As seen on Hard News Cafe
Being a Utah native and growing up LDS in a predominately LDS community, I'm very familiar with Jazz owner and the you-know-this-guy car dealing czar Larry H. Miller. Miller, during the opening weekend of Brokeback Mountain at his Salt Lake Jordan Commons Megaplex this summer pulled the picture hours before its Utah début. Of course this sparked a fiery controversy with community members. Supposedly Miller had just heard that morning that the film was about homosexuality and made the call to pull the film. Miller is known for his deep religious conviction. He doesn't go to Jazz games on Sundays and bankrolls LDS film projects.
The controversy, of course, was good publicity for Brokeback. As a limited release film Brokeback surpassed box office predictions and received all kinds of accolades. It also did well in Utah and eventually came to Logan and stayed for an astonishing four weeks (those of you who know Logan, know that that's saying something). Miller, when asked by the local Media as to why he did it, said he didn't agree with the content and got a lot of flack and praise for saying that. My staunch, straight arrow father called him a hero. Others called him a hypocrite, pointing out other films that the church would also frown upon that were shown in his theaters at the same time as Brokeback. Case in Point, Eli Roth's Hostel. After having seen both Films, I can't help but comment.
Hostel is brutally baked with decapitations, chainsaw limb hacking, disembowelments, eye plucking and brick powered skull bashing. In addition it blows Brokeback out of the water in the sex/nudity category as well. This film boarders on NC-17 and by nature is anti-American, inhumane, sadistic, cruel and bloodthirsty. But, one thing is for sure there are no homosexuals, if anything, the film is also anti-gay. One scene shows a man on a train touch the knee of the man he's sitting next to and get's called a 'faggot.'
In contrast, Brokeback is the classic tragic love story. It follows the romantic and secretive 20 year relationship of cowboy's Jack and Enis and profoundly defies the stereotypical masculine nature of the cowboy image. It provokes altered, off-the-beaten-path thinking and promotes conversation about the traditionally taboo subject of homosexuality. It's also a reflective portrait of small-town America and typical conservative, xenophobic closed-mindedness.
So, Is Miller heroic for standing up for his values and standards or is he just another homophobe? Had he seen both films would his decision still have been the same? Perhaps this is just another illustration on mainstream society's homophobia. Does showing Hostel over Brokeback imply that Miller would rather promote brutality and merciless killings over homosexuality? If the content concern for Miller was sex scenes, why didn't he pull Hostel and many other films like it that showcase explicit erotica? Would he rather watch people die than see men kiss?
At the time's of Miller's decision I posed this hypothetical question to a co-worker while conversing about the situation. "Would you rather watch 2 guys kiss or someone get decapitated?" Surprisingly his answer was the later. My co-worker is a non-traditional male nurse and just got his doctorate degree. I was banking on a different answer from him. So maybe Miller's not so far off. Maybe the later would be the consensus of most Americans. I would like to hope it wouldn't be.
1 comment:
On top of all that, further controversy ensued when Miller spoke when the U asked Miller to speak at the Discover U Days event, as a community representative.
In the end Miller did speak at the event, despite a 1500-strong list of U faculty, staff & students protesting his speech.
Prior to the speech, Miller met with U of U Gay Rights leaders to discuss the issues at hand.
What has resulted is a dialoge and widespread discussion of the issues. Impressively, Miller acknowledged that his actions were harmful toward the LGBT community. This upon hearing some of the stories of those affected.
More impressive still is that the turn-out of silent protestors, wearing cowboy hats & western wear, far outnumbered the rest of the attendees at his speech. He did address their presence and gave a rousing speech.
This is what it's all about! See my blog for the full story.
As for your colleague, his intelligence as evidenced by his education doesn't validate his prediliction for violence over affection.
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