Anyone else watch this Sunday night on F/X? Not bad at all. Stars James Spader and Claire Forlani. http://www.fxnetworks.com/shows/originals/pentagon/ Hopefully it will help engender a healthy dose of skepticism about the "evidence" our leaders use to justify wars like the present one.
In case you missed it, here are upcoming rebroadcasts: Sat. 3/15, 6pm and 10pm Wed. 3/19, 8pm and midnight
Out of curiosity, what exactly about the film title/topic caused the eyeroll? Are you thinking the film is likely to be full of lies attacking a government that was unfairly maligned for the whole thing? Seriously, I'm interested.
i'm just a little unamused at the timing. i caught a few minutes and felt it was a bit over dramaticized. i've always been less than impressed with "film" versions of things like this for some reason. because IT has to have entertainment value or people won't watch it so in that i tend to discredit it. which may be undeserved but i hope that sheds a little light into my somewhat unfair bias.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/dailyheadlines/s_121888.html "Now, thanks to circumstances no one could have foreseen, his story has startling currency. The airing of "The Pentagon Papers" finds the nation poised for war against Iraq. There are doubts that the government has leveled with its citizens about the costs and consequences. An anti-war movement has mobilized. For those who hear them, echoes from the past are loud and disconcerting. Count Ellsberg as one who draws parallels. After watching a cassette of "The Pentagon Papers" last week, he voices his approval of the film. "If it encourages just one person to be a whistleblower," he said Wednesday, "that would be great." Of course, the film, in the works for two years, was never meant to address the current crisis, nor, in telling the decades-old tale, does it express an anti-war position. "We tried to steer a middle course," says Maurer, whose past films include the acclaimed "Introducing Dorothy Dandridge" for HBO. "I think this movie is very patriotic," he says, "a story that extols the virtues of democracy, of an active citizenry."
True. And let me be totally egotisitical for a sec and "quote myself," as I considered this very point on a thread in the Movies forum: "I have to say I am both very impressed and shocked that the Fox Network would choose to broadcast it at precisely this moment. Actually, I'm having trouble fitting it into my overall pessimism about the effect of corporatization of our media outlets (Fox is a prime example). Are they just so confident that Americans will make ZERO connection between "ancient" history and the present war cries that they ignore the obvious parallels and cynicism such a film might breed? With NBC execs fretting over Martin Sheen's political views and cancelling MSNBC's top rated program, "Donahue," it had been a bad week for lefties in the mainstream media. Who'd expect Fox to come to the rescue? Caveat: I don't want to overstate the "subversive" nature of the film. It's naturally fairly watered down as far as the deviouness of the government lies, and it ends in such a hopfeul manner that perhaps most viewers will watch it and think, "Thank God we have such a great press that we dodged that bullet! That's why things are so open today!" Actually, that probably is the reading most will have, and in that case it might make sense why Fox would celebrate America's free press now, when it really isn't so free anymore: keep the people thinking little has changed since 1973...."
While I agree with most of what you say here, it was my understanding that Donahue's new show was a ratings dog. I doubt if NBC has the balls to muzzle Sheen or the West Wing. It's still too much of a net plus for the networks in terms of ratings and ad dollars.
1. Donahue was the highest rated show on MSNBC. 2. An internal MSNBC memo was leaked fretting about Donahue's embrace of anti-war guests and discussions.
it was also the lowest rated show on wednesday nights. tying with a .3 rating with MSNBC's hardball. http://www.drudgereport.com/msnbc.htm MSNBC was a sinking ship. Donahue was a crap show all he did was dance around. hell they saved Brian Williams(moved him to CNBC) over Donahue what does that say?
All relative. If you are a turd in a pile of crap, can you claim to be the least stinky of the rest? MSNBC may not be crap, but their ratings are crap. To be the top rated among crap ratings could still be crap when compared to the not-t0o-crap ratings of other networks. As for Mr. Williams, he shouldn't be too worried. Is he not the guy hand-picked to replace Ol' Tom on the Nightly News after the 2004 election? That is the top job at any network.