I just pretty much dismissed this first portion as ignorant rant, conforming to his own ideas of cult worship, but for Nic Cage instead. It contributed nothing to the review of the film.Charlie Jane Anders at io9.com wrote:Every cult needs its own wacky trainwreck of a movie. Scientology got Battlefield Earth, and now the cult of Ayn Rand gets Atlas Shrugged, Part 1. But how does Atlas stand up to Battlefield Earth?
Quite well, actually. Atlas Shrugged Part 1, which just opened in theaters today, is a grand addition to the roster of movies that are both kooky and clunky. A movie this hideously wonderful really ought to be against the law.
Spoilers ahead...
Actually, scratch that. The federal government shouldn't outlaw dreadful movies like Atlas Shrugged – rather, the feds should just regulate them. For example, we could have a federal mandate that all such movies must star Nicolas Cage or a comparable actor – someone who knows how to bring the right level of gravitas to dialogue like, "Which do I sacrifice: an excellent piece of smelting, or this Institute?"
Call it the Nicolas Cage Full Employment Act. Or better yet, since Nic Cage is a precious national resource that's currently being distributed unevenly, the Nic Cage National Equalization Act. It should be up to the federal government to make sure that as many ludicrously insane movies as possible have access to the vital panacea that is Nic Cage.
What the film, and the book too for that matter, did was to spare the viewer/reader from the machinations of a Congress gone wayward. The smoke parlor rendezvous by the miscreants of the story arent too out of line with the reality of the Obama/Pelosi/Reed gangups we've seen, we just dont get to see all the other partisan hackery going on behind the scenes of the story. This is where the book comes in a little better to describe the political ties, and favors involved with the legislations in the story.The good news is, according to Atlas Shrugged the movie, all it takes to pass a new federal law is three people sitting in an upscale restaurant, as long as one of them has a cigar. Any time someone with a cigar mentions some completely demented idea for a federal law, it becomes the law of the land within five minutes or so.
Slightly understandable critique, but then again, we do have to get some fiction somewhere in the story.In Atlas Shrugged Part 1, it's the dystopian year of 2016, and a lot of stuff has gone off the rails (literally) in just five years. The economy has collapsed, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is under 4,000. Because of unrest in the Middle East, there's no more oil, and gasoline is $37 a gallon. We see lots of scenes of the rusted, decaying landscape, with former corporate vice presidents standing around wearing sandwich boards proclaiming that they will vice-preside for food. (And even though everybody's out of work and there's almost no industry, people talking about runaway inflation, presumably because elves are on a buying spree.)
The best response to this portion is, wait and see, this makes more sense as the story progresses. And the government of the story is not uninvolved in safety standards, they just dont use them for actual safety, but as a political currency, with mandates passed and enforced as favors rather than actual safety measures.So everybody has to travel by rail – which makes it a shame that the antiquated rail lines have something like a 50 percent derailment rate. The federal government seems totally uninterested in mandating safety standards for the rail industry, since all the feds care about is outlawing competition and efficiency and stuff.
Cant figure out if the reviewer here is being sarcastic or not, because he just pretty much nailed the theme right there, and as this whole review has a negative undertone, I suggest sarcasm was intended here, but taken as a serious statement, he's made an excellent point. First of all, again, the book would reveal, Taggart Transcontinental does have a pretty good record, but the point of the interactions is to show that Jim, the idiot of the story, has chosen to give an inferior supplier a contract, in this interest of "fairness". The book describes how the train company has had a long standing relationship with Rearden Metal, and that the new contract with the "little guy" was a new development, and is costing the company money because the "little guy" just cant deliver because he doesnt understand the industry. The "Rearden Metal" is a new development that Dagny decides to try, because Rearden Metal can supply the product, where as the "little guy" cant. Anyway, thats the practical solution, and the one Dagny chooses. Jim however, takes the political favor road with the "Dog eat dog" rule, requiring the long standing service providers to be favored and given "monopoly powers" no less, in a given region, this forces the competitor out of business.So we meet the Taggarts, head of the amazingly Taggart Railway, which practically has a "Days Without Derailment: 0" sign hanging in its headquarters. There's Jim Taggart, who'd rather beg the government to put his slightly less derail-y competitors out of business than replace all his railway ties that are currently made out of cotton candy. Meanwhile, there's his amazonian sister Dagny, who wants to succeed in the rail business by actually having rails. It's one of those radical ideas that might just work.
The trouble is, Dagny is having trouble getting new steel rails made, probably because of the government. So she turns to a new company, Rearden Metal, which has a new metal that's twice as light as steel and yet twice as sturdy. People keep warning Dagny that metalologists think this new metal is unstable, and it's never been tested – because in this dystopian future, everyone's forgotten the secret of testing metal. The Senior Metalological Institute of Metalology is extremely perturbed.
The one major theme you will pick up on, is that competition is admirable, not an enemy to advancement. When the other railway is forced under, Dagny is infuriated, not because she wants the competition, but because its not the place of the government to be imposing these standards.
They arent the only 2 who understand, there are a few more, some of which are "disappearing".So anyway Dagny decides to use Rearden Metal's new Rearden Metal to replace her rails, without testing it first, because the Invisible Hand. Dagny and Hank begin a sweaty, lustful, entrepreneurial courtship, which consists of them looking into each other's eyes and talking mistily about the power of selfishness. They're the only two people who understand each other, in a world of frivolous, decadent rich people who just want to be part of the system and drink endlessly fizzy cocktails.
I really dont consider any of the legislation present in this story to be out of the realm of possibility. In fact, if our love affair with socialism continues to slip us into the void, you will indeed begin to hear whispers of stuff like this, even if its taken straight from the pages of this story and considered sound doctrine.And of course, all the other business people, who can't compete with Dagny and Hank, want the government to drive them out of business. Cue lots of scenes of those three guys coming up with ever more cracktastic ideas for new laws, such as the idea that one person can only own one company. (And for some reason, Rearden Metal, Rearden Smelting and Rearden Ore are three different companies. Hank should fire his lawyers.) People talk seriously about the "Dog Eat Dog rule" outlawing competition between companies, and the Equalization of Opportunity Bill outlawing some states having more money than others. You start to wonder just what is in those cigars they're smoking – and can we in the audience have some too?
We've already seen an afront to states rights upheld by SCOTUS.
We see government getting in the business of running businesses, dictating fee structures. Interference in the private sector is interference, and aside from butting out, theres only one direction that leads.
This is a page right out of the Al Gore, "environmentalism" book. Actions like this are not out of the realm of reality.Meanwhile, the debate over whether Rearden Metal's Rearden Metal is safe goes on and on. At one point, the State Science Institute apparently decides the metal is safe – but issues a statement saying otherwise, because they're worried about losing their funding. They're the last remaining science institute in the country and they're hanging on by a thread. (That's where we get the great line about "excellent smelting," which sort of sums up the movie right there.)
This was actually one of my favorite parts. Exactly why would a government agency want to purchase the rights to an inferior, nay, UNSAFE product? This move on the part of the government reaked, and Hank called them out on it, and the interactions of this run-in were top notch.My absolute favorite scene in the movie comes soon after, where Armin Shimmerman (Quark from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) shows up to portray the ultimate personification of central planning – the Anti-Quark, if you will. The Anti-Quark wants Hank Rearden to sell his company to the government, so he'll stop putting all those poor steel companies out of business. Hank tells the Anti-Quark that he'll sell the company if the Anti-Quark can answer the question, "Is Rearden Metal good?" He asks this like ten times, and the Anti-Quark refuses to answer, finally saying that it doesn't matter – if the metal is bad, then it'll cause horrible fatalities on this new railroad. If the metal actually is good, then it'll put these other companies out of business. So it's either a safety risk or a social risk.
Oh, and Armin Shimmerman gets the amazing line, "During a steel shortage, we can't allow a company that produces too much steel."
The whole business left me wanting to meet the Anti-Odo.
The review couldn't have missed the mark any worse than here. The story, in general, is about the ramifications of government involvement in the private sector, about the results of socialist policies, and about which class truly needs the other for existence. Innovation and science are merely overtones of the story, when read with an open mind. But when hammered by reviews that this is "libertarian spooge" and realizing that it directly attacks socialist policies, progressive minds struggle to find other "themes" to avoid confronting the ACTUAL theme.So the movie, in general, is about the development of new technology, and whether society should welcome or fear scientific innovation. And the two choices appear to be: A) test the new metal by running a train over a suspension bridge made out of it, going 250 miles per hour; or B) condemn the new metal without any testing whatsoever. In a sense, this movie aims to fulfill that great mission of science fiction: exploring the impact of new scientific discoveries on the world as a whole. Unfortunately, we get only one or two moments where anybody takes seriously the idea that a metal half as heavy and twice as strong as steel could have some interesting uses. Damn those metalologers.
I only hope that the next installment gives even HALF justice to the interactions in Part II of the book. It will really drive home the disparity of themes I outlined above. Again, the motor mentioned here, is merely an overtone of whats really going on.And then towards the end of the movie, we suddenly take a sharp left turn, because Dagny and Hank find out a miraculous engine that uses the Casimir Effect and has a miniature particle accelerator in it to create atmospheric intensity. It's like the engine equivalent of Rearden Metal's fabulous Rearden Metal, except that it was never produced because the company that was making it turned Socialist.
So Dagny goes on a quest to track down the inventor of this engine, which leads her to a former physics professor who now runs a diner in the middle of nowhere. He tells her, "The secret you're trying to solve is greater – and I mean, much greater – than an engine that runs on atmospheric intensity."
What could be greater than an engine that runs on atmospheric intensity? We may never find out (unless we read the book, which seems like too much to ask) because the movie ends soon afterwards. This is only part one of a two three-part movie – because just like Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn, there's too much story in Atlas Shrugged for just one movie.
That giant libertarian placard was classic. And was a perfect transition into the next Part. It will make sense. I urge the review to actually keep an open mind when reading or viewing this story, to set aside any preconceived notions they may have, and analyze the themes from a neutral basis.I don't want to give away the movie's cliffhanger ending, but it's basically the culmination of a running subplot in which men of genius are all vanishing to join the mysterious John Galt. And it ends with Dagny on her knees, surrounded by flames and giant libertarian placards, looking up at the camera and shrieking, "Nooooooooooo!"
Somehow, I think everyone in the audience knows how she feels.
