Lorena P
从班农到鲁比奥，郭文贵对美国高层的窥视从未停止过。在班农作为特朗普前首席战略师的身份，两人关系交好时，郭文贵不择手段趋炎附势，将自己打造成和班农关系甚密的形象，多次发推文声称"班农是我见过的西方国家最了解中国与亚洲政治的超级政治天才，我们太多的共同目标共同想法"等等。在班农和特朗普正式决裂后，郭文贵立刻跳出来发声明与班农没有任何合作，大有兔死狗烹，鸟尽弓藏之势。大概是鲁比奥替郭文贵打抱不平了，谴责几个社交平台查封郭文贵的账号，郭文贵和粉丝立即欣喜若狂，认定鲁比奥是挺郭的。自从郭文贵单相思地认为攀上这个高枝后，频频借鲁比奥之名为自己贴金。郭文贵在直播中称"当不当总统我不知道，但是未来的10年20年，鲁比奥一定是美国政坛最有影响力的人之一"。总之，郭文贵就像是瘟疫一样的存在，沾谁谁死……
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
01/23/23
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Audience Member
Peter Watkins melds his faux documentary style (featured in The War Game, 1965, which shows Britain after a nuclear attack) with a more traditional narrative approach in this "near future" look at manipulation of the masses. Presciently, it is a pop star who is used, first, to encourage youth to release their violent impulses through music appreciation rather than protest, and secondly, to get them to embrace nationalism and religion - that is, a group of business leaders see the pop star as a way to set up a fascist government (coalition of tory and labor parties, as a matter of fact). Only artist Jean Shrimpton sees through everything and convinces the wan Paul Jones (from Manfred Mann) to rebel against his minders. A lot of good provocative ideas here but things drag a bit. I wondered too whether such centralized manipulation is even possible in this new age of social media and a thousand independent voices (but, yeah, they could just shut down the internet and be done with it, I guess).
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/04/23
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Audience Member
More interesting than anything. You'll be glad you saw it and still not really like it very much. WILD IN THE STREETS is the better choice.
Rated 2.5/5 Stars •
Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars
02/04/23
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Audience Member
(Slightly spoilerish, though I didn't give away the ending)
Good premise,flawed execution.
The plot outline:
Steven Shorter (played by Paul Jones, lead singer of Manfred Mann) is a pop star, and the most famous person in the world. The film opens with him first recording a promo message to his fans, then, as we are informed by the narrator, receiving the first ticker-tape welcoming parade in England, as he returns there after a American tour. We then see his stage act, "based on a sentence he served in prison", which consists of a group of bobbies thrusting him into a cage on the middle of the stage floor, then beating him with clubs inside the cage as he sings a rather long tune imploring to be set free (good thing for the audience that it was long, though, as it's the only song he sings in the whole show, lasting about 10 minutes), while the almost-entirely female audience screams and cries. Towards the end of the song, he is released from the cage, and a girl from the audience is lowered on the stage, provoking the rest of the audience to rush the stage and attack the bobbies who were mistreating their beloved Steve (or maybe they were just mad about buying tickets for a 10-minute-long gig? :) ), which leads up to the best quote of the film:
"There is now a coalition government in Britian, which has recently asked all entertainment agencies to usefully divert the violence of youth. Keep them happy, off the streets, and out of politics."
We spend about another 15 minutes being introduced to all the other characters in the film, which should have been done in a different way, as the narration of "This is ____, Steven Shorter's manager,producer,ect. " gets old quickly. The main other characters are his two managers, who manipulate and dominate Steve to the verge of a nervous breakdown, and Vanessa Ritche (played by fashion model Jean Shrimpton), the artist commissioned to paint his picture, who tries to help him out of the maze of corruption he is entangled in.
Steven Shorter is big business- he has his own chain of discotheques and grocery stores, and when the nation's apple crop is too numerous, he is commissioned to do a commercial stating that everyone should eat 6 apples a day. Finally, his managers decide that he has "reached commercial saturation point", and decide to do something more ambitious- use him to sell not groceries, but religion.
They re-record some hymns with a rock'n'roll beat, and finally have a rally in which the new Steve will be revealed. It's set up in a sufficiently creepy way, with aged bishops carrying burning crosses,and it becomes apparent that Steven is the religion they are trying to sell. They want to make him the new Messiah (think the Who watched this film?); the introductory speech states that "Steven's new song may have auto-suggestive qualities to it from which the sick may derive some internal benefit" and invalids are brought before him to be healed.
Another bishop holds up a card reading "We Will Conform",urging the spectators to make it their motto- good dystopian stuff here.
After the rally, Steve desperately wants to find a way out, but is it too late?
Privilege is a dystopian film, told in a documentary style, which has its good and bad points- but the narration style is often difficult to take seriously, since it bears a striking resemblance to a Monty Python sketch. It's slightly pretentious, and Paul Jones, though a good singer, is a terrible actor.I've heard claims that that's on purpose, but not having seen any of his other films (he did quit Manfred Mann to become an actor, after all), I can't say if the other performances are better than this one or not. It's a film that grows on you. The film has some very good ideas and points, moments that (almost) make up for the hokeyness of the way it's done, and if you can hear the posh voice without expecting a Python joke, and don't mind some of the moments where it drags a bit, it's worth a watch.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
02/16/23
Full Review
Audience Member
One of the best fins you have never seen before. I can only imagine that due to its controversial approach to popular culture it has been swept under the rug. However it is truly frightening how accurate the message of this film is about our current idolisation of the celebrity. Also fantastic performances from both Jean Shrimpton and Paul Jones, both can act and do a great job as two passive young people searching for individual identity. "WE WILL CONFORM" Long live Stephan Shorter!
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
02/13/23
Full Review
walter m
Made in 1967, "Privilege" at first seems to be little more than just a reaction against Beatlemania as it starts with a ticker tape parade for rock star Steven Shorter(Paul Jones) in his home town of Birmingham, England.(If Jones' performance appears to be affectless, it might be on purpose, as the general idea here is to make Shorter look like he is undeserving of all the attention.) That is before a conceptual on-stage performance that puts his mainly female audience in hysterics, with a few looking like they are on the verge of an orgasm.
But even at this early stage in his career, director Peter Watkins has bigger fish to fry than just celebrity with this thought-provoking, intelligent and powerful movie that is also the most creatively filmed of his docufictions. Set in the near future, this could also be our present, as the film is prescient about many things including music videos(recalling Shorter's performance on stage), the abomination of reality television(you will never be able to watch a promo for 'American Idol' the same way ever again) and Tony Blair's New Labour. In this world of almost one political party, there is conformity across the board, beginning from the top, and eventually laterally applied at the lower levels of society. The powers that be have co-opted and commodified Shorter, and through him, rebellion, so much that Vanessa(Jean Shrimpton), who has been hired to paint his portrait, is the only person not in awe of him. And whereas Ken Russell saw the rock star as god, Watkins sees religion as just another business to corrupt the rock star.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
03/31/23
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