Culture Wars

[urbanoid]

15 minutes ago, Murph said:

AS much as I hate to say it, Bernie has a valid point here.  

While socialist/communist policies generally don't have merit and lead to decline and/or outright disasters, it doesn't mean that their observations are always wholly incorrect. Mass immigration usually results in wage-busting. Guess the techbros got jealous of other industries/agriculture and decided to outsource well-paying American jobs as well, to the legal-but-de-facto-indentured foreigners.

'Early Bernie' used to be anti-immigration, then he fell silent on the issue, now he mentions it again.

Not a single lie detected here:

Quote

For years, Bernie Sanders warned that increased immigration would lower the wages of U.S. workers. Now he barely mentions it.

Days before the Senate voted down a bill in 2007 to overhaul the U.S. immigration system, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) went on CNN’s “Lou Dobbs Tonight.”

“If poverty is increasing and if wages are going down, I don’t know why we need millions of people to be coming into this country as guest workers who will work for lower wages than American workers and drive wages down even lower than they are right now,” Sanders said. ” … On one hand, you have large multinationals trying to shut down plants in America, move to China, and on the other hand, you have the service industry bringing in low-wage workers from abroad. The result is the same: Middle class gets shrunken, and wages go down.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/03/16/years-bernie-sanders-warned-that-increased-immigration-would-lower-wages-us-workers-now-he-barely-mentions-it/

Edited January 8, 2025 by urbanoid

[Murph]

28 minutes ago, sunday said:

They do not look like a case of misscasting, I think. It is not like they put a pair of blonde, blue eyed Slavic Jews.

No, I am shocked Netflix did not make Mary a transvestite of color, Joseph a latte sipping soyboy, etc, etc.

[Ivanhoe]

2 minutes ago, Murph said:

No, I am shocked Netflix did not make Mary a transvestite of color, Joseph a latte sipping soyboy, etc, etc.

Why are you using their deadnames?

[Murph]

I am sorry, I will report to re-education camp immediately!

[17thfabn]

5 hours ago, sunday said:

They do not look like a case of misscasting, I think. It is not like they put a pair of blonde, blue eyed Slavic Jews.

Do you mean that this depiction is wrong?

[sunday]

That is another aspect - the Son of God is Perfect God and Perfect Man.

Perfection of Man could vary between cultures, so in the same way there are images of Our Lady that could be more Asian or more Mexican, you may find an image of Christ blonde and blue eyed.

Examples:

Our Lady of Akita

Our Lady of Guadalupe

I think those variations help with the devotion of the faithful.

A movie is different.

[R011]

46 minutes ago, 17thfabn said:

Do you mean that this depiction is wrong?

Only if it's meant to look like Him and not just symbolize Him.

[sunday]

5 minutes ago, R011 said:

Only if it's meant to look like Him and not just symbolize Him.

Agree.

[urbanoid]

1 hour ago, 17thfabn said:

Do you mean that this depiction is wrong?

Yes, the one on the right is correct.

[Mr King]

 

Personally I prefer Korean Jesus.

 

[rmgill]

44 minutes ago, Mr King said:

That's a depiction of Conan the Cimmerian after he was nailed to the tree of death by Constanius before he was rescued by Olgerd Vladislav in A Witch Shall Be Born by Robert E Howard. 

🙂

Edited January 9, 2025 by rmgill

[Soren Ras]

5 hours ago, rmgill said:

That's a depiction of Conan the Cimmerian after he was nailed to the tree of death by Constanius before he was rescued by Olgerd Vladislav in A Witch Shall Be Born by Robert E Howard. 

🙂

You, Sir, are a man of culture.

Though as a tiresome pedant I feel obliged to point out that you missed a "t" in Constantius. 😉

[sunday]

It was the Tree of Woe in the movie...

[rmgill]

7 hours ago, sunday said:

It was the Tree of Woe in the movie...

Yes. Millius and Stone took liberally from several of the short stories. Thulsa Doom was a character that Kull of Atlantis opposed. He was also a foe of Cormac Mac Art in other stories. The Set/Snake worshipping bit is also from a number of the Conan stories with Set figuring significantly as one of the eastern gods. The humongous snake fight was in another story. 

They managed to use a lot of the same references, referring to conan as a 'slayer', references to haga and black lotus, etc. 

Overall I rather like the 80s Conan duet of movies, and Red Sonja. Valeria WAS another character from the Conan stories by Robert E Howard. A set of vignette films more true to REH's stories would be lovely to see.

I think the 80s movies could have been improved by having someone like Rutger Hauer read a laconic internal monologue when Conan is thinking rather than the narration by Mako alone. The perception that Conan is not very intelligent is a mistake, he's quite cunning and quite smart, just laconic. 

9 hours ago, Soren Ras said:

You, Sir, are a man of culture.

Though as a tiresome pedant I feel obliged to point out that you missed a "t" in Constantius. 😉

 

As to misspelling Constantius, that's what I get from referring to the conan fandom wiki vs going to my front library and grabbing the correct volume and checking there. I had just re-read a very nice published volume of several of the Conan stories which also is sprinkled with Frank Frazetta art in both pen and ink and color plates. It's named "And Their Memory Was a Bitter Tree: Queen of the Black Coast and Others". So it was all quite fresh in my mind, but I could not remember which of the short lived villains had done that to Conan just that it was from the A Witch shall be born. 

I highly recommend the volume as a center piece to any Robert E Howard Collection...

It sits alongside this volume which my partner in the Humber gave me from his collection when he moved to Maine. The Last Celt: A Bio-Bibliography of Robert Ervin Howard. It's the first edition.  I'm rather smug about having that. 

Edited January 9, 2025 by rmgill

[Sinistar]

10 hours ago, rmgill said:

They managed to use a lot of the same references, referring to conan as a 'slayer', references to haga and black lotus, etc. 

Overall I rather like the 80s Conan duet of movies, and Red Sonja. Valeria WAS another character from the Conan stories by Robert E Howard. A set of vignette films more true to REH's stories would be lovely to see.
 

 

the first one is a favorite

then it diverts into the mainstream PG rating after the first R rated movie

you lose the philosophy of the first film in the follow up

 

interesting is the question - what is the riddle of steel paired with nietszche's opening quote:

 

conan's father says it is steel you can trust and nothing else

thulsa doom compares steel to the hand which holds it and claims that flesh is stronger than steel

both are done in carrying their philosophies with them to their deaths

 

in between you get discussions about the aloof gods and fate or what is best in life and whether anyone wants to really live forever

 

at the end of the film you see an older conan as king sitting on the throne pensive and pondering and looks unsettled

somewhat contrasting with king osric becoming philosophical in later age in his scene with conan

you lose that film structure in the follow up films

 

 

[rmgill]

True. The follow on is more basic sword and sorcery. The sleeping god is another motif from another short story as well. 

[Soren Ras]

The Milius movie had a lot of good stuff included. My main gripe is that it did not really even attempt to portray the Hyborian world as a place, in contrast to how vividly it was conjured up by Howard. 

Sandahl Bergman was a mighty fine Valeria, and I really would have liked to have seen her in a proper adaptation of Red Nails.

Howard was some kind of genius at world building with very few words.

[Ivanhoe]

3 hours ago, Soren Ras said:

Howard was some kind of genius at world building with very few words.

 

Quote

He was dark, but he did not resemble the Latins around him. There was about him none of the warm, almost Oriental sensuality of the Mediterranean which colored their features. The blond barbarians behind Sulla's chair were less unlike the man in facial outline than were the Romans. Not his were the full curving red lips, nor the rich waving locks suggestive of the Greek. Nor was his dark complexion the rich olive of the south; rather it was the bleak darkness of the north. The whole aspect of the man vaguely suggested the shadowed mists, the gloom, the cold and the icy winds of the naked northern lands. Even his black eyes were savagely cold, like black fires burning through fathoms of ice.

https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0607861h.html

Worms of the Earth, 1932.

It takes unusual talent to use such lurid descriptions to good effect.

[rmgill]

7 hours ago, Soren Ras said:

The Milius movie had a lot of good stuff included. My main gripe is that it did not really even attempt to portray the Hyborian world as a place, in contrast to how vividly it was conjured up by Howard. 

Probably stuff that ended up on the editing room floor. Too much exposition would likely have tired out the typical audience. 

Hyboria is, supposed to have been Earth, but before history and before another land change that altered the continents. Supposedly 15,000 BC or so, hence while iron is less known and you see copper and bronze mentioned specifically.....Naturally the science of continental drift was not yet understood by most at that point. 

And REH is a bit anachronistic with mail and other metals from time to time. Though one could presume meteoric iron sources in some cases where great 'magic' swords are concerned. It is also a land of high magic. 
 

7 hours ago, Soren Ras said:

Sandahl Bergman was a mighty fine Valeria, and I really would have liked to have seen her in a proper adaptation of Red Nails.

I'd love to see a similar example of Queen of the Black Coast. Though I suspect that folks would not like Bêlit's crew demographics. 

7 hours ago, Soren Ras said:

Howard was some kind of genius at world building with very few words.

One of the letters in The Last Celt is a note from a school teacher saying that his writing was going to take him FAR. 

[Ivanhoe]

I'm going to assume that Kimmel suffered a neurological injury from the mRNA shots. Who in their right mind goes after Stallone?

 

[Murph]

Hour of the dragon…..

[Murph]

I miss the good old days:

 

[Murph]

This:

[X-Files]

On 1/8/2025 at 10:15 AM, Ivanhoe said:

https://www.timesofisrael.com/boycott-calls-over-israeli-cast-as-mary-in-netflix-epic-on-jesus-mother/
 

Anti-Semites are seriously upset that the Netflix movie hired a Jewish Israeli to play Mary.

Just wow.

 

Five maladjusted Progressive individuals ranting online while overdue to have their anti-psychosis prescriptions updated does not constitute newsworthy news.

[X-Files]

This guy be channeling the Messiah

 

Jonathan Roumie - Wikipedia