The film Selma has only been out a weeks but already it is already wrapped up on controversy
controversy about it portrayal of LBJ Oscar snubs the Oscar snubs of the director but
also about who should get to see it especially when we are talking about the young and so
you've got a very different situation depending on what part of the country you are in now
for some students there's a program called Selma for student it was started in New York
City 27 business leaders funded 27,000 free tickets for 7th, 8th, and 9th graders in the
city and the effort expanded from there now 275,000 free tickets will be made available
with different requirements depending on which state you're in for middle and high school
students they can show their ID and they can get in free to see that movie outrageous it's
a redistribution of wealth exactly they should have to pay that $15 for the tickets now they
don't have to as I said the age range for the free tickets varies depending on the city
and movie theaters will only be able to provide a certain number of tickets based on how many
have already been paid for Dekalb Country school superintendent Hugh Taylor I already
him and I haven't read the whole thing he cancelled a planned outing by the students
at the predominantly minority school saying he was concerned about obscene language and
racial profanity in the Oscar-nominated film there was a history class that wanted to take
a trip to the see Selma since it shows an important part of American history he's saying
no they use potty language and I won't allow it so in some places they are trying to make
sure kids know they learn the lessons of the civil rights movement in others blocked I
don't know maybe Hugh Taylor is a progressive black guy who wants to protect kids from language
but either way whatever he is this is a terribly stupid short sighted decision you Hugh Taylor
are just like Mr. Carson on Downton Abby exactly that's timely I haven't seen Selma yet the
language and the violence how excessive is it there's more violence in 93% of all movies
I mean there's more violence in a 100 movies that came out in 2014 I mean this violence
you feel because these are real people and they did go through that violence you know
when a pastor from Boston is murdered you know this but that's what the story is about
if you if the argument against violence is that it's got to be contextual and relevant
to the story there's literally never been a movie where the violence is more relevant
and in context perhaps it has to be fictional there's not which is why American Sniper is
OK since he lied about so many of those kills I like to point out that Expendables 17 came
out this year another great movie also snubbed at the Oscars weird so let's talk a little
bit about that Oscar snub not for the movie it was nominated for best picture and there
was a best actor no David Oyelowo was not nominated supporting actor oh he wasn't oh
I thought he was snubbed they were a snub but look the five men who were nominated who
were great and I think he was terrific I don't actually have a problem with that one I mean
I think if you count Jake Gyllenhaal in Nightcaller who was really great like those were the five
who were nominated Oyelowo and Gyllenhaal there were seven great prefaces and five of
them are going to get nominated two of them aren't that's just the way it's going to go
OK but the director wasn't nominated Ava DuVernay wasn't nominated she'd have been the first
black woman director it feels it just feels like an oversight if it had been directed
by David Fincher directed this film it seems like he would have been I watched the What
The Flick of it she's one of the few working black female directors in Hollywood right
now atleast and so it would have been a good movie especially considering it was well direct
it was really well paced and you feel the tension again about a story where you sort
of know how it turns out and what's weird about it is just that the numbers game you
can nominate up to 10 movies 8 were nominated Selma were nominated there were only 5 directors
nominated and so obvious if there were 8 movies nominated and 5 directors 3 directors aren't
going to get nominated but Bennett Miller was nominate for FoxCatcher but Foxcatcher
wasn't nominated for best picture that just struck and now granted the process is different
the full academy votes on the best picture only the director's wing votes for best director
but that's a statistical anomaly that shouldn't if were nominated for best director and there
are enough movies to get extra movies nominated for best picture your movie should be nominated
for best picture so that the one Bennett Miller did a nice job with Foxcatcher but she belongs
there but what was interesting from a political point of view is what we think cost what some
people think and I think it rings true to me that cost Ava DuVernay that nomination
was that right before the voting came in there was a movement to suggest that the portrayal
of LBJ played really effectively in the movie by Tom Wilkinson was unfair and it was not
historically inaccurate it was historically inaccurate there was no doubt about that but
of course that happens in almost every movie and LBJ since they made him a principal character
in the movie rather than some sort of generic government figure represented the establishment
opposition to what's happening and so they had LBJ represent other people a whole wing
of opposition that they had to face so let me read a couple of quotes here that should
give you an idea of just why everybody should ignore this LBJ's find his legacy is well
he's not fine is protected but I mean this is the guy who passed the voting rights act
and the civil rights act prior to that you cannot diminish those great accomplishments
Bill Moyers was his press secretary at the time here's what Bill Moyer's had to say there
are some beautiful and poignant moment in the film that take up closer to the truth
than anything I've seen in other movies to date: the cruelty visited upon black people
every day by whites and armed authorities the humiliation they faced simply trying to
register to vote name all the county judges in Alabama!
that a line delivered to Oprah Winfrey in order to get her registration card name one
right name one the courage and fear of those black people who put themselves on the line
for freedom's sake the ambivalence of Martin Luther King Jr. as he faced the inescapability
of leadership and constant threat of death I cannot imagine the dread one had to subdue
to step on that bridge that day and I came out of the theater shaking my head in disbelief
at the obscenity of the Republican Party as it has piously but insidiously taken of voter
suppression as a priority The Party of Lincoln of Emancipation Nixon Southern Strategy Moyers
continues 50 years ago has now become the subliminal matra White of American Unite back
in the 1970's in the early days of a resurging conservative movement the late Paul Meyrich
talked about him earlier in the show godfather of the religious right and co-founder of the
American Conservative Union and of ALEC (the American Legislative Exchange) declared this
is quote from Meyrich that Moyer sites I don't want everybody to vote elections are not won
by a majority of people they never have been from the beginning of the country they are
not now as a matter of fact our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the
voting populace goes down and it's going down so that's Bill Moyers coming out and saying
hey look man the film's great and he has an interest in protecting LBJ so then he goes
on and talks about the LBJ as for how the film portrays Lydon B Johnson There's one
egregious and outrageous portrayal that is the worst kind of creative license because
it suggests the very opposite of the truth in this case that the president was behind
J Edgar Hoover sending of the sex tape to Coretta King some of our most scrupulous historians
have denounced that one he's right and that part not really nessicary to deny someone
a best director Oscar because of that it's silly it doesn't matter and again from a storytelling
point of view it was important that they established the most powerful people in the country were
trying to get Martin Luther King and rather than introduce a new character to do they
throw it in a character you've already seen but that said if people think that LBJ was
behind it and then finally he says then casting the president as opposed to the Selma march
which the film does is an exaggeration and misleading so he's not going out and saying
that it's this grave injustice he wasn't opposed to the march but we talked in the beginning
of this show our first story about politics and about playing politics and the president
suggesting now a revamped tax bill that will that would again mostly lower capital gains
that's where most of the money will come from and the right is saying raise capital gains
right exactly raise the rate so we get more money into the treasury and the right is saying
that that is hideous he's playing politics but that's what LBJ and the true is of course
and MLK was they debated what the conversation showed I'm going to paraphrase it very simply
is that LBJ wanted political will to he said I need he recognized a great politician LBJ
the politics were going to make a difference in passing the voting rights act you couldn't
just support it you had to get the votes to make it happen and he needed the votes so
his recitation with King was like let me get to a moment where I can get them and King
was like No and so LBJ was like all right so you're going to this march well then so
let's make this march the thing so they were two guys working for the same thing with the
same goal in mind I just thought it was worthy to bring that stuff up cause I feel like she's
getting a bad rap Ava DuVernay and very quickly because he wrote this thing this week over
the weekend in Los Angeles Times John Lewis who was there who was portrayed in the movie
congressman from Georgia he wrote an opt ed in the L.A. Times and this should be everybody
who hasn't seen Selma should be left with this the movie Selma is a work of art says
Lewis it conveys the inner significance of the ongoing struggle for the human dignity
in American a cornerstone of our identity as a nation it breaks through our too-often
bored and uninformed perception of our history and if confronts us with real human drama
our struggled to face 50 years ago continuing with the rest of what John Lewis said and
Selma does more than bring history to life it enlightens out understand of our lives
today it probes that efficacy of nonviolent action and civic engagement especially when
government seems unresponsive with poignant grace it demonstrates that Occupy inconvient
protests and die-ins that disturb our daily routine reflect a legacy of resistance the
led many to struggle and die for justice not just centuries ago but in our lifetimes it
reminds us that the day could be approaching when that price will be required again I just
love that he brought up Occupy that be brought in everything that's happening now this is
a guy who made the country better continues to serve in congress from Georgia and a reminder
that this isn't over that these things going on that you were talking early when you were
quoting Dr King about the moderate whites this stuff make them uncomfortable Occupy
made them uncomfortable the die-ins made them uncomfortable and he's saying no this is what
you're supposed to do we're supposed to make people uncomfortable that's how make progress