"I'm told #7 Stop-Loss opened to only $1.6 million Friday from just 1,291 plays and should eke out $4+M. Although the drama from MTV Films was the best-reviewed movie opening this weekend, Paramount wasn't expecting much because no Iraq war-themed movie has yet to perform at the box office. 'It's not looking good,' a studio source told me before the weekend. 'No one wants to see Iraq war movies. No matter what we put out there in terms of great cast or trailers, people were completely turned off. It's a function of the marketplace not being ready to address this conflict in a dramatic way because the war itself is something that's unresolved yet. It's a shame because it's a good movie that's just ahead of its time.'"
AAAAAaaaarrrrgggggg!!!!! You've got to be kidding me!
It's not a "function of the marketplace not being ready to address this conflict." It's a function of the fact that you idiots made a movie about a man who is deserting.
In case you couldn't tell, I had a visceral reaction against this film the first time I saw its trailer (maybe a month ago). I'm a member of the great unwashed masses - you know those of us who live in the Tweens (the flyover lands between NYC and Cali.) - who will never go see this movie or others of its ilk.
To those of you from Hollywood trying to push these movies: You have no credibility. Every single movie you make comes across from an anti-war point of view. As the Wall Street Journal put it,
As Hollywood sees it, the fictionalized stories worth telling about Iraq and the war on terror involve the rape and murder of an Iraqi girl by American soldiers ("Redacted"); the kidnap and torture of an innocent Egyptian ("Rendition"); the duplicity of the Army surrounding a soldier's death ("In the Valley of Elah"), and other American perfidy.Stop Loss fits right in with the meme.
Don't get me wrong. I don't expect Hollywood to actually make big budget, serious pro-war movies. It isn't going to happen. Personally, I'm of the opinion that they couldn't do it if they wanted. And, I really don't want them to try - at least until they can do better than something like Heartbreak Ridge (the last pro-war movie I can remember which isn't about WWII or earlier).
I just wish that Hollywood would stop making the anti-war, anti-U.S. movies. I know they won't; I've heard the Jon Stewart manifesto,
The films that were made about the Iraq war, did not do as well. But I'm telling you, if we stay the course, and keep these movies in the theaters, we can turn this around. I don't care if it takes 100 years. Withdrawing the Iraq movies would only embolden the audience. We cannot let the audience win.and I believe that Hollywood will continue to make movies of this sort to live out their Vietnam era mindset and to tell us ignorant sots out in the hinterlands what we should think.
