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Reader comments on Hero
Subject: Re: Unprofessional
Date: Aug 27, 2004
Fahrenheit 9/11 was a documentary. If anything at all it is meant to convey a message, camera-work, "acting", and such are all extra. Hero is a different type of film, though, so your criticism of his review is valid. All other points: agreed.
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Response to this comment:
Unprofessional
Your review of hero is focused almost exclusively on its message. You don't say anything about the acting, the plot, the camera-work. There are plenty of good films that have messages we don't agree with, but that are still acknowledged as good films because these aspects of it were well developed. To review a film solely in terms of its message alone is amateurish and unprofessional. Can only liberal democrats consider Michael Moore's "Farenheit 9/11" a good film? If every critic reviewed films like you did, that would be the case.
As for your take on the message itself, your view of the world is the typical, provincial American point of view. My grandfather was an officer in the Kuomingtang government that fought against the communists in the great chinese civil war. And yet, my father and mother (both US citizens now) fully support the policies of the communist government. Why? Because, the situation is not as one-dimensional as the the US media would make it out to be. The best analogy is Iraq. Can one talk about human rights and the freedoms of the individual when there is no rule of law? Such talk is superfluous when you can't walk around outside without being able to do so without fear. It's meaningless when your children grow up without the hope of living in relative prosperity.
Order and economic opportunity is the primary concern of government. The chinese have come to learn this because they have lived through centuries of bloody revolution after revolution.
I think my point is all the more telling when you consider the director, Zhang Yimou's background. His father was a Nationalist. Their family was unlucky enough not to flee to Taiwan and America when the Communists took over. He grew up in gulags reserved for families of the Kuomintang officers. He went into photography, because he was not allowed to go to college. By a lucky break, he made it into film. His early pictures are all staunchly anti-communist. Why now the sudden change? You could say he "sold out," but if you know anything of his character, I'd say that's wrong. It's just like the message of the film. At some point, you've just to realize that more than anything, it's the welfare of people that matters. This must superceded personal grudges, indeed the individual himself.
One last point: it's in the U.S government's geopolitical interests to label the PRC as unprincipled, power-hungry, and willing do anything to stay in power. China, as it begins to marshall the power of its immense population, will be the next superpower in the world. To slow its influence, the US has capitalized on how foreign, culturally, it is compared to the Western world. Why else are we interested in Taiwan? It's a transparent ploy.
Oh, and I am an American.
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Comment index:
Hero from Emily, Aug 25, 2004
» Re: Unprofessional « from Cloud, Aug 27, 2004
truth from What's American, Sep 7, 2004
thanks from barb, Aug 28, 2004
Awesome from Dan Omlor, Sep 13, 2004
Re: But from skeptikos, Dec 26, 2004
hero from tso t'an, Feb 21, 2005
ask from mujahid, Mar 31, 2006
Re: ask from Bubba Hotep, Apr 11, 2006
??? from Kessel, Nov 4, 2007
Bravo from tsering, May 29, 2010
Hero from Emily, Aug 25, 2004
» Re: Unprofessional « from Cloud, Aug 27, 2004
truth from What's American, Sep 7, 2004
thanks from barb, Aug 28, 2004
Awesome from Dan Omlor, Sep 13, 2004
Re: But from skeptikos, Dec 26, 2004
hero from tso t'an, Feb 21, 2005
ask from mujahid, Mar 31, 2006
Re: ask from Bubba Hotep, Apr 11, 2006
??? from Kessel, Nov 4, 2007
Bravo from tsering, May 29, 2010
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