DSL's Movie/TV Reviews and Discussion

[Mike]

I hadn't even heard of the movie until it became politicized and articles about it started popping up in my news feed. Slate had a way too long commentary bashing the movie for reasons that were never that clear other than it apparently was made by right-wingers and stars the guy that played Jesus in "Passion". We can't have that guy working in the movie business. Much of the criticism I've read seems to rest on the argument that the org that rescues children from sex traffickers doesn't do it good enough. Whatever that means. If the guys rescuing kids from sex traffickers are the bad guys, what does that make the sex-traffickers?

It's another perfect example of prog logic. The right-wing view is inherently wrong and if they aren't wrong, the problem doesn't exist in the first place. Conspiracy theory!!

[Tom W]

Apparently, nobody is working in the movie industry at the moment. It's not obvious, but it is a bit hysterical to the actors and writers that have provided us with so much garbage in the Marvel Imperial age get so bent out of shape.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Streaming has destroyed residual checks for actors/writers.

[AlabamAlum]

And they are also scared about AI generated stuff.

[THE_WIZARD_]

As bad as BIDEN BOOM!!! has destroyed this country?

[Tom W]

Streaming has destroyed residual checks for actors/writers.

Make better movies and that won't be as big of a problem.

[THE_WIZARD_]

Yeah...that always helps...

[iam416]

I hadn't even heard of the movie until it became politicized and articles about it started popping up in my news feed. Slate had a way too long commentary bashing the movie for reasons that were never that clear other than it apparently was made by right-wingers and stars the guy that played Jesus in "Passion". We can't have that guy working in the movie business. Much of the criticism I've read seems to rest on the argument that the org that rescues children from sex traffickers doesn't do it good enough. Whatever that means. If the guys rescuing kids from sex traffickers are the bad guys, what does that make the sex-traffickers?

It's another perfect example of prog logic. The right-wing view is inherently wrong and if they aren't wrong, the problem doesn't exist in the first place. Conspiracy theory!!

This is almost exactly where I am. I haven't seen a movie in the theater in years, and I don't plan on making this the first. HOWEVER, I remain entirely perplexed that so many Progs have taken aim at this film for reasons that seem to be largely, if not entirely, unrelated to the film.If it was just one or two nutjobs on a YouTube channel, so be it. But it's like it's a goddamn coordinated effort to stop people from seeing the moving. I just don't get it. Surely the Progs have better bogeymen to tamp down.

[AlabamAlum]

The only thing I have heard is that Mel Gibson is telling people that Hollywood elite are drinking the blood of the kids they abuse for the adrenochrome.

Is Mel really saying that? I don’t know. But that’s a thing out there.

[Mike]

I think it just boils down to them not wanting to see conservative/Christian movie-makers have any success. They view the movie biz as their home turf and they'll be damned if some knuckle-dragging conservative is gonna waltz in and have a successful box office run on their watch. It apparently drives them crazy to the point they'll spill barrels of ink complaining about the bastards that are out rescuing kids from human traffickers. Slate's argument was "Suuuure they rescue the children.... BUT THEN WHAT?"

https://slate.com/culture/2023/07/so...ing-qanon.html

A quick sampling of this disturbing movie review. I've never thought of a movie review as disturbing but well... Slate.

"Sound of Freedom, which stars Jim Caviezel as the controversy-plagued anti–child trafficking crusader Tim Ballard, was completed in 2018 and set up for release by Fox the following year, until Disney bought the studio and shelved the movie."

1. Piss on this guy named Tim Ballard, the main character played by Jesus. He obviously deserves it because reasons.

"But it arrived in theaters surrounded by a cloud of innuendo put forth by its star and its noisiest right-wing supporters—conspiratorial insinuations about who doesn’t want this story to be told and what real-world traffickers are really up to."

2. Fucking noisy right-wingers.
3. Why is "really" italicized?? Other than kidnapping children, are they also up to wholesome pursuits that negate the child trafficking? I bet those noisy right-wingers think the traffickers are ALL bad.

"The pedophiles and child traffickers in Sound of Freedom are sweaty, sharp-toothed deviants, as they’ve been depicted in movies as far back as Fritz Lang’s M nearly a century ago."

4. Getting pretty creepy in here...

"Since leaving DHS, Ballard and his “Operation Underground Railroad” have conducted raids and sting operations like the ones shown in Sound of Freedom, often captured on video for use as promotional material. But his gung-ho methods are frowned upon by longtime anti-trafficking activists, who see them as ineffectual and even counterproductive."

5. So Ballard is a self-serving prick who only rescues kidnapped children because it's all about HIM. Sorry, GUNG-HO prick.
6. Rescuing kidnapped children is frowned upon by longtime anti-trafficking activists?? That seems like a strange thing to frown upon.
7. Gonna need an explanation on how rescuing the kidnapped child is "ineffectual and COUNTERPRODUCTIVE". I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation from Slate.

"According to Foreign Policy, a group of Dominican girls OUR rescued in 2014 were released without rehabilitation or support a few weeks later."

8. Okaaaaaay. So they'd be better off.... in captivity? Gonna need to hear more of this argument.

"Meg Conley, who accompanied Ballard on that raid, wrote for Slate in 2021 about her experience and reported that “anti-trafficking work, the kind that really works, doesn’t have an immediate satisfaction. It’s slow and steady. There are no starring turns.”

9. Thanks, Meg.

"Effective anti-trafficking work may not have starring roles, but OUR’s stories do, and so does Sound of Freedom."

10. So they made a Hollywood movie using poetic license? HEATHENS!

Just noticed there's a more recent Slate article that bashed the film than the one I just referenced.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/...spiracies.html

Slate likes to weave in the QAnon and the "Pizzagate" nonsense as a way to discredit the film, it's actors, and OUR in general. If you are girding yourselves for "ah, here's where they claim the problem doesn't really exist". This is the part where they claim the problem doesn't really exist, or is massively overblown.

"Statistics on human trafficking are notoriously difficult to pin down, but the often-circulated claim that 800,000 children go missing in the U.S. each year is an extreme exaggeration. Such claims conflate different kinds of disappearances, and confuse reports with crimes; the reality in America is likely around 115 kidnappings a year. Sound of Freedom doesn’t give audiences that context, though. It starts with a montage of real footage of child abductions and ends with some pretty alarming stats, presented in somber text:

Human trafficking is a $150 billion a year industry.

The US is one of the top destinations for human trafficking and is one of the top consumers for child sex.

There are more humans trapped today in slavery than at any point in human history, including when slavery was legal.

Millions of these slaves are children.

"These numbers do reflect an ugly reality, but they are misleading in the context of the film. The $150 billion refers to profits for all human trafficking—the great majority of which is for labor, not sex, and which includes both adults and children."

11. Make light of a lowball estimate of 115 kids in the U.S. and complain about the use of "somber text" whatever that is.
12. Oh! It's no biggie because the $150 BILLION industry also includes labor costs! They better be getting health insurance too, goddamn it!
13. Who gives a shit about ADULTS?

Here's my favorite bit from the two Slate articles. It comes from a Foreign Policy article they, themselves, linked in a failed attempt to support their own argument.

"Human trafficking is one of the world’s fastest-growing criminal enterprises, according to the United Nations. Precise figures are hard to come by, given the inherent challenges of collecting data on illegal activity. But according to estimates from the International Labour Organization (ILO), trafficking is a $150 billion industry affecting 20.9 million people worldwide, nearly a quarter of whom are marketed for sex.

The ILO estimates that 5.5 million children are victims of the trafficking industry, and many are sexually exploited. Some young people are held or live in brothels, while others are forced into the hands of international criminal rings; still more are marketed by relatives seeking cash."

The people who wrote those articles for Slate, Sam Adams and Molly Olmstead are human trash.

[Tom W]

HOWEVER, I remain entirely perplexed that so many Progs have taken aim at this film for reasons that seem to be largely, if not entirely, unrelated to the film.

I'm calling B.S. You know Progs as well as any of us. None of that should "perplex" you.

or, on second thought, that was sarcasm..

[Dr. Strangelove]

The only thing I have heard is that Mel Gibson is telling people that Hollywood elite are drinking the blood of the kids they abuse for the adrenochrome.

Is Mel really saying that? I don’t know. But that’s a thing out there.

The stuff about Gibson and the adrenochrome is fake and it goes back to at least last year.

I did some digging and he also really has no connection to Sound of Freedom beyond putting up a little money for it. He's not credited as a Producer or any other role.

There's also been junk floating for a while that Ashton Kutcher is about to EXPOSE the blood-drinking Hollywood elites based off of congressional testimony he gave six years ago.

[AlabamAlum]

What you are saying, and let me see if I have this right, is that there a possibility that things said on the internet might not always be true?

[AlabamAlum]

As far as Gibson, I did see a spot he did urging people to see the movie. The internet folks on Twitter have def made it seem like he had a bigger role.

[Whitley]

As far as Gibson, I did see a spot he did urging people to see the movie. The internet folks on Twitter have def made it seem like he had a bigger role.

Probably doing a favor since James C. Starred in the passion of the Christ movie that Gibson directed.