Galt's Gulch

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    Posted by $ MikeMarotta 10 years, 3 months ago
    "... Rand's large tomb of work ..." should be large TOME of work. It is hard to take seriously a site that touts the before and after teeth of actresses. I am happy that they liked the work, but obviously, they are not at Ayn Rand's own intellectual level.

    I note from the article: "Ironically, Republican Jeff Atwater (Florida's CFO) is hosting a screening of Part III in Boca Raton, Florida tomorrow. It is ironic because, one of his last votes in the Florida legislature, Atwater voted in favor of a heavily government subsidized railroad system, which ..." We have this conversation here continuously and continually. Political conservatives think that _Atlas Shrugged_ is about the Marxist/Muslim Liar-in-Chief and never see Cuffy Meigs as one of their own. Mr. Thompson pleads with John Galt, "I am a liberal, enlightened man..." but he cannot protect Galt from the muscle-mystics, i.e., from the right wing of his coalition.

    And for all of that, this is not about politics. _Atlas Shrugged_ is a love story. It is a novel of philosophical detection. It is a modern American instantiation of the 19th century Russian novel. It is much more - and on many levels. No film could do it complete justice, or else Ayn Rand, as a child of Hollywood, would have made a movie in the first place.

    That all being as it may, I enjoyed every minute of the show.
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  • Posted by $ rockymountainpirate 10 years, 3 months ago
    Nice review.

    Everyone seems to have a problem with Project F. I choose to look at it this way. The competent and capable people have all disappeared, so what else would you expect of a torture device then something that appears cobbled together, rather than something really slick looking. Still, Galt naked on the table as in the book would have been a nice touch ;).
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    • Posted by $ Ripside 10 years, 3 months ago
      Someone didn't appreciate your comment, RMP - nor this post, as both were downvoted. I don't participate an awful lot in the Gulch, so maybe I'm not used to the process like I am on Stack Overflow or other sites that do up/down votes, but that seems odd to me, considering its one of the few positive third party reviews I've seen.
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      • Posted by ewv 10 years, 3 months ago
        I didn't downvote it, but: The review was intended to be favorable but "with friends like this ...":

        "Galt... has been recruiting the top minds of the United States for a place known as Mulligan's Valley (a/k/a Atlantis or Galt's Gulch). It is a place unencumbered by government red tape allowing people to produce what they like based on their own ideas and abilities. In Part II, these 'producers' went on strike from an oppressive crony-based government in favor of a purely capitalistic society." Recruiting only for members in a place that is a different economic society? What happened to recruiting on behalf of the mind on strike against the traditional anti-reason ethics of looters against producers? Most of those who quit in the novel were not recruited and did not go to the valley at all. Most of those who did were there 1 month out of the year.

        "As with most government programs in real life, we find the unintended consequences of otherwise well-meaning agencies, turn into fiefdoms of power, bureaucracy and wasted taxpayer money. " Unintended? Well-meaning agencies?

        "The movie's theme is about getting government out of the way of the producers to benefit society..." Benefit society? What happened to the moral right of the individual to his own life? And maybe the actual theme of the role of the mind in man's existence is a little more than "getting the government out of the way"?

        Has the movie contributed to these conservative rewrites of Atlas Shrugged?
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    • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 10 years, 3 months ago
      Right, RMP. In the book, Project X is actually the adaptation of Robert Stadler's theoretical work. Project X is an array of destructive wave devices placed around the country to punish and prevent resistance. The Ferris Persuader is a much cruder device, which is why it fails during its use. That said, it is perfectly valid in the retelling of myth for characters to transmogrify. Two females became one in Peter L. Jackson's Lord of the Rings. Star Wars has been compared and contrasted with The Wizard of Oz and both of those with the Brementown Musicians. We enjoyed the movie, and look forward to the next version in 20 years or less.
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      • Posted by $ jlc 10 years, 3 months ago
        Two females become one in LOTR?

        Jan
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        • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 10 years, 3 months ago
          Not physically. Two of the female characters from the book were made into one for the movie by merging their story lines. Arwen the elf was one of them. For another retold Ring, if you read the various "Nibelungen" stories from the Middle Ages and then contrast them with the most famous modern version from Wagner, you see characters recast, dropped, brought in. The modern (or post modern) _300_ about the Spartans at Thermopylae was another example of a myth retold. Elements changed to fit the telling.

          Another example I know is "Shakespeare in the Bush" by Laura Bohannon. She tries to tell the story of Hamlet to some African men, but they cannot accept the unreal elements. "Everyone knows there are no such things as ghosts," they protest. "But, of course, everyone has seen a zombi, so Hamlet's father must have been a zombi."


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          • Posted by $ jlc 10 years, 3 months ago
            I am NOT trying to hijack this thread, but I am a big Tolkien buff. To the best of my knowledge, there is not another female character in LOTR with whom Arwen was combined. There is a _male_ character part of whose role she takes in FOTR (and she steals his horse, Asfaloth), though he appears as himself in the movie as well - Glorfindel. He appears as one of Elrond's advisers in Rivendell.

            I am fond of Wagner too, though I prefer to read the story and listen to the instrumental music (except for Tanhauser). Wagner had a knack for driving down into the archetypes of a story and making it a legend.

            I like your Bush Shakespeare story. Ha.

            Tolkien set out to make a corpus of legends that rivaled the Arthurian but which did not derive from the French tradition. It is amazing...but he succeeded. The power of words.

            Jan
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  • Posted by wcc 10 years, 3 months ago
    The irony to me was that the movie exuded the fervor of a "faith-based" film (as the media and critics like to call them). I credit the combination of producers etc. with a great combined effort that yielded a product enjoyable primarily to people already familiar with Rand and the book...(much like the audience for a "faith-based"film). However, I hope the real mission of the film is to pique the interest of those who have not read the book to read it. As in the majority of cases, the movie is inferior to the book...no surprise...the book can be life-altering to those who would look through the window at the tv monitors following Galt's interruption of Thompson's speech and chant "We want John Galt!". As Galt said himself, we each have our own choice to make. I do not believe one would see the three films and make their choice; but, I do believe they would read the book. I instructed my fifteen year-old daughter (Dagney Reardon (last name)) not to watch the movies until she finished reading the book...ironically, she already lives up to her name without having finished it.
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  • Posted by Herb7734 10 years, 3 months ago
    It was a rare treat to hear Aglialoro talk about himself and A.R. I was able to listen to an objectivist speak of himself and his accomplishment. And, as with every production of every nature, Movie, Concert, Ballet, Play, or Revue, I don't care much what so-called critics will say, I'll judge for myself.
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  • Posted by $ jlc 10 years, 3 months ago
    io9 has a 'pleasant' barbed review of AS3...made me think that I had tumbled head-first into a rose bush. At least they agreed (*sarcasm alert*) that John Galt's hair was great.

    Jan
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  • Posted by $ jlc 10 years, 3 months ago
    I like the review, except for the 'kicking at other supporters of the movie' part. We have to stop doing that.

    Jan
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