Elysium

A new big-budget science fiction summer movie is coming out, from the director who made District Nine. The blog motherboard says this is the year's most radical film.

I said, as part of a discussion on facebook:

There is always this problem with Hollywood movies. They will go only so far in their critiques. Matrix made me crazy because the science was so bad, but it told us we live in a dream while our masters use us as generators, feeding off our power. Well, yes, actually.

I liked V, though people who know the comic tell me the movie is awful. Still, we see those masks everywhere now.

I thought Avatar was visually stunning. It is an argument for Nature and aboriginal rights, though in a very stupid form. (White man saves blue natives.)

It's hard to get the funding and the distribution, if what you are saying is a genuine and strong attack on the system of which Hollywood is a part.

So what can we say about Hollywood movies? They are not going to be as direct as an IWW song. But they can be fun, and they can do things that people are able to use, like the V masks.

They are not likely to give us a good plan for action, however. The struggles are too quickly won in Hollywood movies. It's hard to show years of hard work, which finally may result in change. And violence is not always the answer. More often, it is organizing. I also believe in ideas -- and a good understanding of what the problem actually is.