text warez on Thu, 18 Oct 2001 08:16:37 +0200 (CEST) |
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<nettime> OLIVER STONE'S CHAOS THEORY |
THE PICTURES OLIVER STONE'S CHAOS THEORY Issue of 2001-10-22 Posted 2001-10-15 On the morning before the United States bombed Afghanistan, HBO Films presented a panel discussion, at Alice Tully Hall, entitled "Making Movies That Matter: The Role of Filmmaking in the National Debate." The people in the audience were restless, eager for someone to put their anger and unease into focus, and it wasn't long before one panelist, Bob Shaye, the C.E.O. of New Line Cinema, got them going by insisting that movies should entertain, not explain. Referring to his studio's forthcoming "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy, he declared, "What the world needs now is hobbits." As hisses filled the air, Oliver Stone, another panelist, shook his head in disbelief. From the start of the discussion, Stone, the writer-director of such political films as "Salvador" and "JFK," had seemed jumpy, swivelling his thick neck like a turret gun at the sound of any foolishness or naïveté. Now his voice rumbled up from his chest and he began to illuminate the dark levers that move the film industry and, by extension, the world. "There's been conglomeration under six principal princes--they're kings, they're barons--and these six companies have control of the world," he said, referring to such corporations as Fox and AOL Time Warner. His voice grew louder as his ideas took shape. "Michael Eisner decides, 'I can't make a movie about Martin Luther King, Jr.--they'll be rioting at the gates of Disneyland!' That's bullshit! But that's what the new world order is." There was a storm of applause. "They control culture, they control ideas. And I think the revolt of September 11th was about 'Fuck you! Fuck your order--;' " "Excuse me," a fellow-panelist, Christopher Hitchens, said. " 'Revolt'?" "Whatever you want to call it," Stone said. "It was state-supported mass murder, using civilians as missiles," said Hitchens, a columnist for Vanity Fair and The Nation. Stone wagged his head and continued. "The studios bought television stations," he said. "Why? Why did the telecommunications bill get passed at midnight, a hidden bill at midnight? The Arabs have a point! They're going to be joined by the people who objected in Seattle, and the usual ten per cent who are against everything, and it's going to be, like, twenty-five per cent of this country that's against the new world order. We need a trustbuster like Teddy Roosevelt to take the television stations away from the film companies and give them back to the people!" There was more applause, and a few uncertain murmurs. "Does anybody make a connection between the 2000 election"--for the Presidency--"and the events of September 11th?" he asked, and added cryptically, "Look for the thirteenth month!" He went on to say that the Palestinians who danced at the news of the attack were reacting just as people had responded after the revolutions in France and Russia. Afterward, the panelists had lunch nearby, at Gabriel's. Hitchens stood outside, holding a glass of Scotch and a trembling cigarette. He was about to leave for Pakistan. "To say that this attack in any way resembles the French Revolution means you are a moral idiot, as well as an intellectual idiot," he said of Stone. "The man has completely lost it." Inside the restaurant, Stone made his way, grinning, through the crowd. He plunged his hands into the hair of a young female producer and tugged, asking, "Is this real?" Although it seemed to most observers to be early afternoon, he twice observed that it was a wonderful night. Stone sat in a booth, cradling a glass of white wine in his hands, and remarked that he hadn't slept in days. "The new world order is about order and control," he said. "This attack was pure chaos, and chaos is energy. All great changes have come from people or events that were initially misunderstood, and seemed frightening, like madmen. Einstein, Nikola Tesla, Gates. I think, I think . . . I think many things." He explained how the World Bank, McDonald's, and the studios' response to the threat of a Writers Guild strike last year were all manifestations of the new global conspiracy of order. "This is the time for a bullet of a film about terrorism, like 'The Battle of Algiers' "Gillo Pontecorvo's 1966 movie about the conflict between the French and F.L.N. terrorist cells in Algeria, in which the director's sympathies lie with the terrorists. "You show the Arab side and the American side in a chase film with a 'French Connection' urgency, where you track people by satellite, like in 'Enemy of the State.' My movie would have the C.I.A. guys and the F.B.I. guys, but they blow it. They're a bunch of drunks from World War II who haven't recovered from the disasters of the sixties--the Kennedy assassination and Vietnam. My movie would show the new heroes of security, the people who really get the job done, who know where the secrets are." And who would that be? His eyes roamed, searching and sad. "I don't know yet." http://www.newyorker.com/THE_TALK_OF_THE_TOWN/CONTENT/?011022ta_talk_the_pic tures # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@bbs.thing.net and "info nettime-l" in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net