04.16.11
Morning laughs: Republicans and their DOA movies
A handful of lines from reviews of the alleged first part of Atlas Shrugged:
“I’m cultivating a society that honors individual achievement” and “Businesses die because people are paid by need, not ability” don’t exactly roll off the tongue. — Rickey, the Philly Inquirer
The dialogue seems to have been ripped throbbing with passion from the pages of Investors’ Business Daily. Much of the excitement centers on the tensile strength of steel …
Oh, and there is Wisconsin. Dagny and Hank ride blissfully in Taggart’s new high-speed train, and then Hank suggests they take a trip to Wisconsin, where the state’s policies caused the suppression of an engine that runs on the ozone in the air, or something (the film’s detailed explanation won’t clear this up). They decide to drive there. That’s when you’ll enjoy the beautiful landscape photography of the deserts of Wisconsin. — Ebert
“We don’t want Atlas shrugging in America,” said the movie’s producer today on Stossel.
Too late! 26 out of 100 on Metacritic. 5.9 out of 10 on the user view scale.
Speaking of an engine that runs on ozone from the air brings us to Gashole, a documentary made by two Republicans.
DD noticed it being pumped earlier this week at lunchtime by Dylan Ratigan on MSNBC.
Ratigan is frequently a flat-out sucker for really stupid shit revealing only the laziness of him and his minders.
So immediately the show pegs the bogometer by plugging that Gashole has uncovered the suppression of the dead Tom Ogle’s magical water vapor 100-mpg car.
As a conspiracy theory, this one’s about as popular as any other on perpetual motion machines and free energy devices. Which is to say not at all.
Gashole, 5.8 on a ten scale at IMdb and failing due to disinterest.
And here’s a ragingly incoherent/incompetent piece on the same by Allison Kilkenny of Huffington Post/The Nation who also misses the one sinker that rips the entire bottom out of the boat.
My theory as to why Republicans can’t make documentaries with any legs: To make a documentary, particularly if it has anything to do with science or laws of nature, you have to actually have some talent for understanding such matters.
The GOP hates these things. So even when there’s no political agenda, embedded dummkopf-ism spoils everything.
There’s also some wry humor to be found in the fact that the Libertarian/GOP/Tea Party won’t even patronize the stuff made exclusively for it.