http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/031408E.shtml

I was disappointed that Daniel Day-Lewis won an Oscar for “There Will Be Blood,” not because he’s not a great actor (he is), but because the movie was such a betrayal of the book on which it was based. Movies don’t have to follow books. Many don’t. But in this case, what we missed were the things that made Upton Sinclair’s “Oil” a politically courageous book for its time. For our time, it unearths a crucial part of the hidden history of our own working class movement. . (Keep reading…)

CounterPunch February 17, 2008

By ALAN MAASS

Upton Sinclair’s Oil! is a great book and Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood is a great film, but they’re different in many ways–in tone and themes, their views of the characters, even the basics of what happens in the story. (Keep reading…)

Truthdig Posted on Jan 1, 2008

In the film “Charlie Wilson’s War,” the nitwit and deeply corrupt congressman elevated to heroic status through Tom Hanks’ ever-charming performance has a meeting with Pakistan’s then-dictator Zia ul-Haq in which they broker a deal for a joint effort to “save” Afghanistan from the Soviets. It’s all great fun; the United States is, as always, on the side of the good guys, in this case the Afghan mujahedeen, who later morphed into the Taliban, hosts of al-Qaida. (Keep reading…)

WSWS August 24, 2007

The Bourne Ultimatum, directed by Paul Greengrass, screenplay by Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns and George Nolfi, based on the novel by Robert Ludlum (Keep reading…)

Marxmail December 6, 2006

Philippe Diaz’s documentary “The Empire in Africa” opens in NYC, Los Angeles and Madison, Wisconsin theaters this Friday. It is not to be missed. Focused on the bloody civil war in Sierra Leone, it is the perfect rejoinder to those who believe that the West has some kind of obligation to provide law and order through a “humanitarian” military intervention of the sort that NY Timesman Nicholas Kristof contributor calls for in Darfur or that Harvard professor Samantha Powers called for in Rwanda. Using interviews with the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), a rebel group widely portrayed as the Sierra Leone equivalent of the Janjaweed in Darfur, as well as supporters of military intervention against it, Diaz uncovers a rescue mission much more about rescuing diamond mining profits than lives. (Keep reading…)

Marxmail July 30, 2007

When I arrived at Bard College in 1961, some of the greatest film-makers of the 20th century were in their prime. It seemed that every month a new film by a Kurosawa, a Bunuel or a Truffaut would show up at the movie theater in Red Hook, a nearby town. But the most eagerly anticipated films were those of Ingmar Bergman who died today at the age of 89. Films like “Smiles of a Summer Night,” “The Seventh Seal,” “Wild Strawberries” and “The Magician” made such an impact on me that I devoted my freshman year “field period” (an intersession that was meant for independent study or internships, etc.) to a reading of Bergman’s screenplays. I was captivated by the kind of dialogue found in “The Seventh Seal,” a film I watched for the first time in over 40 years on the Turner Classic Movie channel a few months ago. Here is a conversation between the Knight Antonius Block (Max Von Sydow), who has lost faith, and the angel of death: (Keep reading…)

In the wake of HBO’s disappointing and history-deranging adaptation of Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee, American Indian actors, writers, aspiring directors and producers arrive at the end of the trail for their decades-long struggle to gain a footing in Hollywood:our cause is lost in the American film and television industry. (Keep reading…)

Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t get through my Netflix dvd of Stephen Spielberg’s “Munich”. I put it on knowing full well that I would find the politics reprehensible. I didn’t count on it being even worse as a movie. (Keep reading…)

from Marxmail

Unlike the last batch of movies I reviewed here, I cannot recommend any of these as should be obvious from my remarks. (Keep reading…)

Canadian Dimension Magazine, September/October 2006 Issue

(Keep reading…)