Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

worldbeyondwar.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 577 posts

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#171

Post by ArnoVW »

I bumped into this video about the making of 'Top Gun' the other day.

Interesting in many ways. It shows the photographical choices and approaches that they used. The creative process and choices (and the vision and influence of Bruckenheimer).. and the way that the Navy had an influence.

Example: the CO of the Miramar base (where it was shot) had a veto right on the script. He rejected because there was a romance between enlisted, and because there was an in-flight collision. Which resulted in Bruckenheimer finding 'work-arounds' : Charlie becomes an external consultant, the collision becomes a flat spin following a jet wash incident (the CO looked over old accidents to find something suitable)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Knz5LM_FzEE

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#172

Post by dgb23 »

cm2187 wrote: post #39
heavyset_go wrote: post #7

Once this was pointed out, I can't unsee it. It's kind of ruined movies that involves the military or military equipment for me, since it can be really obvious when creators toe the line for the military. When I see military equipment my gut reaction is to anticipate the other shoe dropping, and to look for shoehorned hero worship or some good-versus-evil plot point.

I think Hollywood is lot less subtle now at trying to push political propaganda than it was ever then, except that wokeism is the theme of the day. In some instances it has completely taken over the plot, like in the last season of Fargo, to the point of becoming some sort of unwatcheable catechism.

You are contrasting “wokeism” to military and secret agencies propaganda of a nation that has been warring, invading and coordinating coups for almost a hundred years?

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#173

Post by tgv »

Barrin92 wrote: post #14

one graphic that stuck with me, that I saw a few years ago is this one ( https://imgur.com/svsB0Ub ) (question being: which nation, according to you, contributed most to the defeat of Germany?" Being German and having Russian relatives the perspective on the war on the continent has always been interesting to me. The sheer scale and brutality of the Eastern front, the war crimes and death (The Soviet Union lost more…

> The Soviet Union lost more than 15% of its population

Yeah, but that number is so high because they were effective at killing their own people. The number of needless victims during the fighting and those of the "cleansing" after a win is incredibly high.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#174

Post by deltron3030 »

reillyse wrote: post #33
Barrin92 wrote: post #14

one graphic that stuck with me, that I saw a few years ago is this one ( https://imgur.com/svsB0Ub ) (question being: which nation, according to you, contributed most to the defeat of Germany?" Being German and having Russian relatives the perspective on the war on the continent has always been interesting to me. The sheer scale and brutality of the Eastern front, the war crimes and death (The Soviet Union lost more…

Yes, Russia had pushed Germany the whole way back into Berlin by 1945. Russia defeated Germany in Europe in WW2 the other allied powers basically showed up when it was all over.

I think Russia could only do it because the Brits decoded German cryptography prior leading to traps overwhelming German defenses on all fronts.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#175

Post by bushin »

JetAlone wrote: post #120
nullifidian wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Putin and LitRPG? Can you elaborate?

Gonna second this question - my sibling comment was tongue in cheek but belied a genuine curiosity.

I think they meant books like this one: https://market.yandex.ru/product--romanov-german-ivanovich-t...

"Comrade Hitler. Part II. Hanged Churchill"

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#176

Post by mutatio »

"The Patriot" is a good one, there's a scene where Mel Gibson (colonial plantation owner) / his workers proudly declare his plantation workers as "freemen" when told by the British red coat they will be free if they fight on the side of the King. Mel Gibson has a bit of a track record though, so unlikely dark CIA involvement.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#177

Post by webreac »

awestroke wrote: post #156
echlipse wrote: post #139

I came to know about the Marvel movie military involvement from a youtube video essayist. I don't know whether it's good or bad. It's somewhere in the middle probably. Also every other country does the exact same thing afaik. The opposite of this would be potraying everything about the armed forces in a complete negative light. Now that won't be liked a lot I guess. The important thing here I believe is people should…

> Also every other country does the exact same thing afaik Not true. US, Russia, China, North Korea - sure. Can you name any other countries? Can you give examples for even a fraction of "all other countries"?

France. For example https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Une_femme_d%27honneur

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#178

Post by cycomanic »

fsloth wrote: post #104
prmoustache wrote: post #20

I cringe every time I hear the US president being described as the leader of the free world, as if there were 2 specific sides and USA were leading it and as if USA was an advocate for freedom.

USA is an advocate of very specific stability. "Free world" is a hyperbolic but US is still a huge global power. In cold war it was obvious there were two sides, and the other was obviously more free than the other. Go ask for example Estonians, Lithuanians or Latvians who they enjoyed the yoke of the USSR. Now, as China is becoming an ever more stronger player, we again see that there are two sides arising. While pa…

> USA is an advocate of very specific stability. "Free world" is a hyperbolic but US is still a huge global power.

> In cold war it was obvious there were two sides, and the other was obviously more free than the other. Go ask for example Estonians, Lithuanians or Latvians who they enjoyed the yoke of the USSR.

You could also ask a Guatemalan how they enjoyed living under the US installed military dictatorships (which came out of a US supported coup after democratic elections resulted in a win for the left). Things are by far not as clear cut. Both blocks supported atrocious regimes if it was in their economic interests and worked against "the other side". That we largely only hear about one side shows how well the propaganda was/is working.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#179

Post by gurkendoktor »

kmonsen wrote: post #140
icare_1er wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the name of a fairly recent kind of cult, more or less related to the left, and trying to influence a lot of the political/corporate/cultural world.

Quoting from Wikipedia: “ Woke (/ˈwoʊk/ WOHK) is an English adjective meaning 'alert to racial prejudice and discrimination' that originated in African-American Vernacular English (AAVE). Beginning in the 2010s, it came to encompass a broader awareness of social inequalities such as sexism, and has also been used as shorthand for left-wing ideas involving identity politics and social justice, such as the notion of wh…

Before the mid 2010s, we talked about how the 99% could avoid concentration of power and wealth in the 1%. Now the richest and worst companies in the world paste BLM rainbow flags on their website, and suddenly large swaths of society have decided that, coincidentally, the folks with the big money are the good guys, while random middle and lower class people with slightly outdated beliefs are the actual problem.

There are many long magazine articles discussing whether wokeness is a religion or cult. Either way, it has completely derailed all political discourse for the benefit of the most privileged (as defined by money).

And in the media world, it means that everything is now over-the-top preachy, and that scoring political points has become more important than making good art. Sucks, but at least there are plenty of classic movies to re-watch.

Re: Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

#180

Post by ryanlol »

kmonsen wrote: post #140
icare_1er wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the name of a fairly recent kind of cult, more or less related to the left, and trying to influence a lot of the political/corporate/cultural world.

Quoting from Wikipedia: “ Woke (/ˈwoʊk/ WOHK) is an English adjective meaning 'alert to racial prejudice and discrimination' that originated in African-American Vernacular English (AAVE). Beginning in the 2010s, it came to encompass a broader awareness of social inequalities such as sexism, and has also been used as shorthand for left-wing ideas involving identity politics and social justice, such as the notion of wh…

Did “woke” actually originate in AAVE instead of whatever the technical term for twitter-speak is?
Post reply on HN