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From: reiher@ucla-cs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.movies
Subject: Re: "Red Dawn"
Message-ID: <1325@ucla-cs.ARPA>
Date: Sun, 23-Sep-84 16:46:13 EDT
Article-I.D.: ucla-cs.1325
Posted: Sun Sep 23 16:46:13 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 26-Sep-84 06:05:59 EDT
Organization: UCLA CS Dept.
Lines: 32

I read a rather perceptive review of "Red Dawn" which points out that, for
some films, there are really two films:  the real film, and the one the
audience thinks it's seeing.  Most of the comments you objected to were in
a portion of my review which really reviewed the audience, not the film.
What worries me is not what's in the film, but what some audiences think is
there.  I agree that, to his credit, John Milius did not make "Red Dawn"
totally one sided, and he didn't appear to be trying to make a "let's go out
and whump them commies" film, but this was what the audience I saw it with
expected and wanted, and they were so determined in their desires that that is
what they got out of it, evidence of what was on screen to the contrary.

What really frightens me is that there are apparently a lot of people out 
there who think it would be a good idea to trash some Communists somewhere.
Such people are likely to respond favorably to attempts to get the US more
deeply involved in Central America.  And while it is true that sometimes
a movie, or any work of art, is only a work of art, sometimes it is far more
influential than that.  "Uncle Tom's Cabin" was a great boost for the
abolitionists, and "Birth of a Nation" had a major influence in the resurgence
of the Ku Klux Klan in the late teens and early 20's, even though that wasn't
what D. W. Griffith had in mind, at all.

My objections to "Red Dawn", the movie, as opposed to "Red Dawn", the phenomena,
have to do with the fact that, ideology aside, it is a deeply flawed film, not
at all up to the standards of Milius' equally jingoistic, but much more 
entertaining, "The Wind and the Lion".   As far as my opinions of internal
consistency go, I stand by them.  I'm willing to suspend my disbelief, but I
tend to get annoyed if I later discover that it wasn't worth the suspension.
-- 

					Peter Reiher
					reiher@ucla-cs.arpa
					{...ihnp4,ucbvax,sdcrdcf}!ucla-cs!reiher