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US military intelligence agencies have influenced over 1,800 movies and TV shows

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Re: US military intelligence agencies have influenced over 1,800 movies and TV shows

#61

Post by gumby »

The money and involvement have had quite an effect. Just look at the percentage of combat films Hollywood makes and compare to 30 years ago. To go by Hollywood the country is on a war footing.

And don't forget other entertainment industries like sports. The Pentagon paid millions of dollars a year just for cross promotion with NFL football (not for recruitment advertising): "honor our troops" and the like.

On the other hand the "think for yourself" crowd... :-(

Edit: in changing "hundreds of thousands" into "millions" I ended up with "hundreds of millions"

Re: US military intelligence agencies have influenced over 1,800 movies and TV shows

#62

Post by fixermark »

paganel wrote: post #3

As a movie buff this doesn't surprise me at all. I'm still waiting for THE movie about the US intervention in Iraq, the same kind of movies that Apocalypse Now, "The Deer Hunter" and even Rambo I were for the Vietnam war. I think my wait will be in vain.

It probably will be.

The key difference between the Iraq ops and the Vietnam War is the lack of a draft. Iraq wasn't nationally felt the same way Vietnam was; such a film would have its audience, but you're actually lacking the overall cultural zeitgeist that Rambo was able to tap into.

Re: US military intelligence agencies have influenced over 1,800 movies and TV shows

#63

Post by fosco »

subsubsub wrote: post #57
treebeard901 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

James Bond is essentially a franchise built around the psychological need to cope with the collapse of the British empire and all of the associated loss of status that goes with it. In other words, you are correct, Bond movies do not try to hide their nationalism. This is no great revelation.

I think you might be over estimating how much the British care about having/not having an empire. If you can get around the paywall, this might be worth a read: https://www.ft.com/content/a9c45baa-1dc6-11e7-b7d3-163f5a7f2...

Thank you for sharing this, I was able to get the cache [0]

I look forward to the following "The terminal point of empire is introspection, not a restless desire to do it all over again. "

[0] https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:iE3HTh...

Re: US military intelligence agencies have influenced over 1,800 movies and TV shows

#64

Post by CalChris »

rasz wrote: post #52
r721 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think about Three Kings (1999)? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Kings_(1999_film)

What do you think about Argo? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argo_(2012_film) pure CIA propaganda

Umm, it was propaganda but it was Hollywood propaganda about Hollywood. That's why this rather minor movie won Best Picture because Hollywood loves movies about Hollywood.

As to it being pure CIA propaganda, you'd have to explain more about that.

Re: US military intelligence agencies have influenced over 1,800 movies and TV shows

#65

Post by fixermark »

pupppet wrote: post #32

Finally an explanation for why Michael Bay keeps getting work.

There's a very good film critique dissection of Bay's work done by Lindsay Ellis titled "The Whole Plate" (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJGOq3JclTH8J73o2Z4VM...). She uses Bay as a lens to talk about film studies for a couple of reasons; one of them is that there is no doubt the guy's movies are raking it in, so film theory both highlights what he's doing that's working and---when film theory suggests "What he does should not work"---provides interesting counter-examples to the standard rules.

(Note that while you're not wrong, it's not ultimately the US government buying all those movie tickets ;) ).

Re: US military intelligence agencies have influenced over 1,800 movies and TV shows

#68

Post by fixermark »

fwdpropaganda wrote: post #51

Finally! I've been saying for years "The largest propaganda machine in the world is Hollywood." People usually just roll their eyes.

The America of "Snow Crash" has as its primary exports software and culture, via Hollywood.

It seems to continue to be an apropos prediction.

Re: US military intelligence agencies have influenced over 1,800 movies and TV shows

#69

Post by e12e »

paganel wrote: post #3

As a movie buff this doesn't surprise me at all. I'm still waiting for THE movie about the US intervention in Iraq, the same kind of movies that Apocalypse Now, "The Deer Hunter" and even Rambo I were for the Vietnam war. I think my wait will be in vain.

Not a movie, but "Generation Kill" comes pretty close?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0995832/

As for movies, there's "In The Valley of Elah" comes to mind:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0478134/

And more generally, about modern warfare, I suppose "Eye in the Sky" warrants a mention:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2057392/

Re: US military intelligence agencies have influenced over 1,800 movies and TV shows

#70

Post by altcognito »

gumby wrote: post #61

The money and involvement have had quite an effect. Just look at the percentage of combat films Hollywood makes and compare to 30 years ago. To go by Hollywood the country is on a war footing. And don't forget other entertainment industries like sports. The Pentagon paid millions of dollars a year just for cross promotion with NFL football (not for recruitment advertising): "honor our troops" and the like. On the oth…

53 million over 3 years, or 17 million dollars a year over multiple sports. A far cry from "hundreds of millions of dollars"

And I'm pretty sure that advertising in sports is common sense. Advertising during daytime TV isn't likely to have the same bang for your buck.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/defense-military-tribute...

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