Aggravating scene from Hereafter


Posted On: Wednesday - June 30th 2021 7:58PM MST
In Topics: 
  Immigration Stupidity  Political Correctness  Movies  Bible/Religion



This post was not supposed to be a movie review. It came to mind from one particular scene from the '10 Matt Damon movie Hereafter. However, since I watched it, I'll just give a short review to go along with the main point.

I'd never heard of this movie before. It ought to have been my kind of movie, as I do like these types that speculate about the afterlife. Of course, this one had to trash the traditional religions in one very minor scene, I think mainly to make the story work there. That is not the scene this post is about, but it shows that was a PC influence, even with a movie directed by Clint Eastwood (found out to my surprise in the closing credits).

The whole opening sequence had the PC influence, come to think of it, as it was the dark people saving whitey meme again. In this case whitey was the TV news lady, played by Cecile de France, who, true to central casting, was French in the movie. I did not even think of turning the movie off due to that initial PC bit because the best part of the movie by far was the opening scene tsunami* sequence**. Whatever they did for these special effects, this scene looked awesome to me!

Hereafter flips back and forth between three different stories that come together in the end. There was the French part, starred by Cecile of France, a story about two identical-twin 10 y/o boys in England, and then Matt Damon the psychic who lives in a kindler, gentler 2010 San Francisco.

Commenter Alarmist mentioned I should use the film-buff term "production values". I do need to mention production values, but not of the movie, but the production of the CD. Here was my problem: The scenes with the French people were in France with English subtitles. However, the way it played on our player, only the first line of two appeared on the screen. I could make some of it out, but only enough to get the gist of what was going on. Then, in the British scenes, these people had enough of an accent (probably realistic) that I couldn't make out half of what they were saying either! That'd be OK if the normal DVD closed-caption feature would have worked. No dice on this. The only scenes I could follow completely were those of the San Francisco story. Talk aboutcher bad production values!

I'm glad IMDB agrees with me, but before reading it I had already planned to write that, interesting subject notwithstanding, this movie didn't have much of a point. So, here's what we have: Great opening scene disaster sequence, hard to follow 2/3 of the movie, too much PC, and no point.

OK, about that aggravating scene finally. After his soul-mate twin brother had died (not much of a spoiler really) the surviving twin wore the ball cap his brother had always worn everywhere. He attended a new school, and there was just a quick scene with he, two classmates, and the teacher. The other 2 kids were ... ready? A black girl and a Moslem girl. This was 2010 Britain. Yeah, there were plenty already, I guess, but was this a typical classroom, or was someone (Clint Eastwood, even?) pushing this stuff on us? I think you know the answer.

That's not my complaint, though. The boy wore that ball cap to class. Now, the young Moslem girl is wearing the full-out canvas-to-the-floor get-up. She has no veil but has her head wrapped up like a mummy whose slaves had barely ran out of material. Then we hear, to paraphrase, as, remember, I could barely understand half of it, "You need to take off your cap in the classroom.", from the teacher. What damn hypocrisy! I'm pretty sure the movie was NOT making a point about the hypocrisy. Whoever wrote, produced, or directed this scene was telling us that this is what we'd better put up with.

This boy is a character that the audience is supposed to feel sympathy for. He didn't like to take off his brother's cap off, as it was his only tangible thing left of his brother.. Are we supposed to feel that the Moslem girl must be allowed to wear any damn thing she likes, while this poor sad boy must take off his cap because "the rules"? There's your Anarcho-tyranny on display, courtesy of Hollywood.

I didn't like that scene one bit, and the more I think about it now, I give two thumbs down for Hereafter due to it alone. I just hope Clint Eastwood had nothing to do with it. Otherwise I say Hang him High ... is what you should see rather than this PC bilge.



* This was in some place far away from France, possibly Asia, but not made clear, so they would use that word. I think we are supposed to say "tsunami" instead of "tidal wave" now. It's one of the few PC "let's do as the foreigners do" terminology changes that I am down with, as "tidal wave" is really misleading.

** Speaking of your special senses or clairvoyance, which I haven't gotten to yet, that scene preceded the huge Japanese tsunami. The movie was released in Japan about 3 weeks before the tsunami, and the movie was pulled from theaters early.

Comments:
Rex Little
Thursday - July 1st 2021 8:18PM MST
PS That last footnote reminds me of something that happened back in 2001. There was a movie, "Big Trouble" (based on a hilarious book by Dave Barry) that was scheduled for release on Sept. 21. The release date was advertised weeks in advance, and I was looking forward to it, because I'd really enjoyed the book.

There's a scene in the book where two small-time crooks sneak a gun past airport security and hijack the flight they're on. (Yes, Dave Barry can make that funny.) On Sept. 11, I was watching the TV news relate how hijackers had flown two planes into the World Trade Center, and my first thought was, "Oh sh*t, they're going to have to pull 'Big Trouble'." Sure enough, it was delayed for six months.
Moderator
Thursday - July 1st 2021 3:15PM MST
PS: Bill, I don't know - I've seen some movies that really would have been great to continue watching but for the PC that pisses me off to distraction. (If I have advance notice that the movie has the PC (now, "woke", I guess) crap in it, I want to be sure not to give them any money.

Alarmist, I heard about that story only through the unz comments so far. There's really no logic to any of that. "Keep 'em here. Let more in, because ... they're not all bad!" Well, not all pieces of dog shit on the ground are going to make me sick to my stomach, but I'm not gonna eat any of them.

I'm guessing if it was just a handful of neo-Nazis giving the rest who would just write on internet sites and wear brown shirts a bad name, the Germans wouldn't have that same forgiving attitude.
Moderator
Thursday - July 1st 2021 3:09PM MST
PS: Peter, when I typed that, as taken from IMDB and Wiki, I was thinking it was the Japanese culture that was involved in the pulling of the movie.

Wiki says:
"The film premiered in Japan on February 19, 2011.[42] A few days after the 11 March 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, the film was withdrawn from all cinemas in that country, two weeks earlier than originally planned.[43] "Warner Bros. spokesperson Satoru Otani said the film's terrifying tsunami scenes were 'not appropriate' at this time."[43]"

That Japanese guy was just the spokesman, so you are probably right.

IMDB says less:
"This movie was pulled from theaters in Japan after the devastating earthquake and tsunami that hit in March 2011."

The passive voice doesn't help one figure it out. Anyway, yeah, I think the Japanese customers could decide if that opening scene would upset them or not. Perhaps they had better things to do, as in recovering from a tsunami.
The Alarmist
Thursday - July 1st 2021 11:58AM MST
PS

I just caught a blurb that the mayor of Würzburg, where an asylee ran amok and killed three people, stated something to the effect that this should not be used to stigmatize all asylees; this despite the fact that the vast majority of such attacks across Europe have come from asylees.

Are all asylees bad? No, but that doesn’t mean they should be admitted while we take our chances seeing which ones really are bad. Worse still, not expelling or executing those who are bad once they are known.

The mayor had the gall to say that Germans were not mistreated in general (as a people) by the Allies after the war, therefore asylees should not be treated as a group. The problem with that statement is that it is unmoored from actual history: Germans were treated quite poorly by the Allies, particularly Allied leadership, after the war. The only reason Germans weren’t ultimately starved to death is that the US and UK realized they needed them to buffer against the Soviets.

So, we have to take off our ball caps, but they must be allowed to walk in our culture without being subjected to our rules.

Winning!

If you want to see the quintessential French reporterette, search images on

Florence O’Kelly CNEWS

IKR, whodathunk O’Kelly is a french name?
Bill H
Thursday - July 1st 2021 7:31AM MST
PS To say that there is "too much PC, and no point" is a bit redundant.
PeterIke
Thursday - July 1st 2021 6:04AM MST
PS
"The movie was released in Japan about 3 weeks before the tsunami, and the movie was pulled from theaters early."

I always find this sort of thing surprising. What are we all five years old? Do we think that the movie somehow CAUSED the Japan tsunami? Why on earth should the FICTIONAL movie be pulled from theaters because it loosely echoes real-world events?

Ok, I really don't find it surprising anymore, since it happens all the time. But it's dispiriting how pathetically weak we are as a culture that we're constantly trying to protect ourselves even from the most triple-bank-shot thing that might "upset" one person out there.
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