Daniel Larison is rapidly becoming my favourite conservative and today he takes on a former favourite, Davids Brooks.

Brooks’ column today is about The White Messiah

This is the oft-repeated story about a manly young adventurer who goes into the wilderness in search of thrills and profit. But, once there, he meets the native people and finds that they are noble and spiritual and pure. And so he emerges as their Messiah, leading them on a righteous crusade against his own rotten civilization.

Larison, as always, goes ever so gently for the throat:

Brooks is right when he says the story teaches that, “Natives can either have their history shaped by cruel imperialists or benevolent ones, but either way, they are going to be supporting actors in our journey to self-admiration.” What he fails to do is connect this to the urges of our own liberal imperialists and humanitarian interventionists, who are constantly warning against leaving other nations to their own devices and who are frequently complaining about our boundless benevolence that is repaid with contempt or indifference. He might consult his colleague Thomas Friedman on this point, since Friedman seems to think that most Muslims worldwide are “holding our coats” while we do all the heavy lifting on their behalf and that Afghanistan can be likened to a “special needs baby” that we as a country have just adopted. Muslims do tend to be reduced to supporting actors in Friedman’s own journey of self-importance.

One of the commenters at Eunomia used the delightful phrase

the neocons’ inexplicable War Against Avatar

Excellent!

Way to miss the point! (Don’t play with that or you’ll go blind)

But Avatar claims that there is something wrong with technology, and that the Na’vi of Pandora somehow represent opposition to it.

The right-of-center blogosphere that I loiter around has chosen to focus on the anti-corporate message in Avatar and, indeed, your attitude to corporatism is probably a good predictor of whether you enjoyed the movie (exception: Julio).

But it wasn’t the human’s technology that the Na’vi objected to.

Spoiler (highlight to read it):
It was the gunships the humans used to destroy their home.

Douthat:

The much-discussed irony of James Cameron’s “Avatar” (which has already grossed upwards of a billion dollars worldwide) is that it’s a celebration of primitivism, pantheism, and pre-modernity created with the most cutting-edge technological tools a modern capitalist society can muster.

If there is irony in the air, it is that the freedom-loving conservatives are terrified of the government telling them how to live their lives but are perfectly happy to let corporations do the same.

FWIW I thought the movie was alright.

Was going to write a review of The Battle of Algiers but it is so much easier to copy/paste from Roger Ebert.

At the height of the street fighting in Algiers, the French stage a press conference for a captured FLN leader. “Tell me, general,” a Parisian journalist asks the revolutionary, “do you not consider it cowardly to send your women carrying bombs in their handbags, to blow up civilians?” The rebel replies in a flat tone of voice: “And do you not think it cowardly to bomb our people with napalm?” A pause. “Give us your airplanes and we will give you our women and their handbags.”

Pontecorvo has taken his stance somewhere between the FLN and the French, although his sympathies are on the side of the Nationalists. He is aware that innocent civilians die and are tortured on both sides, that bombs cannot choose their victims, that both armies have heroes and that everyone fighting a war can supply rational arguments to prove he is on the side of morality.

His protagonists are a French colonel (Jean Martin), who respects his opponents but believes (correctly, no doubt) that ruthless methods are necessary, and Ali (Brahim Haggiag), a petty criminal who becomes an FLN leader. But there are other characters: an old man beaten by soldiers; a small Arab boy attacked by French civilians who have narrowly escaped bombing; a cool young Arab girl who plants a bomb in a cafe and then looks compassionately at her victims, and many more.

The strength of the film, I think, comes because it is both passionate and neutral, concerned with both sides. The French colonel (himself a veteran of the anti-Nazi resistance), learns that Sartre supports the FLN. “Why are the liberals always on the other side?” he asks. “Why don’t they believe France belongs in Algeria?” But there was a time when he did not need to ask himself why the Nazis did not belong in France.

I can’t get the hang of the blogging business. Is it better to leave comments on their blog or write a counter-blog of your own? Maybe you should blog then comment on theirs with a link back to yours? But what if they have trackback turned on? It’s all so confusing. In the end, I decided to comment on Aaron’s blog and reproduce it here.

Kevin said…

I watched the Star Wars movies in order. I thought Episode I was pretty good but went downhill after that.By Episode IV it was like he ran out of ideas or his budget for cool graphics was all gone or something.

Aaron didn’t enjoy it as much as I did…

Last night I watched Star Wars Episode 1. The movie really isn’t half bad except for three things.

… but at least we agreed that the first one was best.

If they ever plan to make a movie from a book/cartoon/comic/video game that you love you need to think carefully before going to see it. If that, let’s say, cartoon was made 40 years ago and you have ever so fond memories from your childhood about it, you need to think very, very carefully. If the original was made in stop-frame animation by french people then dubbed into English with all-new, surrealist plots and dry, witty dialogue and the remake was going to use the latest computer-generated, 3D animation with a hollywood screenplay and american voice actors … well, you shouldn’t even risk finding out that the cynical, world-weary, middle aged, main character was to be played by one of those cheery, hopeful, annoying child actors that only grow in California. But Dylan wanted to see it so we got it on pay-per-view.

It wasn’t bad. Once I got used to the fact that Dougal had shed his nihilistic pessimism and become Doogal the ever-smiling puppy, I was able to enjoy the show even though Zebedee never once said “Boing!” and Jon Stewart made a very sorry villian.

It was a shame that Florence had only a cameo role - I spent the first 7 years of school being called Florence and Florence was Best Supporting Actress in the original, the perfect optimistic foil to Dougal’s misery - and disappointing that Dylan was a pale imitation of a hippy - being called “a bit of Dylan” was the worst insult that you could hurl at a fellow seven-year-old and was the reason that no boy children in England were named Dylan between 1970 and 1995. Was Nigel Planer not available?

Still, I enjoyed it heartily. The children laughed and laughed (I did too) and we appreciated the Monty Python references having just watched The Holy Grail. Chevy Chase as the train was great and Ian McLellan was the perfect Zebedee. But…

…by what logic did they think it OK to end a remake of The Magic Roundabout and not have Zebedee say “Time for bed” ??? It’s criminal too that they could find a way to squeeze in the

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.

TRIVIA

I told Dylan it was called ‘The Magic Roundabout’ in England and he asked why they kept calling it a ‘carousel’. I told him it was because ‘carousel’ is what americans call it. “No, it’s not”, he corrected me. “We call it a merry-go-round”. You learn something every day.

STOP PRESS

I just noticed from Wikipedia that the movie was made in England and then dubbed into American for over-here. Now I am very sad

Andrew Sullivan just watched A Man for all Seasons which tells the tale of Thomas More’s struggles with Henry VIII over the relationship between religion, the law and executive power.

Roper: So now you’d give the Devil benefit of law!

More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?

Roper: I’d cut down every law in England to do that!

More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you - where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast - man’s laws, not God’s - and if you cut them down - and you’re just the man to do it - d’you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake.

I have the DVD at home. Need to watch it again.