fantasist.
The documentary includes statements from several people who did not belong to Farrow's family but who spent much time with the family during the years in question. I thought those statements were quite compelling.
In Manhattan, Woody Allen makes crystal clear that the "adults" are acting like spoiled children, and that Tracey, the youngest person, is, ironically, the most mature, grounded and honest character in the film. When Woody's character shows upk and insists, ridiculously, that she cancel her trip at the last minute, she calls out his solipsism & casual cruelty in rejecting her and then expecting her to drop everything at his whim. She then reassures him that "not everybody gets corrupted" & suggests that"you have to have a little faith in people". She is clearly not being used.
I always liked older men - it's a substitute for a few more IQ points.
But it gets really problematic at the end. And forget about having kids because he's probably done with it and cut.
Win-win for prancing, leering old goats.
Some reality is suspended when you watch movies. If think most people realize that even with martial arts training, the average 100 lb. woman cannot readily dispatch those henchmen who have the bad luck to try to mess with her....Cary Grant, Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn were larger than their roles. People wanted to see Cary Grant flirt with Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire dance with Audrey Hepburn. Who wouldn't? They have different rules on Mt.Olympus.
I was just never into that particular scenario.
The seventies and even into the mid eighties were kind of weird times as far as age of consent goes. We were still not out of the very long period of history where seeing relatively young girls as sexual objects was ok.
I've been thinking lately about movies like Porkies, or even (the beloved) John Hughs films. There was a lot of women portraying teenagers being naked and sexy. Movies made by adults for adults. Getting salacious views of naked "teenaged" girls.
I remember when Mollie Ringwald finally talked John Hughes out of having a naked girl in the shower scene in one of the movies she starred it. Good for her.
It never occurred to me that they should be taken as aspirational. Seeing them as aspirational strikes me as a very funny error.
You might not want to look like Woody Allen, but maybe you wanted to be funny like him. Also, yes, he and the characters in his movies are jerks, but they are jerks in an interesting, stimulating, and sophisticated environment, and you might want to live in that environment. I certainly did.
From Dallas and Dynasty to Billions and Succession, television has portrayed the lives of the rich as decadent and depraved and horrible, yet people still want that life. You can be sure that most intellectuals aren't great people, yet many still long for their kind of life.
I don't want to believe that Woody molested his daughter. The assumption that because he'd go after the 6 or 7 year old because he went after the 16 or 17 year old (I'm not sure about the ages) is flawed. But it's an assumption a mother might make in good faith after losing her daughter to her lover. I don't buy the "Mia made it all up" argument. I suppose she saw things that were ambiguous and interpreted them as molestation.
Woody and Mia are both wretched people one wouldn't want to be around, but I don't go with the "blame her because he's a genius, and hey, guys are like that" argument. What turned me off to his movies at first, though, was that he wasn't really as intellectual as I assumed he was. After the scandal, all the innuendos started to go sour as well.
wild chicken said...
"William Holden? You mean Humphrey Bogart."
Yeah. Even worse. Weren't they both in love with her in that flick?
The hollyweird producers were like, hey what's the problem? I mean Chaplin got away with it.
So did Bogart. Lauren Bacall was only 22 when they got married, he was 46.
Ms. Hemingway didn't look 17, and it was hard to consider it "child abuse" when she was taller than Woody. in fact, that was absurdity of the movie; that 17 y/o Ms. Hemingway would be in love with a 43 y/o Woody Allen. Because what? She liked to go to Jazz clubs and listen to Miles Davis?
Manhattan is one of my favorite Woody movies and prefer to Annie Hall. But that doesn't mean I think its realistic! Its one of those "Isn't NYC great movies" that overlooked the poverty, the crime, and 40% of the city that was black/Hispanic. It portrayed NYC is same positive way that On the Town did in 1949, and Pillow talk did in 1950s.
The sweater that looks like a school backpack is a cute touch.
when i saw the movie, i didn't care about her being 17, I just thought she was a bad actress and and wondered why the woody allen character wasn't going to with Diane Keaton.
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance may not be a good example. Casting tricky when the film is set in two periods 25 years apart.
Test. My comments (2 so far) are not posting.
Narr
Blogger screwing with Althouse again?
Thank you, Professor. I know the rules are not to suggest topics for you to write about, however this was one (honestly) when I read the article I hoped you would comment. Not disappointed!
In the movie Dirty Dancing, the main character Baby Houseman is 17 years old. In an earlier script, the character Johnny Castle was described as just a few years older (something like 20, as I recall).
However, the character Johnny was played by the actor Patrick Swayze, who was about 35 years old when the movie was made. In other words, Swayze was almost twice the age of the character Baby. The movie does not indicate Johnny's age, but Swayze obviously was much older than 17.
In the movie's very first scene, Baby remarks that she wants to marry a man like her father. The relationship between Baby and her father evolves through the entire movie. In the movie's final minutes, the father says that he is proud of her. That is the moment when many females in the movie audience burst into tears.
So, although the movie was supposed to be about a romance between two young people who were only a few years apart in age, the movie turned out to be (because the actor turned out to be Swayze) a romance between a 17-year-old girl and a man in his mid-thirties.
I have seen Star Wars, beginning to end, exactly one time in my life- the first time I saw it in a theater in 1978. I liked the movie as I was a 12 year old at the time, but I never liked it enough to watch it again, even on cable television or VHS when it became available in the 1980s. I have seen The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi multiple times since they were much better films in my opinion, even though they also have some serious plot holes in them. For a long time I thought it might have been due to the fact that I didn't get to see the film the year it was released- I saw it over a year later when the hullaballoo had already died down.
It makes sense to me now that Star Wars didn't exactly thrill me like the subsequent two films, but only after I watched the prequels. George Lucas is a terrible screenwriter and a not very talented director, something you only notice when you have seen more than one or two of his efforts.
It's kind of like Meghan Markle and the Royal Family. They're all guilty but you don't know who has the most guilt.
I felt the same way about the Royals and Diana. It was more about all the supporters on each side. They each went so far in attacking the other side that one started to sympathize with that other side. But the counterattacks were so over-the-top that in the end it was "a plague on both your houses."
In the classic movies, Woody's character had his friend and sidekick serve as a foil. Tony Roberts or Michael Murphy acts like an ass or does the reprehensible thing so that Woody's character looks good by comparison. Today, this looks like a way of whitewashing his relationship with a high school girl.
Also problematic, Wonder Wheel which turned the Mia-type character, once likeable, into (essentially) a murderer who lets a man die because of her jealousy. Spoiler alert! That really left a bad aftertaste.
Mike Sylwester said...
"The documentary includes statements from several people who did not belong to Farrow's family but who spent much time with the family during the years in question."
So what? Do they make her stop being a fantasist?
how many people remember Stanley Kauffmann, the NR film critic. I have a copy of his reviews, and in reviewing Manhattan, he stated that he was one of the "Manhattan Intellectual Elite" that Woody was describing. I found that unintentionally hilarious.
When you're a teenager, these people DO seem like super-smarties having witty conversations about Mahler being "overrated". but when you learn a little bit, its obvious they're just a bunch of superficial, middlebrow dingbats playing at being "Intellectual".
We were watching an episode of "Pretend It's a City" and out of nowhere I say, "She's better than Woody Allen."
My wife roared.
Guess you had to be there.
I always thought Diane Keaton was the best leading female in the woody allen movies. But she had enough woody allen after "Annie Hall" and moved on to bigger things. And yes, I know, she made one more movie with him.
I bet woody now thinks: Damn, if only I could have married diane keaton instead of Mia!
MayBee said...I remember when Mollie Ringwald finally talked John Hughes out of having a naked girl in the shower scene in one of the movies she starred it. Good for her.
Before the invention of PG-13, R was the highest grossing movie rating. So a lot of movies had a gratuitous nude scene. Nothing to do with the movie, it was just thrown in to get the rating. When PG-13 came out, it quickly became the highest grossing category and all that stopped.
"George Lucas is a terrible screenwriter and a not very talented director, something you only notice when you have seen more than one or two of his efforts."
Bull - he's just too in his head (and ahead of the curve) to be consistent: I'd put "THX-1138" "American Graffiti" and "Star Wars" (plus "Raiders of the Lost Ark" which he wrote) with the best of entertainment.
Linda Darnell made "The mark of zorro" in 1940 when she was 17, and has started making pictures when she was 16 in 1939. They liked 'em young back then.
I've been watching this docuseries and it's pretty much atrocious. It's just too interesting to watch all that much misery and delusion on full display: by Mia Farrow, by Dylan Farrow, by the people in the Farrow orbit, by all the talking heads that come on to opine about the case. Knowing a bit about the case already I have my biases (rooted in fact, but biases nonetheless). Mia Farrow is a horribly abusive person, a tyrant in the family who brainwashed her daughter into believing she was molested, which in my book makes Mia guilty of molestation even though it never actually happened. It's enough that Dylan believes it happened. Obviously she wanted to alienate the family against Woody, and maybe send him to prison. She had that goal, and she didn't care about the emotional trauma she inflicted on everyone in the process.
And she's still at it. With the way American society has changed in the last five years, Mia has a bigger audience and more sympathetic coverage of the allegations. This docuseries is total propaganda for Mia and it's a little distressing how many people are being hoodwinked, especially journalists. As propaganda I don't even think it's very effective. It just feels almost quasi-religious and unthinking in how it treats the allegations and the investigations.
But I can't stop watching.
You know who's "overrated"? Saul Bellow. That's who.
Gotta Go. Great discussion. but i find the whole mia-woody thing boring. I mean its been going on for how long now? 20 years? I don't care who was telling the truth. To me woody vs. mia is like stalin vs. Hitler.
Too bad they both can't lose.
Star Wars? A yuuge step backward in scifi cinema!
IDGAFF what Woody did or didn't, outside the pleasure I derive from his early work.
Legal is legal.
Narr
Case closed
bleh said...
"I've been watching this docuseries and it's pretty much atrocious. It's just too interesting to watch all that much misery and delusion on full display"
Mia Farrow - NewAge. Meghan Makle - NewAge. Oprah Winfrey - NewAge. Princes Diana - NewAge. Prince Charles - NewAge. Alec Baldwin's lying wife - NewAge. The wife of Chris Cuomo's lying ass - NewAge. Dr. Oz's wife - NewAge. Gwyneth Paltrow - NewAge.
It's no wonder that, when so much of society moves to what these lying hypocritical freaks of nature are doing, y'all can't see there's a difference between a fantasist and someone who isn't. Hell, it didn't alarm a single person when Obama campaigned with Oprah as a "Lightworker". This society is indoctrinated not to see the obvious.
It's really sad, Man.
You'e simply so gone you don't know any different.
rcocean said...
"Too bad they both can't lose."
This is like wishing medicine could fall with homeopathy.
From silent running and soylent green, ok
America Graffiti is the best thing he did as a screenwriter and director, Crack. Yes, he is a bit ahead of the curve as a creator and visionary of how technology can be used in film, but not as a director or screenwriter. And, note, he didn't screenwrite "Graffiti" alone- he had co-writers. He also didn't write the screenplay to "Raiders" either, Lawrence Kasdan did that, and, of course, he didn't direct "Raiders".
Lucas is good at creating ideas and stories for movies, but when he does the screenwriting and directing, he usually fails spectacularly. His biggest mistake was in screenwriting and directing the prequels- if he had done that for "Raiders", I promise you that we mostly wouldn't be remembering the film fondly today.
" Movies have always provided dream material for the young."
Actually, no. Movies have only been shaping people's perceptions of the World for a little over a century. And what a great century it was! Right?
I agree with Biotrekker. The young Hemingway (Tracy) wins in Manhattan because she is the mature one, free (so far) of the intellectual cant of Manhattan. Does the older Woody hope he can lecture her to his heart's content, without getting much pushback? With the Diane Keaton character (Mary), both here and in Annie Hall, he could hardly get a word in edgewise. I had a friend who said Manhattan is the better movie, and Tracy is the better girlfriend/spouse material.
I turned 23 in 1979, and I was caught up in these two movies. At his most arrogant, Woody bordered on saying snarky intellectuals, who talk more than they think, ought to rule. Kind of like the New Yorker. But the more noble suggestion is that it is great to live in a place where such people are free, and sometimes amusing/entertaining. There is no persecution or puritanism. Yes, an idealized New York; gritty New York is invisible. Is Dog Day Afternoon better?
" nobody creates #MeToo movements for young boys even though the social and moral harm is essentially the same."
Oh, get over it. Young boys may well suffer emotional (and also physical) harm from sexual relations with older men, but not with older women, unless some really bizarre element is present. A girl who has sex with an older man may eventually come to feel that she was taken advantage of when he tires of her and discards her. A boy is never going to think anything except "Wow! Was I lucky to get to hit that!"
Such people imagine themselves smart because they are well versed in their own urban (dependent) environment and can negotiate it in ways an outsider could not, but in a rural or other self-reliant environment they are totally incompetent and far from smart. It's the way the self-regarded elites disparage, hate, and willingly defraud those they regard as deplorables that shows the blindness of their high self-regard.
At times in my life I have been attracted to that urban lifestyle, but I never thought it was superior, just easier and more hedonistic fun, which is what makes it so attractive to the young.
Just watched this again after getting it on bluray last week, the way I've always wanted to experience Gordon Willis' cinematography. It's not as if Allen's character was a Svengali. He spent most of the film encouraging her to have other experiences, reminding her that their affair was light and casual, and that he expected her to move on. It's only at the end that he realizes he is in love with her. She turns out to be the wiser one in that scene, just as she's the more level-headed one throughout the film despite their age difference. And part of the point of the movie was these New Yorkers immersing themselves into complicated romantic situations as a means of distracting from dealing with the more difficult aspects of life.
For the woke who profess everything else involving love and sex to be shades of grey and consensual, they sure have the same old bitterness and tunnel vision regarding men biologically preferring the fertile physical beauty and lesser cynicism of younger women (even as the younger women in these relationships are attracted to the wealth and stability that older men can generally offer in return). That's not the same as taking advantage of each other... it's win-win for the participants.
So that explains that photo of Loren and Jayne Mansfield... Loren wasn’t scoping Mansfield’s impressive rack, she was looking out of the corner of her eye, straining to see if Jayne shaved her armpits.
I can happily watch Apocalypto and Twin Peaks S03.E13 every few months.
"Let's go back to starting position. It's really much more comfortable."
Oh and probably most of the Coen bros stuff.
"My parents were big into Woody Allen movies; saw many of them in my teenage years. Rather than lusting after the urbane lifestyle, I was too busy thinking: "WHAT do those attractive young women SEE in Woody ALLEN???" To me, he looks like a worm with glasses. NEVER understood the attraction."
Flip answer: He was the writer, director, and star of the movie. The attraction is baked in.
Non-flip answer: Women (and men) can be charmed and seduced by persons who have wit, humor, intelligence, warmth, and many other qualities besides good looks. Sometimes it can be pheromones, (or something else intangible).
I remember when I was young and working at a restaurant as a cashier, there was one waitress who was built like Olive Oyl, and who was plain-faced--not ugly, but not attractive in any noticeable way--plain-faced. However, after I got to know her, I became terribly attracted to her. When she would come near me, I would get light-headed with physical desire. (For several reasons, most prominently my shyness, we did not ever become involved, though I could tell she was attracted to me, as well.)
What was it? I can't say. It remains a mystery to me. I still regret I didn't try to become involved with her.
"The studios had a problem with her when she first came to Hollywood because she didn't like having to shave her armpits. I'm sure it didn't bother Carlo."
I'm sure you've seen movies and photos of 20-something Sophia Loren.
That would not be a deal-breaker for me : )
Oh, get over it. Young boys may well suffer emotional (and also physical) harm from sexual relations with older men, but not with older women, unless some really bizarre element is present.
Like a husband walking in. That thought crossed my mind at age 15 a couple of times.
Readering: The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance may not be a good example. Casting tricky when the film is set in two periods 25 years apart.
The men were still a decade too old for the older time frame. But if you want another example, Rio Brave with a 52-year-old John Wayne and the 28-year-old Angie Dickenson and the 31-year old Estelita Rodriguez. It is hard to unsee these mismatches and hard not to think that casting appropriate age range love interests would improve the dramatic impact.
rcocean: You know who's "overrated"? Saul Bellow. That's who.
I have hated him in every movie that I've seen him in.
"I was already moving into the world of MANHATTAN by the time the movie came out, although I was moving into the lower-rent end of that world. The main thing about that world I didn't like was that so many of its denizens were "liberals," although that was a time when "liberals" still believed in free speech and hadn't gone completely bonkers. And it was nice that people in that world (in contrast to the Archie Bunker world of Queens where I grew up) valued some of things I valued most: chiefly, books, the arts, etc. And as a kind of a palate cleanse from all the lockstep "liberalism," I could hang out as often as possible at the old Laissez Faire Bookstore on Mercer Street where people were both culturally literate AND pro-freedom. Now I live in a Sun Belt cultural wasteland where people, if they read books at all, seem to read mostly books on Jesus or on how to get rich in Real Estate by the time you're thirty. Makes me miss my old MANHATTAN world."
When MANHATTAN came out, I was still living in Jacksonville, FL, where I saw the movie. A bit more than a year later I had moved to Manhattan, where I still reside today. I have seen NYC go through dramatic changes, but I have LOVED this city for every day I've lived here. In about a year or a little more, I'll have left NYC for a return to the South, (though not Florida). I miss NYC every day I'm still living here, but I'm confident I'll adapt. (My biggest fear is not being near any decent bookstores.)
We know from one of the later Star Wars films, that the Droids were soldiers impressed from among the poorer subjects of the Empire. Some of these Droids were actually people of color....Han, Luke and even Princess Leia killed these poor soldiers with genocidal gusto. Through awakened eyes, it's impossible not to look at these three so called "rebels" as nothing but mass murderers. The Empire may, like the Aztec and Inca Empires, have had its share of flaws, but that doesn't give these three adventurers carte blanche to murder its minions. Awakened citizens should look upon Luke and Han the way we look upon Cortes and Pizarro as people not worthy of our respect or admiration. I would even go further: the early Star Wars films should be banned. Such movies encourage genocide. The later movies where the heroes are female or men of color, however, are masterpieces and should be shown repeatedly.
It's only at the end that he realizes he is in love with her.
But is he really, or is it more self-deceptive BS?
There's no one right answer, and that's something that contributes to the movie's being worth seeing. You can feel his character's emotion, and still question just how real it is.
"Oh, get over it. Young boys may well suffer emotional (and also physical) harm from sexual relations with older men, but not with older women, unless some really bizarre element is present."
Why do you think there would be any difference? Young boys--teenagers--may find relations with older person to be either pleasurable or traumatic--whether the older partner is male or female--depending on many circumstances, not least of which being the young boy's own degrees of desire, consent, relative emotional maturity, and self-awareness.
Manhattan is one of my favorite Woody movies and prefer to Annie Hall. But that doesn't mean I think its realistic!
I just assumed It was a work of fiction. You roll with the absurdities, even when the story echos real life. The NYT doesn't write long think pieces about Superman flying, does it?
"Cary Grant, Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn were larger than their roles."
Well I certainly bought into all that, but looking at from today's woke perspective it looks pretty strange.
Like Proust or Dostoyevsky's characters yearning for a little girl to *dandle* on their knee. What was that all about.
"Why do you think there would be any difference? Young boys--teenagers--may find relations with older person to be either pleasurable or traumatic--whether the older partner is male or female--depending on many circumstances, not least of which being the young boy's own degrees of desire, consent, relative emotional maturity, and self-awareness."
Being sodomized comes to mind...
Au contraire the storm troopers were more like conquistadors corellia might be a lite closer to the center but tatooine was emote.
@Joe Smith: Sophia Loren didn’t even shave her mustache, and I’m a heterosexual woman, and that’s still not a deal-breaker for me.
Woody Allen’s entire schtick was that he was a neurotic nebbishy Jewish intellectual victimized by his passion and revulsion towards the elite childlike NYC WASPs, a quickly fading (though large in the literary imagination) breed even then. Mia Farrow’s schtick was to look like a pre-menstrual anorexic. Who wants to go through life listening to child-women in hats talk about their ideas in fern bars? It has to be a fetish.
I find the whole Goodbye Columbus resentment thing distasteful and self-indulgent, if not rankly prejudiced towards the despised Shiksas. I learned the hard way to avoid such men early on. I guess I have Woody Allen movies to thank for that.
There’s little fun in dating someone who is dating you to piss off his mother.
How can anyone say Saul Bellow is over-rated? Bellow was a genius, like Updike, and he was early cancel-cultured along with Updike for narrating raw truths about race and gender relations in America, both with great compassion, which didn’t save them.
One thing I never noticed but which became apparent to me once he admitted it in an interview, Woody Allen based his film persona to a great degree on Bob Hope's film persona. Once Allen revealed that, I could see it plainly.
Two words: Leonard Zelig, the human chameleon.
When I was a teenager, I didn't get Woody Allen movies. I thought they all seemed like huge assholes, and I didn't want to be anything like them.
"Being sodomized comes to mind...."
As I said, this could be experienced as either pleasurable or traumatic, depending on many circumstances, not least being the young (teen-age) boy's (or girl's) own degrees of desire, consent, relative emotional maturity, and self-awareness.
That aside, not all homosexuals engage in anal sex. (Sodomy is a general term, and covers oral sex, as well.)
Later, the realization that you're not supposed to want to be like them.
Here is something I can only say in the comfort and safety of cyber space. In her later years, Carrie Fisher was not a movie star. As as writer and stage performer, she was witty and perceptive, and it was worth observing her observations on life in Hollywood. But she did not have the appeal of a movie star. In that last Star Wars film, you couldn't help but think how much crueler the ravages of time had been to her than to Harrison Ford. The Maid Marian of Errol Flynn's Robin Hood held it together in old age and so did Carrie Fisher's mom, but Carrie had no such luck. I guess she was age appropriate for Harrison Ford, but there was no longer any spark between them.
If the subject is morally ambivalent Woody Allen movies, Crimes and Misdemeanors and Match Point are far more subversive than Manhattan.
The Crack Emcee said...
I just re-watched Star Wars for the umpteenth time
so, what's your opinion on droids as slaves?
https://freebeacon.com/culture/are-droids-slaves/
The Jedi (and the Whole "Republic") are racist (speciesist?) slime!
FREE The DROIDS! where is R2D2's reparations ??
Tina Trent said...There’s little fun in dating someone who is dating you to piss off his mother.
Is that a Milo Yiannapoulis reference?
Robert Cook said...I miss NYC every day I'm still living here, but I'm confident I'll adapt. (My biggest fear is not being near any decent bookstores.)
The carry out culture--the lack of a decent Chinese or Mexican restaurant on every block. Pizza too. What I really miss most is the sense of possibility--that anything can happen at any moment. And P.S. 1--there's no other museum like it. But, day to day, it's the quick cheap bite of good food that's easy to get.
My life is a lot easier now, but it's also more boring.
makes crystal clear that the "adults" are acting like spoiled children, and that Tracey, the youngest person, is, ironically, the most mature, grounded and honest character in the film.
Also the plot of every Disney Channel series.
gilbar said...
"so, what's your opinion on droids as slaves?"
Who gives a fuck - they're droids. The Stormtroopers are black guys like me - they deserve reparations.
When my wife’s grandmother was 17 she was married and mothering her first. She went on to birth seven. One died of the Spanish flu. The other six grew to adulthood. Two were WW2 marines, one became a multi millionaire car dealer, two were business executives with a myriad of accomplishments. Collectively they raised a massive brood of hardworking productive citizens. Not one of them has ever taken a dime of welfare. Or any of the other handouts so plentiful in modern day America.
F*** Woody Allen. And all who sail in him.
”The carry out culture--the lack of a decent Chinese or Mexican restaurant on every block. Pizza too. What I really miss most is the sense of possibility--that anything can happen at any moment. And P.S. 1--there's no other museum like it. But, day to day, it's the quick cheap bite of good food that's easy to get.
“My life is a lot easier now, but it's also more boring.“
Well said.
Most are scots like domhall gleeson or brits like richard grant.
Why do you think there would be any difference? Young boys--teenagers--may find relations with older person to be either pleasurable or traumatic--whether the older partner is male or female--depending on many circumstances, not least of which being the young boy's own degrees of desire, consent, relative emotional maturity, and self-awareness.
I agree, and it is also so with young women/girls. I suspect many are just fine with it, and I suspect many more were until they were told that it was wrong (looking at you, Ms. Ford).
Robert, you'll have to find a college town down here to have much chance of being near a decent bookstore. The Research Triangle in NC attracts a lot of people, and you're close
to the ocean and the hills.
I'd go there myself were I not so attached to this place, with all its faults.
Narr
Nobody canceled Allen, Bellow, or Updike for me
Who gives a fuck - they're droids
well, alright then!
I knew a Muslim North African who said EXACTLY the Same thing; word for word...
But, he pronounced it as: Who gives a fuck - they're Christians
gilbar said...
Who gives a fuck - they're droids
well, alright then!
I knew a Muslim North African who said EXACTLY the Same thing; word for word...
But, he pronounced it as: Who gives a fuck - they're Christians
I love it: I just pointed out to you that the victims are black guys - even in Star Wars - and you're still defending non-humans.
Nothing racist about you.
They were centurions, on the border worlds.
I avoid Allen’s movies like the plague.
He isn’t doing anything illegal.
So, he should make movies the way he wants to make them and ignore the bullshit artists.
"How can anyone say Saul Bellow is over-rated? Bellow was a genius, like Updike, and he was early cancel-cultured along with Updike for narrating raw truths about race and gender relations in America, both with great compassion, which didn’t save them."
Saul Bellow is a bore. Who reads him? Who ever read him? His prose is deader than a 3-day old run-over Goldfish.
"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work; I want to achieve immortality through not dying. I don't want to live on in the hearts of my countrymen; I want to live on in my apartment.”
I love Woody Allen. I believe Woody Allen. I believe Moses Farrow, his and Mia's adopted son, the therapist, who says that Mia Farrow is crazy, pretty much, and infected the other children. Moses Farrow said Woody would never do such a thing as he was accused of and, furthemore, Moses was there the whole day it was supposed to have happened and it could not have happened as he was around the entire time.
Who gives a fuck, they're movie characters!
Except for Muslims.
Narr
Whom, fuck
This is frustrating.
Woody Allen has been making the same film for 40 years.
Urbane, as a matter of diversity, and progressive liberalization, is profane. Kneel.
Very slightly OT: The great thing about New York is that it keeps the New Yorkers in New York.
Mid-Life Lawyer at 2:40 PM
I believe Moses Farrow, his and Mia's adopted son, the therapist, who says that Mia Farrow is crazy, pretty much, and infected the other children.
That is what I thought. The documentary changed my mind.
Moses is featured in the documentary, because he and Dylan were Woody's favorite two children. He was not interviewed in the documentary, as far as I remember, but he appears and speaks a lot in the old videos.
I was impressed by a couple of people who did not belong to the Farrow family but who spent much time with that family during those years.
One was an old schoolfriend of Mia's who lived nearby and who had some children the same age as some of the Farrow children.
The other was a girlfriend of one of the older Farrow boys. She spent so much time in the Farrow home that she was considered to be a quasi-older-sister of the younger Farrow girls.
Both that neighbor and that girlfriend seemed to me to be credible in their statements about Woody's behavior with Dylan.
By the way, Farrow herself does not come across as hysterical in the documentary. She impressed me as a reasonable, thoughtful, kind woman.
I'm trying to recall--have I watched any single movie eleven times? Probably, but 11 times in five years?
Narr
That's messed up
Skippy Tisdale said...
"Woody Allen has been making the same film for 40 years."
Stop it. There is nothing remotely similar between Interiors, Deconstructing Harry, Bananas, and What's Up, Tiger Lily? except Woody. The man is a national treasure, and that was established, in movies and elsewhere, by the time Annie Hall - a work of genius - came out. Even his lesser works put most artists to shame, just for the scope of his ambitions.
I swallowed Mia's line, and I feel bad about it, because I (of all people) should've known better: Woody Allen IS me. I won't make that mistake again.
Both that neighbor and that girlfriend seemed to me to be credible in their statements about Woody's behavior with Dylan.
Thanks, but I find more credible the investigators who said the child was clearly coached by the mother.
Farrow herself does not come across as hysterical in the documentary. She impressed me as a reasonable, thoughtful, kind woman.
It’s not like Mia Farrow is some obscure person and we need to rely on a documentary to know who she is. She’s famously been doing and saying crazy shit for more than fifty years.
There’s a new pop up restaurant by my house and it is actually called fab. Isn’t that fab? It stands for food, art and beer. Get it fab.
So fab. Love it.
The closest I've ever come to watching a Woody Allen movie is when those pretzels were making me thirsty.
Mike Sylwester said...
"I was impressed by...an old schoolfriend of Mia's" - who is totally objective?
"Farrow herself does not come across as hysterical in the documentary. She impressed me as a reasonable, thoughtful, kind woman." - who just happens to be so into kooky unbelievable shit, like astrology, that it's been mentioned in celebrity articles that have nothing to do with the controversy. It's just who she is - when the cameras ae turned off. Susan Rice also comes off as smart - but she's waving sage around in her office, too. Don't become so openminded your brains fall out. As Neal deGrasse Tyson says: You will not impress me with tales of UFOS, or pictures, or videos - today, you simply HAVE to produce something that's literally from out of this world.
Mia Farrow's kookiness will not stay hidden behind film, any more than Woody's humanity will be limited by it.
So Leland and Cookie were raped as teen-agers, by grown women? And they were traumatized by it?
I guess anything is possible.
When I was a teen-ager, with long, blond hair, I had some encounters with adult males I sure as hell could have done without. I would have been happy to have similar encounters with adult females. Except maybe that one guy with the golden hearse who threatened me with a corkscrew. I actually ended up feeling sorry for him, once I got a continent between us.
As a Foster child, I've been faced with possibly every sexual experience the world has conceived for us, and can't say any of them "scarred" me, so much as gave me things to think about later - including much later as an adult. Now I don't see gays as others do because I know they force themselves on others, in a wide variety of ways, many socially acceptable. I no longer see women the same way after The New Age Movement, because I know they kill without feeling - Marianne Williamson has watched millions of gays die of AIDS while selling her "spiritual" claptrap to them. Oprah's gotten people raped and killed. Hillary, too. They - and their fans - simply do not care.
I've always known men were shit - I am one - but we were getting better. The collapse of everyone else's moral standards is a catastrophe.
"Who gives a fuck - they're droids. The Stormtroopers are black guys like me - they deserve reparations."
There will come a time when we have the technology to make robots look like people.
I predict that there will never be black-faced robots allowed in the U.S.
President Ocasio-Cortez III will forbid it.
That is how fucked-up we are as a country.
So Leland and Cookie were raped as teen-agers, by grown women? And they were traumatized by it?
No, but I've known people who committed suicide because they were, so pardon me if I don't think you are funny despite persisting in this line of thought. It's not that it is "the era of that's not funny"; it is simply because I don't find suicide funny. Should I now go on to just suggest you think suicide is funny? That seems to be your level of discourse.
I must have seen Get Smart (2008) more than eleven times, but I have the DVD.
rhhardin, I hereby put a cone of silence on you! Just kidding.
Steve carrell as maxwell smart, pass.
Joe Smith said...
"There will come a time when we have the technology to make robots look like people."
But they won't BE people. They'll be sophisticated toasters.
By the way, Jupiter; I tend not to debate others by calling them out, but rather just disagreeing with their views. You are welcome to think it is fine for older women to rape young boys and that young boys enjoyed it. Perhaps you did and that is why you think others must. I don't know. I don't care. I tend to assume others have different experiences.
In my case, I tend to handle mental health problems well. So well that when I was in grade school; I was asked to counsel my peers who had problems. I can't say that was a great idea in hindsight, but I didn't know at the time and took on the task. Much of what they (the educators that thought this was a great idea) wanted was to have peer level discussion on sex education. So many discussions were on the subject of childhood sex.
One thing I learned was that while children tend to experiment with each other; experimenting with adults tends to be easier, because adults know how not to get caught. I also learned getting caught is typically when shame is introduced and it is often the shame that causes more harm, hence my comment earlier at 2:02p about Ms. Ford. Ms. Ford noted she thought nothing of the childhood incident when it occurred. She didn't consider, what she claimed to have happen, as being wrong until years later, when it occurred to her it was wrong.
Fortunately as an adult now, she could cope with that event and any shame she may have felt in realizing it didn't bother her at the time or maybe that she enjoyed it at the time. The problem with children is they don't easily cope with the shame that perhaps they enjoyed the situation. The children are told by other adults how wrong it was, the child realizes that they enjoyed the event, and then come to the conclusion that what they did was equally wrong. As their adult partner is punished, the child decides to punish themselves.
Well, that is something I witnessed a few times in my life and once was often enough. Indeed, I can understand a little about Cracks' comment at 3:40p, but that's a subject too complex for you, Jupiter. Again, I don't particularly like calling you out, but you decided to be a dumbass, despite no one actually agreeing with you. I would have thought that would be sufficient for you to recognize, but it wasn't. Since you are as dense as your namesake, I figured I better come back here and spell it out for you.
Trust me; I don't expect you to be smart enough to let it go and realize you were just dumb today. I've read you to be funny in the past and was fine until you called me out and suggested your own fantasy of what happened to me or Cook. But maybe, there is a chance you'll realize how stupid you were, if no other reason than to claim by name that a person you don't know was raped. Like I said, I now doubt your intelligence to realize this. I'm not traumatized by this, because I deal with ignorant people all the time that it no longer bothers me. But leaving you ignorant would be a mistake on my part.
It was a good flick (Get Smart 2008). Two teams of writers probably, one with gags at Steve Carell's as doofus expense, the other a subtle comment about sex roles and happiness.
Joe Smith said...
"I predict that there will never be black-faced robots allowed in the U.S.
President Ocasio-Cortez III will forbid it.
That is how fucked-up we are as a country."
Ye, we are so fucked-up to try and for once protect the psyches of those we tormented culturally for centuries, right?
Of course. What monsters.
Even in venezuela they dont do that far down, delcy rodriguez is the puppet speaker. Tommy boy maduro is a tool.
Szechuan swallwell is nearly at that level.
Can’t argue with you, Crack. Men were shits but they were getting better. Everyone else was getting worse. I except all the men and women who were never shits. I think they’ve been teleported to a Ray Bradbury planet.
Darwin was wrong devolution seems to be a problem.
I think Crack is a good guy...very creative.
And we actually agree on a lot of issues.
But racism is not everywhere.
Shouldn't the appearance of robots represent the population?
Wouldn't it be racist if they didn't?
How about dark mannequins...isn't that racist?
Standing around silent all day carry the clothes of white designers on their backs and getting paid nothing?
Do you see how silly this sounds?
For the record, I never owned a slave and I don't want one.
This native New Yorker never understood Manhattan. It seemed to me that the people in the movie (with the exception of the 17-year-old) were an assortment of jerks. But it also seemed that they were representative of the people in Woody Allen's life. So why would Woody Allen hang around with these people who he presents to us as an assortment of jerks?
A robot that's not very bright and has a chip on his shoulder would be good.
I was eighteen when I saw Young Frankenstein at least 8 times the first year it was out. Never could sit through an entire Woody Allen movie though I do remember enjoying Bananas when I read it but I recall nothing about it.
Joe Smith said...
"I think Crack is a good guy...very creative."
Thank you.
"And we actually agree on a lot of issues."
I feel that way about almost everyone here.
"But racism is not everywhere."
And that's where you fuck up - I never said it was - it's your mind the goes to that extreme, on my behalf, and then holds it against me. That's how racism continues.
"Shouldn't the appearance of robots represent the population?"
Whatever.
"Wouldn't it be racist if they didn't?"
Nope - just keep them non-human and we're cool. I never saw a racist Roomba.
"How about dark mannequins...isn't that racist?"
Nope.
"Standing around silent all day carry the clothes of white designers on their backs and getting paid nothing?"
Ha-ha.
"Do you see how silly this sounds?"
Yeah, because you're acting like the experience of blacks is trite, which is more racism. When is the American history you want us to revere so much going to be taken seriously by you? It included about 300 years of black being ugly - Bo Derek is still a "10" with cornrows but blacks can't wear them to school sometimes. Do you see how silly - and cruel - you sound?
"For the record, I never owned a slave and I don't want one."
My first day of school with whites, they sat me between two boys and one said to the other "Do you like niggers?" And the other one said "Yeah, I think everybody should own one." So you're missing out.
I've had my share of bad experiences, but nothing to make any white people feel guilty about.....I was on the bottom rung of the white totem pole. Even that's an putting on airs.. I was in the slit trench at the bottom of the white totem pole. That's where the excess effluvia and snot of those on higher totems runs down and congeals. Not all of those bad experiences made me a better man. I've still got some fierce resentments. That said, I still think I've had more opportunities and a better deal in life than the average Indonesian worker in a sneaker factory....Just being born in America, even if you're on the lower rungs, is a pretty good deal. White people are allowed to feel privileged for their American birth. You're not born on third base, but you're in the game. Black people only in limited circumstances and in a tentative way are allowed to think themselves fortunate for their American birth. The fact remains that there are worse places to be born than in America.
"Woody Allen has been making the same film for 40 years."
No, the same 3-4 movies. He rotates them.
God save us from "serious" Woody Allen. but some like it.
I think Norman Mailer is overrated anymore. He's just not rated. No one cares. Susan Sontag is another that has faded into oblivion. There's wasn't much there to begin with, except for politics. And now the politics is gone, no one cares.
Mahler is better than I expected. Like about half of his symphonies. Don't like the the other half. Now, that I'm older I can appreciate the subtle complexity. Not sure if he's "overrated" or how popular he is.
I don't so much dislike Woody's serious movies as I dislike serious movies. Gimme the yux.
Now that I reflect, I've 'seen' numerous movies 11 times--the record for theater viewing might be 11 or 12 (2 -3 films?) and in passing on TV etc probably dozens in my near-68 years.
In very few cases do I wish to watch again; music, even recorded music, is always more repeatable to me than visuals.
Narr
Glad my name isn't Yu. Peeple
William said...
"The fact remains that there are worse places to be born than in America."
When I got back from the Philippines I didn't want to hear shit about poverty in America - even from blacks. But I also knew Thai people treated me better than white Americans.
If y'all just didn't get indoctrinated into thinking you know everything,...
rcocean said...
"God save us from "serious" Woody Allen. but some like it."
I like all of his work. His output's getting spotty with age, but it all holds up over time, because he's trying to find our humanity in it.
It's getting harder nowadays.
Further thoughts: Norman Mailer only got away with stabbing his wife and not doing any jail time for it, but, later, when he ran for Mayor of NYC, he got Gloria Steinem to be his press secretary. Eat your heart out Woody Allen and Roman Polanski.....Woody Allen always wanted to make a Bergman film. The one time he succeeded, more by happenstance than design, is with the movie Crimes and Misdemeanors. It's about a guy who commits a foul crime, gets away with it, and then has honors heaped upon him for his contributions to humanity. Back when Woody was still getting awards, that movie had all kinds of resonance.....I'd like to see Colin Kaepernick go on a tour of all those third world Nike factories. He could lecture the workers there on how he overcome all kinds of hardship and prejudice to finally triumph and have his own line of sneakers. I'm sure that would inspire the workers to work a little harder and take pride in being part of a brand that makes the world a better place.
I violate the "half your age plus seven" rule: I took the Red Pill about a decade ago and went from a Beta male to an Alpha Male also in that time period. I stopped dating women closer to my age. I'm 65 and my current FWBs are 24, 30, 32 and 34. I don't want to get married again, and they certainly don't want to marry me.
Many women friends my age think I'm creepy because I enjoy the company of young women, but they won't say it to my face. They disapprove. Their husbands and my male friends all support me. They're envious but won't approve of my social life to their wives.
I'm gonna keep doing this until my equipment fails to work. I am no longer handsome at my age, but I am very witty and I make these young women laugh. When they laugh, their eyes close and that's how I get away with not being Mr. Good Looking.
THEOLDMAN
Of course Woody may have tried to seduce Hemingway -- who wouldn't? You won't get any if your don't try. Don't confuse flirting and attempts at seduction with bullshit sexual harassment positions put forward by dried-out feminists and post-menopausal MSM types.
Post a Comment