“Hillary: The Movie” Is A Movie…And I Bet Dalton Trumbo Would Agree
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Movie: a sequence of consecutive pictures of objects photographed in motion by a specially designed camera (motion-picture camera) and thrown on a screen by a projector (motion-picture projector) in such rapid succession as to give the illusion of natural movement
No where in the definition does it speak to its content nor that it needs to be good.
This week the Supreme Court will consider whether Hillary: The Movie, because of its content, should be considered, not so much a movie, but a 90 minute campaign commercial: a campaign commercial that falls under the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law that imposes telecast and marketing restrictions.
Citizens United, a nonprofit corporation, has long targeted Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton as devil incarnate. CU President, David N. Bossie, admits that the film was made with political motive in mind. Bossie has been one of the most relentless critics of Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton and acknowledges that his film has a “point of view.” That point of view pretty much paints a picture of horrific repercussions if the evil Hillary Clinton survives on this earth for one more second. Bossie would like America to see what he sees and hopes that they would take his POV into consideration when time comes to make life decisions…say, like when voting.
But what does any film do but purport a point of view, sometimes left, sometimes right, sometimes dumb, sometimes brilliant, sometimes (a good percentage of the time) pretty damn unwatchable. Sometimes fact, sometimes fiction, sometimes fact contorted in such a fashion as to make fact unrecognizable. Doesn’t matter what genre, every film has a POV, I give you The Great Dictator, Wagging The Dog, Apocalypse Now and who could forget the compelling 1948 animated short, Olive Oyl for President.
No one would question that Johnny Got His Gun, Dr. Strangelove and M*A*S*H* were left-sided, anti-war films, yet if any of them were to air during the height of the Iraqi invasion, would any court restrict it to the rules leveled by campaign ad laws.
2008’s An American Carol showed that the right can also make terrible comedies, though my guess is more people saw Carrot Top’s Chairman of the Board than saw AAC, so it’s difficult to ascertain what more than a few thought of it.
Documentaries like An Inconvenient Truth and Fahrenheit 9-11 are for the most part, clear smacks at what the Republicans have wrought.
I’m a flaming, card-carrying liberal who has had my point of view produced for the screen, even having my peers deem my POV as award-worthy. And - boy, is this going to stick in my throat - I never thought I would be on the same side as Citizen United lawyer, Ted Olsen, but limiting how these films are used only limit what all Americans are able to say…right or left.
With great fears that it would color the public’s point of view, hampering America’s entrance into WWII, Dalton Trumbo’s book that his Johnny Got His Gun was based on, was pulled from book shelves. Treating Hillary: The Movie with anywhere the same level of verisimilitude as JGHG, is both an injustice to American’s right of speech and an insult to Dalton Trumbo.
I would hope that my brothers and sisters on Hollywood’sleft side stand behind everyone’s First Amendment Rights, no matter POV nor how poorly that POV is depicted.
*See if you can find ther loverly Kathy Fields in the Johnny Got His Gun movie poster.
Steve
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Well even if it was campaign still it is documentary movie
Either way it will be successful, any movie based on somebody in such a situation of power can’t help but draw a crowd of enthusiasts.