Tuesday, September 29, 2009

This Is Why: Update

"Film industry luminaries," including Woody Allen (no surprise there), Martin Scorsese, David Lynch and Terry Gilliam are petitioning for the release of Roman Polanski, who is finally about to face the music for plying a 13-year-old girl with champagne and quaaludes, then raping and sodomizing her in 1977.

The "luminaries" are in especially high dudgeon over the fact that the authorities nabbed Polanski while he was on his way to be honored at the Zurich Film Festival. The Guardian quotes this huffy line from the petition (which I haven't been able to access): "It seems inadmissible to them [the "film industry luminaries"] that an international cultural event, paying homage to one of the greatest contemporary film-makers, is used by police to apprehend him." Producer Harvey Weinstein, fantasizing about the omnipotence of the film industry, said he was "calling on every film-maker we can to help fix this terrible situation." Meanwhile, "luminaries" from other countries are attacking the arrest of the 76-year-old fugitive child rapist as an "assault on freedom of expression" worldwide. Too stupid for comment.

I think my favorite line comes from German producer Henning Molfenter, a member of the Zurich film festival jury who now plans to boycott the festival:
There is no way I'd go to Switzerland now. You can't watch films knowing Roman Polanski is sitting in a cell 5 km away.
With Roman Polanski sitting in the hoosegow, I can watch films AND eat a jumbo tub of popcorn (extra butter), washed down with a 44-ounce diet Coke, and then top the whole thing off with a brownie batter Blizzard from Dairy Queen.

(And with the quality of filmmakers these days, the junk food would be the only worthwhile part of the whole venture.)

5 comments:

  1. Here's an NSFW account on just what this monster did. I'm still laughing about Woody Allen trying to defend him.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The grand jury testimony is pretty bad, Cyg. I notice Polanski's apologists are trying to minimize this based on the girl's age -- as if that makes a difference -- all the while ignoring the fact that she repeatedly told him to stop all through the whole thing.

    ReplyDelete
  3. And as Creative Minority Report says, what if Polanski were a priest?

    ReplyDelete
  4. "And with the quality of filmmakers these days, the junk food would be the only worthwhile part of the whole venture." ... you said it !

    Haven't gone to see a movie at a theater in a very long time, and I don't anticipate to do so in the near future, especially knowing that nihilistic crapola is the order of the day.

    ReplyDelete
  5. H.H., that and the general idea of fattening the bankrolls of these degenerates.

    I did recently go to the theater, however: to see The Maltese Falcon at the Egyptian (built during the Silent Era). THAT was worth more than just the popcorn.

    ReplyDelete