Falling Down: The great American lie.

[Worlds fastest turtle]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgNWg-a2EgE

[the vampire of time and memory]

Originally posted by atomicgirl:

Originally posted by C4Warr10r:

They're just leaving the state. Michael Douglas didn't do that, because the movie had to be twisted into a critique of capitalism and white people, as per the paradigm of the same Left that imposes control. A lot of people are identifying with the movie because they feel that pressure, but that's not America doing that. It's just the same Left that does this crap everywhere else.

Your take is so bizarre, I wonder if you even saw the film. This movie was about humanizing the large number of white men who went postal in the 1980s as victims of society, particularly of women. There's an implication that D-FENS goes crazy because he got a bum rap as a domestic abuser, and starting with Cuckoo's Nest, Michael Douglas either produced or starred almost exclusively in movies in which violent men are shown as sympathetic because they were driven to violence by women.

this guy never has any actual idea what he's talking about, he just has to have an opinion on everything and uses this place to practice his amateur writing skills

[permanent name]

i thought it was a meme funny movie with a surprising message

[Hobbit XIII]

Originally posted by atomicgirl:

You guys really think that the movie, written by privileged middle class screenwriters, is a fount of wisdom. All righty then.

I always say it is about consumer rights, because it is.
it is about the right to travel freely in public spaces.
And in my opinion Michael Douglas is the one guy in this entire civilisation who is willing to stand up to everybody who ♥♥♥♥♥ with people.

The gangs, the fast food chains, the racists, the con artists, the overspend to justify budgets of a really ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up tax system.

Michael Douglas stood up to them all.

his personal life was a mess but take that out of the equation and we have a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ civilian hero., a man who should be celebrated.

[atomicgirl]

Originally posted by Dutchgamer1982:

other movies you may like :

idiotcracracy

What is great about this movie?

[atomicgirl]

Originally posted by m662:

But all said I think George Carlin still said the best explanation of the American dream.

George Carlin lived the American dream. He came from a poor working class neighborhood in NYC, dropped out of high school and became a millionaire. That was the epitome of the American dream, yet he was telling his audiences that the American Dream wasn't real? It was a dream, how did he go from being a nobody from NYC to being a millionaire before he reached his 50s?

Carlin never spoke any truth, by the way. There was a movie called Network about an angry guy called Howard Beale who is propped up to be some cool prophet on TV, who winds up preaching nihilism. The whole point of the movie was that Beale was only an idiot who was hearing voices but because the character became so popular in real life, comics like Carlin, Bill Maher and Dennis Miller imitated him. So people just assumed anyone who spoke and acted like Beale was speaking truth to power.

And anyone who knew Carlin from before he turned in the late 1980s saw him for what he was, an actor playing a character, kind of like how Andrew Dice Clay was a character. He started out as an actor, not a comic.

[atomicgirl]

Originally posted by Sir Dookface McFerretballs:

It is scary how much we see this now with younger Xers and millenials and gen z likely never able to afford a home or car, stuck renting, stuck with inescapable student loans (thank Joe Biden for that in 2005), not able to save for retirement, not having kids, and being told by the boomers to just pull up their bootstraps because the boomers had it good and refuse to see or listen to what is going on.

The Baby Boomers who fought and died in Vietnam or came back maimed and screwed up with PTSD had it good?

The same generation that was told they had to prepare for nuclear war as kids? And saw all of their idols assassinated (including John Lennon)?

Endured race riots, violent protests, the AIDs crisis, the Energy crisis, Reaganomics, the homeless crisis, drug epidemic, downsizing and outsourcing?

Do you know who or what a Baby Boomer is?

[the vampire of time and memory]

Originally posted by atomicgirl:

Originally posted by Sir Dookface McFerretballs:

It is scary how much we see this now with younger Xers and millenials and gen z likely never able to afford a home or car, stuck renting, stuck with inescapable student loans (thank Joe Biden for that in 2005), not able to save for retirement, not having kids, and being told by the boomers to just pull up their bootstraps because the boomers had it good and refuse to see or listen to what is going on.

The Baby Boomers who fought and died in Vietnam or came back maimed and screwed up with PTSD had it good?

The same generation that was told they had to prepare for nuclear war as kids? And saw all of their idols assassinated (including John Lennon)?

Endured race riots, violent protests, the AIDs crisis, the Energy crisis, Reaganomics, the homeless crisis, drug epidemic, downsizing and outsourcing?

Do you know who or what a Baby Boomer is?

most of these problems were only relevant to those living in america, a small part of the world (not to say other parts of the world weren't going through their own stuff in this period)

[C4Warr10r]

Originally posted by atomicgirl:

This movie wasn't about a white guy with a white collar job going berserk. It was about the large number of ex-military white guys who were committing mass shooting sprees, going all the back to the Charles Whitman in 1966--which they were at the time. By the time this movie came out, we'd had a large number of them, to the point where it was called "going postal."

So again, it's about people living under government oppression. Who did postal workers and Vietnam vets WORK for? Not that we had a lot of those shooters, either, but a big deal was made about them.

Where is the movie where men are driven to violence entirely by women? Troy, maybe? Oblivion? 28 days later? It's just not usually a thing, because that would be retarded. It takes more than that to push a man over the edge, since a man can always just go find other women. There is no "Falling Down" movement, but there is a passport bros movement.

How do you explain ANY of that with your lens? You can't, but I can. I just did, and you claim that it is "bizarre". Fine, try again, because I'm not convinced by anything you're saying, and I don't see the underlying, common point. Film is art, and it speaks to people if it is good art, so how do you explain the underlying phenomena that you're scratching the surface of?

[Hobbit XIII]

Originally posted by the vampire of time and memory:

Originally posted by atomicgirl:

The Baby Boomers who fought and died in Vietnam or came back maimed and screwed up with PTSD had it good?

The same generation that was told they had to prepare for nuclear war as kids? And saw all of their idols assassinated (including John Lennon)?

Endured race riots, violent protests, the AIDs crisis, the Energy crisis, Reaganomics, the homeless crisis, drug epidemic, downsizing and outsourcing?

Do you know who or what a Baby Boomer is?

most of these problems were only relevant to those living in america, a small part of the world (not to say other parts of the world weren't going through their own stuff in this period)

this just defies reality.

[Hobbit XIII]

Originally posted by atomicgirl:

George Carlin.

I thought I was his only critic not that I know much about him outside some stand ups hows he did.

My lasting impression of him was an interview where he spent a good part of it talking about corporate America the dumbing down of people and how the people in power just want everybody else to be able to run the machines for them the people in power.

We will get less everything will become harder for us to get, money will be harder etc etc
We will work harder and get less that is what they want.

It was pretty inspiring stuff considering it was a prime time thing.

I was thinking wow this guy really has a heart for the common man, he knows what its like.

He continues 'I can tell you how to beat their system get yourself and your family independent of the power game, and you can buy it at .....'

Then I realised the truth.

[Talby]

Originally posted by permanent name:

Originally posted by Talby:

That's the thing - when you think about how the EU elections are changing / getting rid of their equally corrupt gov't, this movie would also relate with those voters quite well , yes?

no that doesn't make any sense and makes it sound like you haven't seen it before.
...

You didn't get it - I have not seen this since I was very left-leaning, and watching it today would be a bit of reminder of why and how things are exponentially worse here in left-leaning states and many countries in the EU.

Personally it was a good reminder of why people say "the left and right switched sides" here in the US...

[atomicgirl]

Originally posted by the vampire of time and memory:

this guy never has any actual idea what he's talking about, he just has to have an opinion on everything and uses this place to practice his amateur writing skills

What are you on these forums for? To practice the armchair psychology you learned from Dr. Phil? You're so good at this, you didn't even notice "girl" in my username and called me a guy.

I'm not practicing anything, BTW. Just because I'm on the internet doesn't mean I have to write like a dumb 12 year old texting to their friends. Remember that everything that you do online carries over into your real life. If you want to keep writing and expressing yourself like an illiterate on forums, that';s your problem, but don't be surprised if you start having a harder time communicating offline because you spend so much of your time online writing like a fool. Maybe instead of reacting like a brat and mocking me for having amateurish writing skills, you should learn by example.

[Othobrithol]

Economically the boomers did have it better than the younger generations. It was the last american generation where things like home ownership, retirement etc were reasonable expectations from simply having a full time job.

This was mostly due to three factors.

A - The population, and thus the competitive pool for resources (including employment) was about 2/3rds the current level, with a much lower participation by females in the workforce. the labor pool has significantly grown and thus the price of labor has been far outpaced by natural inflation.

B - The United States was experiencing an economic golden age through much of the period. As much as pundits want to pin this on this or that administration, it actually derived from the lack of competition for US business. A good chuck of the world was behind the iron curtain, Europe was still recovering from the wars of the first half of the century, and the current powerhouses in Asia like Japan, China, Korea were still in the early stages of industrialization.

C - There has been a shift, often over exaggerated but real, in income inequality. Even conservative estimates point towards towards a 10% shift in the share of the income taken by the upper 20% of earners. In the mid to high incomes this shift becomes part of the background noise and outweighed by other factors. But on the low end, where fixed costs like housing, food and fuel make up a much more significant percentage of income, that has put more of the working class into poverty.

[Morkonan]

Originally posted by permanent name:

...
there's nothing psychotic about his experiences though. he's just been living a lie so long he snaps, does whatever he wants, and then when an authority figure tells him he's the bad guy he

unless you're meaning to say that any kind of political belief is psychotic, and simply not understanding your place in the world makes you the participant in a psychotic episode?

In the end, he's faced with an unquestionable interruption of "reality" and his world comes crashing down. He only has one escape left.

Look at it this way - In the opening scene, he's recreating his "drive to work." This is years after he lost his job (IIRC) and his marriage collapsed. So, did he just decide to comfort himself by engaging in his routine that he has defined himself by for just that one day? Obviously not. He's been doing that for years...

He's retreated into a fantasy where everything is "normal" again. It just takes one last trigger to push him over the edge. And, what does he do? He rails against all the normal complaints people have in a world that doesn't often serve dreams, aspirations, and desires very well. It's a world that is flawed that he's driven to act out upon. All his energy is directed outward, but with the real problem he has refused to face being very personal, very introspective. He's defined his life by his job and may have even taken out his dissatisfaction on his wife, who has protective orders against him for a "reason."

IMO, there's quite a bit of different lines of commentary in this movie. Consumerism is one,
but how we define ourselves and what we value as important as well as how we see ourselves in this world that seems to rarely value us... Well, it's got a lot to say. :)

He puts on the mantle of a "common man vigilante" who's reminiscent of another famously deranged fictional character. A character that was so unhinged, he may have been the only sane and reasonable character in the whole movie...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwMVMbmQBug

:)

like, is Brazil about a psychotic episode to you?

Unfortunately, I've only seen bits and pieces of that movie. But, Gilliam is a genius and I've always wanted to watch it.

[the vampire of time and memory]

Originally posted by atomicgirl:

Originally posted by the vampire of time and memory:

this guy never has any actual idea what he's talking about, he just has to have an opinion on everything and uses this place to practice his amateur writing skills

What are you on these forums for? To practice the armchair psychology you learned from Dr. Phil? You're so good at this, you didn't even notice "girl" in my username and called me a guy.

I'm not practicing anything, BTW. Just because I'm on the internet doesn't mean I have to write like a dumb 12 year old texting to their friends. Remember that everything that you do online carries over into your real life. If you want to keep writing and expressing yourself like an illiterate on forums, that';s your problem, but don't be surprised if you start having a harder time communicating offline because you spend so much of your time online writing like a fool. Maybe instead of reacting like a brat and mocking me for having amateurish writing skills, you should learn by example.

the post was referring to the guy you replied to, but go off queen