ftp.ee.pdx.edu/2014.02.ftp.ee.pdx.edu.tar/ftp.ee.pdx.edu/pub/mst3k/misties/True_Lies

Text File | 1994-08-16 | 17KB | 455 lines

Newsgroups: rec.arts.movies,soc.women,talk.politics.misc,rec.arts.tv.mst3k
From: "Steven Miale" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: TRUE LIES: fascist propaganda (SPOILERS)

<MST3K theme here>

In article <[e-mail]>,
Steve Work <[e-mail]> wrote:
>
>                True Lies
>        Summary of a fascist propaganda movie

<Crow> Heil Arnold!
<Tom> Animals vill be bred und schlautered!

>                by Steven Work
>
>
>   The new Arnold Schwarsnegger movie called True Lies contains a large
>number of right-wing messages wrapped neatly up in an explicitly violent
>wrapper.

<Joel> I'll take the ones with the cherry centers.
<Tom> Well, I always prefer hazelnut myself.

>
>  Some of the messages are:
>    1.  Killing 'bad' people is ok.

<Tom> They were bad people, big momma!

>    2.  Humiliating your enemy before you kill them is humerus.

<Crow> And humorous as well.

>    3.  Women (even wives)

<All> *gasp* EVEN WIVES?

>have prostitute tendencies just under the
>surface, so they must be looked after all the time.

<Crow> Well, I lock 'em in the outhouse myself...

>    4. When women empower themselves with the voice of reason, the get
>everyone in trouble.

<Tom> This does hold true for sorority girls...

>    5. If you ignore your 14 year old daughter she will end up listening
>to hard rock, and stealing money from you close friend to pay for abortions.

<Joel> Why, I ignored my father, and now he listens to punk rock and drivers
    a Harley!

>    6.  Ideas such as "Stop booming and killing our country people"

<Crow> As well as "stop bombing..."

>should be considered radical. Anyone who works towards that goal should
>be considered a terrorist.

<Joel> How about people who use ICBMs to deliver that message?

>    7. If you wear your hair long, don't shave close, and aren't dressed
>in a suite, you are likely to be a pants-urination lying slime-ball of a
>used car salesman, not even worth killing.

<Tom> Or a UNIX hacker, in which case you are definitely worth killing.

>   8. Hints on what to do during a nuclear explosion.

<Crow> Hint #1: Hiding behind a tree is NOT an effective way of shielding
    yourself.
<Tom>  Hint #2: Remember: That's not a real mushroom!
<Joel> Hint #3: People with three eyes should be avoided.
<Crow> Hint #4: Watch out for mutant lizards and turtles, especially
    ones named "Leonardo."
<Tom>  Hint #5: Fishing limits will no longer be enforced.
<Joel> And finally, hint #6: Remember to wear clean underwear.

>    1. Killing 'bad' people is ok.
>
>     Arnold says this while under a truth drug, displaying the moral
>shallowness of our main character.

<Tom> Maybe it was a joke...

>'Bad' people defined by someone else, like his commander or the president.

<Crow> Or Webster's 9th edition.

>    Never in this movie does Arnold attempt to evaluate himself as a
>killer. That is left to his wife (convenient gender role), and she does
>it badly, or does not voice her criticisms.

<Crow> Uh, Joel...
<Joel> Yes?
<Crow> Do you think this guy is taking this movie seriously?
<Joel> Yes.
<Tom>  But how? I mean, the entire movie was, in many ways, a humorous
    sendup of your typical action flick. I mean, the ridiculous
    situations, like the motorcycle-horse chase scene or the falling
    Uzi, only serve to make fun of what we expect when we go to see
    an action film.
<Joel> Maybe he's an idiot.
<Tom>  That must be it.

>  The main character never makes an attempt to understand the position of
>this enemy. This would show a normal human dimension to this right-wing
>created murdering elitist which would be unthinkable.

<Crow> Unthinkable! You have made one of the classic blunders!

>He would have to
>think of all the other issues: economic class unfairness

<Tom> Exploitin' the workers! 'angin' on to outdated Imperialist dogma
    that perpetuates...

> on-going racial tension,

<Joel> Can't we all just get along?

>degrading quality of life for people in our country and
>around the world,

<Crow> If elected, I promise to do everything to solve this situation.
    *chuckles* They fell for it again!

>hungry children

<Joel> Mommy mommy! Where's grandma?
<Tom>  Shut up and eat your pot roast.

>continual intrusion and repression
>from our government law againcies such as the BATF and FBI,

<Crow> Help help! I'm being repressed, I'm being repressed!

>not to mention the use of military forces against US citizens.

<Joel> *slap* Bloody peasant!
<Crow> You saw 'im repressing me, didn't you?

>Even Arnold
>would buckle attempting to hold up right-wing values in light of those
>issues.
>
>     No, our main character is super human in his ability to ignore these
>basic issues and go about killing 'bad' people.

<Tom>  SUPER-human!
<Joel> Faster than a '76 Pontiac!
<Crow> More powerful than a TI-99!
<Tom>  Able to leap small antholes in a single bound!

>    2.  Humiliating your enemy before you kill them is humerus.

<Crow> What does this have to do with bones?
>
>    Instead of seeing people who disagree with our main character's
>viewpoint as a thinking person who possible has a point for him to
>consider, Arnold is shown as a true man of action; without hesitation he
>jumps right in and kills people, but first he dehumanizes them if possible.

<Tom>  Well, killing is a pretty dehumanizing action in the first place...
>
>    3.  Women (even wives) have prostitute tendencies just under the
>surface, so they must be looked after all the time.
>
>   The wife, after small amounts of encurragment finds that she is very
>much turned on playing the role of a prostitute.

<Joel> Da-da da-da da-BOOM

>And the movie suggests
>that it would have been even very easy for her to have carried through
>with it.

<Crow> Obviously knocking somebody's lights out doesn't count.

>That is surely what our main character thought, her husband.
>But some inner strength (unique to this wife maybe) prevents her from
>following through.

<Tom>  Unique to this wife... but to YOURS?
<Joel> Every year, thousands of housewives abandon their homes in search of...
<Crow> Danger!
<Tom>  Excitement!
<Joel> Venereal disease!
<Tom>  Don't let it happen to YOU!
>
> The other main female character is rediculusly shallow. She is out for
>money and is willing to do anything for it.

<Crow> Oh, a capitalist.

>Typical of what an unmarried
>women will become if left to stew in her own posionis juices.

<Tom>  Mmmmm... unmarried woman stew! But there's one thing, Doc - you
    forgot the unmarried woman!
>
>    4. When women empower themselves with the voice of reason, they get
>everyone in trouble.
>
>   The one time the wife tries to take partial control of the path of her
>life, she is seen saying just the wrong things. She is so impassioned
>with her new power that she is driven to tell the truth and at the time
>the truth is the worst thing to tell.

<Crow> Perhaps he is missing out on the dramatic irony and humor from
    this situation.
<Tom>  You forgot, he's an idiot.

>   Just a note about honesty and truth.

<All start humming "The Battlehymn of the Republic">

>In this movie people only tell the
>truth when they are forced to, or let their guard down. Honesty between
>husband and wife is never attempted until it is too late when neither
>believe the other.

<Joel> It's called HUMOR.

>   Even before these two are married trust is destroyed by the husband's
>lying.

<Crow> But the wife lies too...
<Tom>  Yes, but women can do that. It's called "empowering."
<Crow> And if men do it?
<Joel> We're pigs.
<Crow> Oh, I understand now. I think...

>During the movie he is never really chastised for that, more for
>not being able to keep the lie going. When the wife finds out she is
>driven by rage to shrike her husband of 15  years (her continuous lover
>and the father of her child) and we are expected to laugh. And we do.
>Her rage is funny, his rage is dangerous.

<Tom>  Danger!
<Crow> Excitement!
<Joel> Venereal disease!

>    5. If you ignore your 14 year old daughter she will end up listening
>to hard rock, and stealing money from you close friend to pay for abortions.

<Crow> Hmm... stealing from people to pay for abortions. Sounds like the
    Federal Government to me!

>    This is the embodiment of the right-wing idea of family values. If you
>do not take control of your children and wife's life in smallest details
>your wife will have an affair and you daughter will have abortions left
>and right.

<Tom>  What about the center and surround speakers?

>    Our main character is not perfect.

<All> *gasp*

>His main failing in this movie is
>seen as not paying enough attention to his family. And the result is a
>personal nightmare where we are asked to envision his wife performing
>oral sex on a slime-ball used car salesman and the 14 year old daughter
>is doing drugs, having sex on motorcycles

<Joel> It should be done in the back seat of a Chevy!

>and stealing money for abortions.
>
>   The failing of his family are seen as our main character's failings. He
>is the father of the family so he is responsible. He was not spending
>enough time going through his daughters closets or listening in on his
>wife's telephone conversations.
>
>    In this Arnold embodies the negligent father. It is not a large leap
>from this position to the analogy of the government as the parent and
>the citizens as children. Us kids can have as much fun as we want, but
>don't expect to be free of the servalence and basic intrusion that is
>required to keep everyone from mis-behaving, and we should sometimes
>expect spankings.

<Joel> Spank me!
<Tom>  And me!
<Crow> Yes, we all deserve a good spanking!
>
>    This is seen in the resent move to have all digital equipment (digital
>phones, faxs, computer networks) equipped with the 'clipper chip' the
>National Security Agency and the FBI (possibly others) want installed in
>all devices. These are used to 'listen in', or wiretap digital equipment
>that normally is encoded. As we see in the movie (and we should be
>confortable with this) branches of the government using wiretaps.

<Joel> How he manages to introduce a legitimate privacy issue into this
    so-called "work" I'll never understand.
>
>    In fact, our main character is driven to use a wiretap on his wife.

<Crow> Wiretaps - wave of the future!
<Tom>  Listen to your best friend say what a dick you are!

>Oh,
>what a poor bumbling good natured fool, how funny. We all know that
>government agents are just regular people and can be driven to respond
>in ways that would normally result in life imprisonment for you and I.
>Chuckle. Chuckle. They are only human. And when caught this should not
>be seen as a regular occurrence. Just the odd event.
>
>
>    6.  Ideas such as "Stop booming and killing our country people"
>should be considered radical. Anyone who works towards that goal should
>be considered a terrorist.
>
>    What a radical; having a position that demands the United States stop
>(and stop supporting other countries) bombing and killing their
>citizens. What a nut!

<Joel> Yeah, it's not like they try to invade other countries!
<Tom>  Or kill hundreds of Marines
<Crow> Or massacre hundreds of thousands of Kurds
<Joel> Or tried several times to destroy any chance of a Jewish state
>
>    7. If you wear your hair long, don't shave close, and aren't dressed
>in a suite, you are likely to be a pants-urination lying slime-ball of a
>used car salesman, not even worth killing.
>
>    If you are not a successful wealthy lying use car salesman type, then
>you are lacking in the moral fiber and/or the world domination goals
>that the wealthy right-wind have.

<Joel> But used-car salesmen *do* want to take over the world.
<Tom>  Here at Joe's autos, purchase of a late-model car will get you
    free membership in the World Domination Society!

>Sure you are trying hard, and your
>technic is correct, but for some reason your moral fiber is in question
>because your goals are direct pleasure for yourself

<Crow> Am I pleasing? Do I please you?

>not something noble
>and ultimately repressed like helping the powers that be.
>
>
>   8. Hints on what to do during a nuclear explosion.
>
>    Probably the personally scariest message is the idea that a nuclear
>bomb will be exploded and that we should be resigned to this fact.

<Tom>  I have a plan, that will solve all our problems...

>The
>main character takes this opportunity to grab a kiss from his wife,
>before running off to save the day. A good example for what we should do
>when this happens.

<Crow> Honey, the bomb's gonna go off in 15 minutes. Gimme a big one,
    will ya?

>    In the movie they poor concrete over the bomb, making it inevitable
>that it will explode. Even Arnold is not expected to defuse it through a
>ton on hardening concrete.

<Tom>  Well, technically the character was "Harry", and Arnold is just
    an actor.
<Crow> You've forgotten, he has no sense of what is reality and what is
    fantasy.

>Our take-home message: Although our heroic
>government agents can prevent the next one from going off, we must
>expect at least one. But stay calm, everything is under control.
>
>    And for gods sake, don't ask questions from the powers that be. Don't
>play the female role (demonstrated earlier with the wifes screw-up) of
>empowering yourself and controlling more f your life and getting
>everyone in more trouble. Just look at the Vietnam war, we could have
>won that if only people didn't get so upset and demand we stop. What a
>mess the people made of that. The solderers being killed are only the
>lower class, and god knows we have enough of them..

<Tom>  Stop with that class struggle nonsense...
<Crow> But that's what it all about, *class*!

>General Comments:
>
>   After seeing this movie my mind cries out for perspective.

<Joel> As well as a clue.

>Are these
>messages intentionally inserted because they make the basis of a good
>action movie, or are these messages wrapped in the violence as take-home
>messages?

<Crow> Maybe a cigar is just a cigar.
>
>    Because I generally see a lot of these movies reviewed some of the
>other action adventure movies that included violence to see what
>messages they relied on. Lion Heart with Jean-Paul VanDame comes to mind.

<All>     Lion Heart is really neat!
    Lion Heart is full of meat!
    We've been eating LI-ON HEART!!!!

>  The general idea of the movie is that when the main character hears of
>his brother's imminent death he excapes out off the French Foreign
>legion, endures increasable hardship (fighting sport street fights for
>money)

<Crow> Thus supporting the fascist idea that the lower-class rejects of
    society should support themselves with physical violence, while
    the upper-class bourgeois should continue to control society
    as well as the moral fiber which we lap up.
<Tom>  Yes, as well as not questioning what the Powers That Be decide about
    our daily lives.
<Crow> Precisely. In these times we should not question authority, we should
    follow it, even if Authority has no moral fiber themselves.
<Joel> Hey, snap out of it guys! You're beginning to sound like Steven
    Work!
<Tom>  Oh... OH! Thanks, Joel.
<Crow> Yeah, you really saved us from a life of nonsensical babbling!

>as he crosses international boarders to come to his brother side.
>When he get there he is too late, his brother is dead, and all he has
>left of his brother is his brother's obligations which he picks up and
>carries without complaint. He does not going looking to revenge his
>brother death (of course they go looking for his family, so he must
>defend them). All in all, some pretty good messages about supporting
>family and being responsible.
>
>   Using Lion Heart as a counter example of an action/adventure movie, I
>have to conclude that the fascist right-wing messages are not a
>requirement of a good action/adventure movie. And if follows that the
>messages in True Lies were (maybe intentionally) included as extras.

<Tom>  Maybe you should get a life.


    * THE END *

Compliments to:    [e-mail]
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