I'm pretty sure Hollywood did make a lot of movies about America under communist rule or similar totalitarianisms. They were cautionary tales.

I don't understand why some people seem to jump to the conclusion that any time somebody tells a story about something, they're advocating that thing. Sometimes we tell stories about things that we do not actually want to come to pass, you know?

Personally, I happen to like dark stories. I like it when the good guys are flawed. I happen to like the fact that Sherlock Holmes was a drug addict (just like his modern-day avatar, Dr. House). Does that mean I revel in depravity or think drugs are just peachy keen? No. It just means I'm entertained by that kind of thing.

The Bridges of Toko-Ri was released in 1955. Although not an anti-American film, it is a bit anti-war with the leading man (Bill Holden) getting bumped off in the end. A definite story of 'why am I here' throughout the film.

Besides...anything with Grace Kelley in it is worth a second...third...forth...etc...look!

It's like Ray Bradbury said about science fiction: "I don't write to predict the future, I write to prevent it."

Ray Bradbury, of course, was the author of "Fahrenheit 451."

"I happen to like the fact that Sherlock Holmes was a drug addict (just like his modern-day avatar, Dr. House)."

As Denis Leary might say: "Hey, hey, hey, stop this bus and let me off of the Pretentiousness Turnpike."

Any faithful reader of Holmes or viewer of the sublime British TV recreations (available on the Biography Channel) starring Jememy Brett would attest that Holmes was never, ever PROUD of his drug use. (Witness "A Scandal In Bohemia" as one example.) If anything, his drug use being suspected, let alone discovered by his good friend Watson was always portrayed as a guy's worst nightmare: that of being caught by one's own mother in the act of pleasuring oneself. Unlike a certain former POTUS, Holmes was at least willing to admit to, and show a modicum of shame for, a personal weakness.

Of course, that was back when evil was allowed to be called EVIL, and that whole "guilt thing" couldn't be so easily explained away as it is today.

Nowadays, we seem to resent anyone who looks like a perfect hero, which might explain why all our Founding Fathers are portrayed as slave-holding rascist arseholes. It only takes one reading of a "decent" biography of Washington or Lincoln to lead elsewhere.

Decent men do decent things most of the time; they don't have to do it all the time to be considered decent. In the coarsening of our modern world, we tend to expect more from such men than we ourselves are capable of.

Red Dawn,and Amerikaa are 2 that coe to mind.I liked both.

Didn't "Red Dawn" end with the US *winning*? Yes, most of the kids were dead, but they were only one resistance group, and the movie's whole point was to glorify their extreme heroism in standing up *against* the Red juggernaut, not to, you know, be sympathetic to the Russians. And the war ended, overall, with a shot of the US flag still flying proud.

I was in the 'acting' biz though I left last year for the obvious reason that most people in the Entertainment Industry (from the writers, to the producers to, the actors/musicians) believe their American audience to be stupid puritans unwillingly to embrace the 'darker side' of humanity.

While the American audience wallows in what they believe to be sophisticated artistry, the artists enjoy finding ways to humiliate those gullible Americans.

Nothing is funnier than knowing Americans are paying out the nose to be screwed in the arse by sadistic narcissist who get paid way to much money creating self-indulgent BS.

Really, if one enjoys being enterained by the suffering humilation of others, next time just go to your local drug rehab to really get your rocks off instead of enriching the lives of people who actually consider you an ignorant backward hick.

Stephen, ABC did this already in the 80s. There was The Day After and Amerika. One about the nukes going off, the other set ten years later after a Russian-infiltrated UN takes over the country. The funny thing is that three years after Amerika aired, the Soviet Union collapsed.

"Red Dawn," directed by John Milius, was vilified by critics and the rest of Hollywood, not least because it was released during the 1984 election when Mondale was running as a Soviet appeaser. Milius, who'd been considered among the wonderkind young directors (along with Lucas, Spielberg, Coppola, etc.) didn't get another major directing job for nearly a decade, a hasn't had another one since 1991's "Flight of the Intruder."

Oh, the movie was a huge hit. So much for Hollywood only caring about the bottom line.

I think that the big difference is that back in the day, *they* were the bad guys, in current offerings, *we* are the villains, and getting what we deserve too.

I don't know that the pilots Stephen mentioned are like this, but that's how I'd bet.

Well, next year's programming is no different than this year's failed attempts, of which I've written a ton about. This year was the year of the paranormal, with Supernatural, Invasion, Surface, Night Stalker, Ghost Whisperer and, I believe, Threshold.

What's the zeitgeist behind this? Ahh: that the world is unexplainable (i.e., we were lied to and blah blah blah...).

Or: Lost was such a hit everyone tried to edge in on the format from a different angle, and with the exception of Supernatural, all fail (though I've never seen Threshold, so...).

The TV guys are trying to tell us something, but it's not a cohesive, coherent attempt. I think they all just think the same thing at the same time because they're afraid of being outdone by some risky risk-taker at another network.

Oh, sure, the zeitgeist could be that the network execs think the world is going to hell and they need shows to contextualize that to generate ad revenue, or it could be unimaginative groupthink getting ready to shovel another load of bad horsecrap onto the airwaves.

I don't think those chumps in TV land are smart enough to come up with a conspiracy along the lines you insinuate. Intentionally, anyway. Accidents can happen.

After "The Stand" what's the point?

Besides, I can't believe they'd show red America in a beneficial light.

syn, I don't quite follow who or what you have a beef with, but I think you're wrong about us Americans. We're are a lot more sophisticated than we were in the 30's and 40's when we bought the leftwing propaganda that were the movies of that period. Now we're basically ignoring those kind of movies and TV programs. They're still being made, but for foreign consumption.

American TV is getting better too (gee, I never thought I'd ever say that!) because there are more entertainment options, so programming has to get better to appeal to viewers. It's called competition and it usually means better products all round.

Meanwhile, I think other commenters are correct that doomsday scenarios won't scare us and a lot of us will think the programs hilarious, check out "The Day After Tomorrow," but I think those producing these anti-America films and TV programs dearly hope that they will turn voters against the Bush Doctrine and conservative ideas and send them into the arms of the nanny-staters who promise to make nice-nice with terrorists so they can be safe.

My bet is that they'll be so heavy handed that they'll backfire because people will be able to figure out that a return to the liberal foreign policy of appeasement is what let terrorism flourish in the first place and a return to it will guarantee more attacks.

I too loved "House" last season and hate the new episodes when everybody suddenly got touchie-feelie literally. The fun was the acerbic dialogue. Poor Hugh Laurie. He looks embarrassed and uncomfortable as do the other cast members.

Another program I liked was "Numb3rs," but I noticed this season has a lot less math and smart repartee more t-f garbagiola. Then last Friday was a smear of drug companies by that little jerk and great research scientist, Rob Morrow. I'm on the fence with that show already and one more slip toward the Kool-Aid drinkers and it's off my automatic taping list.

The new Helen Mirren feature revives some of those old Cold War fears but there's also an interesting twist on the Alien films too. One for the feminists, I think! Preview here:

http://rswipe.blogspot.com/2005/11/helen-mirren-to-lead-new-nasa-seti.html

I think I'll stick with Hugh Grant...

xxx
Roberta

Well, I guess this will just be a continuation of a trend that has been developing for several years. When it comes to non-football major network (ABC, CBS, NBC) programming, I'm down to 3 shows a week that I bother to watch, and if 2 of those went away (Surface and Lost), it wouldn't be a big loss. Numb3rs is pretty good (except for when they reference aerospace subjects) but the last episode was pretty heavy handed with the "drug company as embodiment of evil" theme.

Fortunately, with the Dish Network I have over 100 other channels to see if there's something interesting (and it's amazing how often there isn't) along with so many other forms of entertainment like the Internet and, gasp! reading.

It's funny how the networks are complaining about declining market share but they don't put on programming that millions of people like me want to watch. It's the same with the movie studios. I really enjoy a good movie and have over 200 titles in my DVD collection but have not bought a new title this year because none of the releases interested me. I've only rented a few times this year for the same reason. As for going to the theater, forget about it.

Stephen--

You forgot 1984's Red Dawn. Not that it was a good movie, of course.

One of my favorite fairly recent shows was Dark Angel. Set in a post-apocolypic America after a major terrorist attack.

While America was majorly screwed up in the show, I didn't percieve at all to me anti-American. In many ways it reminded me to value what we have because it could be destroyed.

I see that someone mentioned "The Day After." Some others, along this line, were the depressing-as-hell "Five" (1951) and "On the Beach" (1959). "Planet of the Apes" had a similar man-destroys-Earth backstory, but it was much more entertaining. Oh, "Damnation Alley" was similarly themed...loved it when it came out, but last time I saw it, I thought it was extremely cheesey.

While there were several anti-American movies made during the cold war, none were made before 1949, and in none of them were the Soviets or Communists made to seem as a better alternative. Twilight's Last Gleaming and Three Days of the Condor are examples.

In books, there were more explicit ones, especially Micheal P. Kube-McDowells -"Alternities" set in world where Eisenhower was killed before he could be elected and Taft won, setting up a "Fortress America". With the US as a facist isolationist country, the Soviets took over piece meal and lost their paranoia. They were the good guys.....
I did not believe it then and I do not now.

What about "The Day the Earth Stood Still"? I loved the movie but it was rife with Message, that we earthlings must learn to GET ALONG lest we be destroyed by intergalactic police. Also "Dr. Strangelove"? and a bunch of B sci-fi's and at least two Twilight Zone where there was an atomic war and horrible aftermath that I can remember.

Seemed like there was a constant media drumbeat of appeasement in the 50s and 60s. And since the average dumb kid like me *knew* we couldn't do anything to change the USSR, why we had to go to work on ourselves instead! Hence the 1960s we all remember and loved..

I'm not saying I've got much hope for the shows but post apocalyptic has always been popular in the face of a truely comfortable life. It's kind of like virtual slumming. Australia gave us Road Warrior and Tank Girl (hm... I wonder if Blockbusters has Tank Girl). When there aren't any real threats we make them up to play pretend.

I don't know if Red Dawn was good or not. I couldn't sleep for two or three weeks after seeing it and had a disturbing flashback driving through Lead South Dakota afterward. ;-)

One thing about "America is Destroyed" is that it presents this as a possibility should action to prevent it not be taken. If the shows turn out that way is something only time will tell.

The "America ended/conquered" genre is an old, established genre, one that is usually used as a warning about how bad it would be, and an opportunity for right-wing fantasizing.

Get real, Steve. Obviously they are doing this because such a scenario allows them to depict pro-American values without alienating the left. The alien-invasion genre works the same way; in either scenario, even Michael Moore would be on our side.

Holy cow. I traded e-mails with Kevin for a while last night and mentioned as many Cold War-era movies of this theme as I could remember off the top of my head, but I can't believe I forgot "Strangelove."

My dog in this race is really simple: Hollywood tells stories. People who get all up-in-arms because they don't like what kinds of stories Hollywood is telling should count themselves lucky that they don't have any real outrages in their lives.

I disagree with your claim that House has been toned down in the second season. They're simply not focusing on House's addiction because it's been dealt with, story-wise, at least for now. It was one of the major themes in the first season, with lots of seemingly gratuitous pill-popping up until the episode where he quits cold turkey on a bet. The season ends with him coming to terms with his addiction, and popping that slo-mo pill while listening to the same Stones song that played in the first episode, bookending the season and the story of House's addiction. Conclusion - it's okay to pop Vicodin if you're in chronic, debilitating pain, and can do your job regardless of being high.

Last Tuesday Cameron popped E and screwed Chase while being suspected of HIV infection. I hardly think the show is pulling any punches. As for Sela Ward's character, she'll be gone before the season is out. And House isn't so much chasing her as he is retroactively enforcing a scorched earth policy with his exes.

My initial reaction was the same as yours, Stephen: more lefty crap, they'll play well in lefty enclaves and crash & burn everywhere else.

Then I took a second look, and I have a question that the Drudge piece doesn't answer: given that the setting is "after the USA falls," what is the specific story-premise? Is it that "America is gone and good riddance, now the survivors can start building EUtopia in North America?" Or is it "the old rotten-to-the-core government is gone so the survivors start rebuilding the United States the way it was originally supposed to be, based on good old American values of hard work, horseplay, and individual freedom?"

Who do you think will be destroying America in the new shows? I'm guessing oil execs, the CIA, or maybe neo-Nazis. There were a lot of "America gets destroyed" movies in the Cold War, and it's practically a cliche that America brought down the destruction on herself.

I personally am looking forward to those shows. Of course I am going to have a whole lot of fun pointing out the holes in the plot.

"What that guy is using a 9mm? Real survialists don't use 9mms"

Kinda like I was really exicted when i found out about the show named "I SHOULDN'T BE ALIVE"

http://dsc.discovery.com/fansites/alive/about/about.html

meh. Like most, I grew up watching this kind of garbage. Nobody in my crowd got the idea that the 'other side' was better - we all just got in our heads that we'd grow up & have to knife-fight some ex-stockbroker over a rusty can of catfood amid the ruins and prepared ourselves for that eventuality.

'Course, we were kids.

But it also made us into the knuckle-dragging red stater types we are today, too. There's a blowback to too-obvious manipulation.

Sam, The very reasons you cite are what I think are wrong with House" this season.

The fun of the show was the verbal bantering and House's unsentimental approach to diagnosis and his unapologetic taking of pain killers. I don't think it's an apt comparison with Cameron's decision to against her nature and take recreational drugs and engage in a risky sexual encounter when she knows she might have AIDS.

These characters were larger than life. Now they're just like the rest of us and not half as much fun.

The mystery is, a show is good and people watch it, then the producers seem to lose their nerve, and stop doing what's good about the show and just revert to another insipid sitcom. At least so far, they haven't slipped in any leftie propaganda. If that happens, it's goodbye House et al. Numb3ers will get a second chance. After that, it's curtains.

I dunno, Dark Angel was pretty good. Of course, that was pre-9/11 and seemed much more far fetched. And there were a couple billion episodes of the Twilight Zone based on the same thing.

If we're going to talk "Body Snatchers" flicks, why forget about the 1978 Donald Sutherland version?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077745

Jack Webb made a notorious "Red America" movie in 1962, Red Nightmare, sometimes retitled, "The Commies are Coming, the Commies are Coming!"

Here's what IMDB has to say about it

Stephen,
Jeff is an absolute idiot,
"I'm pretty sure Hollywood did make a lot of movies about America under communist rule or similar totalitarianisms. They were cautionary tales."
No, they didn't, much as they may have wanted to.
However, much to the Left's joy, they did make quite a few 60's/70's/80's movies about some evil right wing/business, government/religious group assasinating some wonderfully Progressive politician/enlightened/third world leader.
Right/Left, the historical ingnorance of people is the largest National Crime.
Mike

Nicole Kidman wins an Oscar, and what does she choose to do? Crappy remakes like "The Stepford Wives" and horrible movie versions of TV shows like "Bewitched." And now we have yet another remake of "Body Snatchers?" Yeesh! I thought I heard a while ago that she was going to take a break from making films - it's a good time to do that now, Nic.

The post-apocalyptic-America genre has also made its way to video gaming. A new turn-based strategy game called Shattered Union (PC/Xbox) depicts America split into six rival regions following a series of calamities including the nuking of Washington, D.C. Think of it as what might happen if "Jesusland" really were divorced from the blue states as that now-famous satirical map suggested.

Anti-American plots are a sign of inspired creativity? That's like saying that a sitcom scene where someone listening through a window thinks that the two are talking about sex when they are actually talking about something innocent is an original work of creativity.

America is here to stay, no matter how much the liberal left wishes otherwise. ironically, if the people that the left loves, such as Commies and Islamofascists, were ever to rule the U.S., the first people they would get rid of is the liberal left.