Hollywood Hates Me, It Really Hates Me

Several years ago, in a column for the Los Angeles Times, I weighed in on the subject of "liberal bias" in film and almost instantly became a figurative piñata in print, on blogs, and by email. From a polite, if somewhat off-base spanking via letter-to-the-editor by director Joe Dante, to numerous -- and some very creative -- F-Bomb emails, I heard from those either rightfully defending the independence of film, to those inquiring as to how my knuckle-dragging conservative paws managed to bang out a column in the first place.

As my wounds have mostly healed, and as there is nothing like receiving a good ass-kicking to refocus the mind during a presidential election, I decided that, for the obvious reasons, the Huffington Post is the perfect forum to revisit the subject. Thank you, Arianna.

Before getting to what I think is a very reasonable question and objection, I'd like to stress that I'm a Republican who not only wants to hear from Hollywood, but believes that "celebrity" voices such as George Clooney, Jamie Lee Curtis, John Cusack, Rob Reiner and Bill Maher, not only add to the national debate, but are very much needed.

Education or lack thereof, does not an intellect make. Titles can produce stereotyping. Stereotyping can produce prejudice. Prejudice feeds ignorance and intolerance. For a number of ignorant conservatives or Republicans, a "celebrity" is incapable of having a rational thought, advancing an original idea, and has no business addressing the pressing problems of a country they, their children, spouses, or partners, happen to inhabit and love. I for one, want no part of that "conservative" America.

So, for some on my side of the fence, "celebrity" elicits the expected, ill-informed, and counterproductive knee-jerk reaction. For some in Hollywood, "Republican" elicits the equal, if opposite, reaction. As a somewhat successful novelist and struggling screenwriter, I once had an agent on the left coast purporting to represent me, say, "Why do you have to be a Republican? I hate Republicans."

My reply to that was, "aside from the fact that you don't know jack-shit about me or my background, who cares what political party I'm from? Isn't your job to decide if I've written something worthwhile and if said script can make a studio some money?" My response was not well received.

The headline of my past column in the Los Angeles Times was "Insert bias in films -- deduct from the bottom line." The gist of that headline and my point being, if you (certain filmmakers) gratuitously and continuously bash contemporary Republican politicians or policy in your movies, don't you run the risk of alienating a large segment of the movie-going audience? If that's the ultimate goal, then great. However, if you, your studio, and your investors, want the film to be a financial success, then, aside from the spite factor, why run the risk? What does cinematically neutering George W. Bush and Dick Cheney add to the end product or the art?

"Because I can," does not quite seem like a good enough answer. While that defense works for a dog, it might cause a producer or two to seek shelter with that dog when their movie tanks.

What got me thinking about all of this again, was the recent New York Times review of the movie, Get Smart. In the body of the review the reporter said, "The filmmakers take tiny, tinny digs at the vice president and cook up a subplot about yellowcake uranium." So, with one sentence, we are enticed -- or pissed-off -- by the specter of a Darth-Vader-like vice president, an illegitimate war in Iraq, and a spy for the CIA being exposed by a brutish White House. Again, if the filmmakers think all of that is a selling point and will add to the bottom-line, more power to them. That said, I know a number of people -- Democrats included -- who take offense at this tactic and therefore decide to skip the film.

When I wrote my first column on this subject, Joe Dante proceeded to take me to the literary woodshed. In the column, I mentioned that if I were making a film, I would do everything in my power to ensure that it "contains no political viewpoint." Meaning that no petty political bashing would take place. Just because I'm the screenwriter or producer, what gives me the right to denigrate Barack Obama, his wife, or his beliefs, in my film. In the end, isn't that unilateral power selfish, childish, and disrespectful of a least some of the audience?

For whatever reason, Mr. Dante misunderstood my point. In his letter to the Times, he said, "...Under this rubric, MacKinnon would have been unable or unwilling to contribute to the scripts of films as diverse as Dr. Strangelove, Network, ... The Green Berets, ... Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, ... Seven Days In May, etc., not including decades of classic European films which have always embraced agitprop."

The fact is, I'm a fan of each and every film he mentioned and would have done anything possible to protect and preserve their point of view. As it turns out, I tried several times to contact Mr. Dante. I admire his work and wanted to explain my position. I spoke directly with the agency that represented him at the time, and, no surprise to me, never heard back from Mr. Dante. It is my hope that my message was trashed by the agent rather than ignored by Mr. Dante.

The examples of this type of "Let's pound the Republicans, Bush, or Cheney because we can," abound in film. From the immoral and bigoted "Duke" brothers of Trading Places (a great flick) being surrounded by pictures of Reagan and Nixon, to Lauren Bacall in My Fellow Americans insulting the first President Bush by name, to the remake of The Manchurian Candidate, a film Scott Rudin, one of the producers and a proud Democrat was quoted as saying, "...is a very, very angry movie. It's a movie that is honestly distressed about a lot of things going on in the country right now."

Some of the filmmakers acknowledged that the fictional company in the movie which is disgustingly profiteering from America's wars and war dead, was modeled explicitly after Dick Cheney's former company, Halliburton. John Cusack tills this same ground and theme in his new movie, War, Inc. Albeit, going for laughs.

At least financially, The Manchurian Candidate did not fare well. After the poor box-office results rolled in, one of the Paramount executives said, "It's very frustrating. You think you've done everything right, and the audience doesn't show up in the volumes that we'd anticipated."

Objectively speaking, could at least one reason be that because of its anti-Republican/Bush/Cheney subplot, the film was heavily criticized by conservative talk radio, some of the Fox News Channel hosts, and in various blogs and columns? How much of that criticism contributed to the poor box-office?

My final example is the 2007 film, Shooter, that starred Mark Wahlberg. In this film, the ultimate bad guy is a conservative senator trying to exploit the oil market. As the movie progresses, we learn that he and his mercenaries were behind a genocidal act in Ethiopia. Again, when we see the malevolent senator or his killers, in the background, are pictures of various Republican politicians past and present. Not my movie, but it honestly seems heavy-handed and unnecessary.

With regard to titles and stereotyping, one last point that involves me and Mark Wahlberg. I actually had the chance to meet Mark when he was in DC filming Shooter. As it turns out, we both come from the same Dorchester section of Boston and from a very similar "street kid" background.

When I spoke with Mark, he asked me what I was up to? I told him "now, mostly writing political thrillers." He then mentioned that the film he was shooting was based on a novel and that he would like to read mine when finished. When I told him the main character in my next novel comes from our neighborhood, he insisted that I send it to him.

During that conversation, everything about Wahlberg suggested that he was a very honorable, genuine and down-to-earth person. We both agreed that no matter the success, we'd never forget where we came from. To demonstrate that he meant what he said, when I was a full block away and walking back to my office, he screamed, "Doug. I mean it. Send me the book."

Obviously, you can see this coming down 5th Avenue. I tried. Oh, how I tried. Some of the background of the novel unavoidably identified me as a "Republican." Did that do me in with his "people?"

Over a year later, I have not heard back from Mark. Like Joe Dante, unless proven otherwise, I'll continue to believe that he is a class-act who never got word that I reached out and sent the material as instructed.

Good intentions notwithstanding, it does get old being smeared and ignored because of that evil Republican brand.

Douglas MacKinnon is a former White House and Pentagon official and author of the forthcoming novel, "The Apocalypse Directive."

Comments

[rebeccaj]

Plenty of "liberal" films flop.

As usual, I smile to myself as another conservative cries "Victim!"

Poor people, gays, women and minorities can't be victims -- but rich, powerful conservatives are to be pitied.

Hmmmm?

[bn]

I saw GET SMART - Cheney, Bush et al got off lightly. The screenwriters made fun of their foibles, usual for any celebrity or world leader, in the style of most comedies.

The writer of this piece must realize that this current administration is highly mockable...

[CitizenE]

"What does cinematically neutering George W. Bush and Dick Cheney add to the end product or the art?"
cinema verite.

[dtrobert]

So it's not ok to bash Nazis in movies, because they might feel offended?? It's not ok to bash Mussolini's black shirts? It's not ok to bash the KKK?

I don't get it. Republicans are evil, so bashing them should be the norm.

But seriously, Republicans have lost all right to complain about their treatment over the last 7 years of cheerleading for torture, war, corporate malfeasance, and all around nastiness... They might not be Nazis, but that's just because they don't have the balls to take their ideas to their logical conclusion.

There used to be a somewhat tolerable Republicanism. Bush and Co destroyed all remaining traces of it.

[gopindrag]

So, Doug, you're just another poor, misunderstood good Republican citizen? I would like to know how you feel, now, about your 2000 vote and 2004 vote. And finally, I wonder can you give me a one word difference between Bush and McCain?

[BlackJAC]

I've racked up about 150 individual rejection letters from agents and publishers, myself, and that doesn't include duplicates or E-mails. I've got some big names in there, too: William Morris, THE NEW YORKER, THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY, THE PARIS REVIEW, ESQUIRE, the US Naval Institute, even PLAYBOY whom I queried just to get their rejection letter. I got a lecture on character dynamics from one of Richard Donner's hirelings before she rejected me to my face. I even had Humble Journey Films contact me to see one of my scripts--one that's made the quarterfinals in two separate contests--on a Wednesday and then changed their mind that following Friday. I blame this on these Guardians Of The Money being either illiterate business school graduates who think the height of intellectualism is reading all the Harry Potter books or embittered failed writers poisoning the well, and not politics.

[oya9]

This smacks of Republican (white guy) victimology. Stars won't return your calls/read your books/shower you with attention because you are a Republican. Maybe they are just not that into you.

More seriously, perhaps the "bias" is not so much liberal, but professional. The last 30 years of Republican dominated rule has meant the evisceration of arts funding on the national and on local levels. Even if we granted your premise, why would you expect films to show positive portrayals of a party that sees cinema and other arts as at best inconsequential and at worst dangerous? Under the "if you can't test the hell out of it, don't teach it" mentality of this administration, we have a generation of students who don't have the benefit of art or physical education in school. Perhaps if you were trying to create a bi-partisan coalition of entertaine­rs/writers to push back against the neglect of arts in the country rather than hustling for personal attention, you'd get more of your phone calls returned.

[Helzapoppin]

Why bash contemporary Republicanism? Because the shoe fits.

[clevelandchick]

Sorry buddy, Republicans aren't exactly very popular right now. You may want to look at your party's authoritarian tendencies, alienation of women and homosexuals, lack of sympathy for those less fortunate, aggressive violent imperial foreign policy positions, disdain for intellectuals, law-breaking and hypocrisy as to why nobody makes Republican friendly movies that make any money.

[copernikus]

Maybe you should stop being so sensitive. There are many Republicans that abhor what this admonistration has done, so "Get Smart" taking shots at Cheney is not the same as their taking shots at all Republicans.

[hw]

But Republicans are now associated with lots of lying, illegal wars, profiteering, torture, shredding constitutional rights, George Bush, numerous sordid scandals involving airport restrooms and diapers,
numerous sordid scandals involving cronyism...

[Hurin]

Rather than whine, why don't you start a conservative production company? You can call it Conserviwood, and the rest of us will laugh at you when its films get the same viewership as the half- hour news hour, and again when your 80 year old televangelist stars are put away for child pornography.

Thats the real Republican way isn't it?

[AuntSally]

I agree. That whole Die Hard series was so uber left wing it makes me ill.

[clevelandchick]

I hope you are being sarcastic.

[lisakaz2]

She was.

[rfshunt]

Right you are, AuntSally. Not to mention the ultra-liberal leanings of that "24" TV series.

[BlackJAC]

Don't even get me started on how Dirty Harry Callahan kept going out of his way to protect the civil liberties of all those killers terrorizing the city. "Go ahead: make your phone call to your lawyer just like the Constitution says you can."

[Zenobius]

There may not be a lot of Republicans in Hollywood. If they do the normal human thing, and assume the attitudes of their heavily Democratic community are representative, they may not be very aware of them.

Also, Hollywood's films are aimed at a worldwide audience. The popularity of Republicans in the rest of the world is not high. Someone has to be the villain. Members of groups that are unpopular in the worldwide audience tend to be chosen as the villains. Maybe in portraying Republican senators as villanous oil speculators who hire mercenaries, the movie industry is just reflecting what its audience outside the US thinks US Republicans are like?

[nevergiveup]

Culture--which what movie making is central to, even when the movies made are not very good--always reflects society. Republicans have trashed our society, our government, the Rule of Law, We the People, the Constitution, Human Rights, the middle class, the working poor, the environment, air quality, science--and more. They are however Pro Gun, Pro Tax Cuts for the Wealthy, Pro War, Anti-Science, Pro War, Anti-Education, Pro Free-Market (that one still makes me laught when I write it) and pretty obviously patriotic in ways that are destroying American Democracy.

So, if yo don't like how politics, especially Republican politics, is portrayed as the villain in movies—then why don't you encourage your fellow Republicans to come to the Party of America, ans top marching lockstep with the worst president in American history. Good luck with that.

[SanityClaus]

Maybe Mark Wahlberg thought your book was no good.

My brother is a screenwriter and he's quite accustomed to actors passing on his work, even those who expressed a great interest in reading it and for whom he has tailored the script to play to their strengths.

And only a tiny percentage of properties ever become movies. Maybe your stuff just isn't thriving in a free market. Perhaps you should submit to the National Film Board of Canada or another country's state-operated film production companies.