The Magic of Hollywood

I love movies. I enjoy sitting in a dark theater and letting my imagination go as the film before me spins it tales of adventure, mystery, romance (yes, I do like some “chick flicks”), and intrigue. There’s something about imagining an impossible scenario and then watching as someone else brings your story to life.

I watched a movie the other night that I hadn’t seen in quite a while. It was Capricorn One, with a young James Brolin, Sam Waterston, and a pre-felony O.J. Simpson. The story line follows a projected visit to the planet Mars that is faked due to a flaw in the safety equipment that would have killed all the astronauts onboard. They are coerced into going along in order to keep the space program alive by threatening their wives and families. The entire surface walk is done on a sound stage at an abandoned Air Force Base in the middle of the Texas desert 300 miles west of Houston. The problem comes when the sensors at space control show that the heat shields fail upon reentry and all the astronauts supposedly die, when in fact they are very much alive. If they actually show up in public, the entire scam is blown and the powers that be determine that they have outlived their usefulness.

The remaining movie tells how the three astronauts escape from their captors and how one reporter figures out the truth and is determined to bring this to light. Although predictable from this point on, it still makes for an exciting movie with the hero (Brolin) finally showing up at his own funeral and memorial service.

The movie is based on the conspiracy theory that the Apollo 11 moon landing and subsequent moonwalk were fakes and actually performed on a sound stage in some remote location. I saw a documentary several years detailing all the evidence to support such a theory and it was quite compelling. The movie was made in 1978, only 9 years after that famed Apollo 11 moonwalk of Neil Armstrong and Edward “Buzz” Aldrin, Jr.

The interesting thing is how you root for the good guys in the movie taking a stand against the evil bureaucrats of an evil government. And I remember coming out of the movie theater thinking how evil the United States government was. It wasn’t the first time this had happened. I think this would be actually called propaganda.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a pastor in Nazi Germany, who died in a concentration camp because of his outspoken criticism of Hitler’s policies, once told a story of how his entire village was awoken early one morning and everybody was forced to come into the village square. They were kept there for hours with nothing to do, waiting for a speech from some Nazi spokesman. Without food or water or the opportunity to rest, the people were continually told that the speaker would be there soon and how great an opportunity it was that they would be enjoying.

By the time the speaker had finally arrived, a mob mentality took over and the crowd was quite receptive to the message being spoken. Even Pastor Bonhoeffer felt more inclined to accept the premise of the speech, even though he knew deep down that it went against his core beliefs. He said that once they were released to go back to their homes, he had to reflect on how deeply he had become involved in what he knew was inherently wrong.

I think the same thing happens in a movie theater. We all cheer for the good guy and want justice to come to the bad guys. The more wicked the bad guy is portrayed, the more we want him to come to a bad, if not really painful, end.

I was in a hotel once and saw “Private Parts”, the story of Howard Stern. Now in my mind, Howard Stern is part of the problem with this country. He has made his millions from being a crude, vulgar, sensationalist. And even though a lot of his radio bits are funny, most of his radio show is a benchmark for offense and mocks the First Amendment free speech rights. However, that being said, I found myself rooting for the Howard Stern character as he continually fought with his boss, played by a weasel-like Paul Giamatti and even cheered when he eventually won the battle and earned creative control of his radio show.

Just about every Hollywood film made has is an agenda that comes along with it. Some movies, like “Milk”, about the openly gay city council member Harvey Milk in San Francisco, display their agenda openly. Others are not so obvious. The Disney movie “Pocahontas” was a not-so subtle attempt at trying to shape our children’s thinking about environmental issues, suggesting that western settlers were all evil exploiters while the North American Indians were all innocent and honorable and good for the environment. After all, they cherished Mother Earth and saw the bear as their brother.

This is not to say that movies should not have a message. Most literature has a bias in one shape or another. “David Copperfield” was written to bring to light the child labor exploitation in England in that day. I just need to remember that when Hollywood gets to sell its agenda, it is usually a counter cultural message that goes contrary to most traditional family values. That being said, enjoy the film like you would a chicken dinner. Eat the meat and throw out the bones. Just remember, with Hollywood, you get an awful lot of bones.

To read more by Thomas A. McLoughlin, go to http://insearchofintelligentlife.com or http:docsboyblog.blogspot.com

Lady

From all outside appearances, Lady was just an ordinary family pet. She was part Chow and part Cocker Spaniel. If you wanted a duo of two personalities that would combine to make a really overbearing, obnoxious combination, you probably could not pick a better mix.


However, Lady was really sweet. She had hr quirks, one of which was an obsessive compulsion for tennis balls. Especially the fuzzy ones. It did not matter if they were rain soaked or covered in mud, she would spend hours just licking her particular tennis ball. And with her mottled colored tongue (the gift from the Chow part of her), the grass, mud and all other assortment of junk on that particular ball would almost make you gag looking at it.


She was so obsessive about her ball that “it” had to be put away when it was time to go to bed. Otherwise, she would spend all night pushing it away only to chase it down and reclaim it. Or, if it got stuck under a piece of furniture, she would go to any means to get it back, including ripping the cover on a sofa, tearing a piece of lattice away from the deck, or scratching on a door which the guilty ball had been pushed under. There was even one morning when Dawn, Lady’s owner, woke up to see her staring at a cabinet, just shaking. Dawn originally thought that Lady was having a stroke or a seizure and called her name. She slowly looked away from the spot to acknowledge her name being called and then returned her gaze on that particular spot. When Dawn investigated, she found a ball hidden under the cabinet. Once the ball was put away, Lady returned to her normal self.

Lady had been bounced around from one home to another a couple of times and this was probably her last home. The last home she had been in would not let her have a ball because of her compulsion towards them. If there was a 12-step program for balls, she would’ve been standing up at the front of the room saying, “Hi, my name is Lady and I am addicted to tennis balls.” The rest of the room would reply, “Hi, Lady.”


She was the darling of the dog park here in Sioux Falls, though. All the little kids would want to pet her and all the ladies thought she was so cute. And she didn’t take a lot of junk from the other dogs where her ball was concerned. I don’t know if it was the Chow or the Cocker Spaniel which responsible for that. Cockers can be sort of fierce about what they want as well as the Chows. If another dog messed with her ball, they could expect a fight. Homey just didn’t play that.


Usually, when we would go to the Dog Park, Doc and Dooly would tear off into the center of the park, Doc looking for a ball to bring back and Dooly making sure that Doc didn’t have too much fun. But Lady, when she found a ball, would just carry it around waiting for me to take it and throw it so she could chase it down. When she got a little tired, she would lay down with the ball between her stretched out legs, licking it. If someone else came along to throw her ball, that was okay. She would let you have it as long as you threw it for her.

Lady was 14 ½ years old and her eyesight was starting to fade where you needed to throw the ball in front of her so that she could see the movement and then chase it. She was starting to develop those bumps on her body that an older dog will get. There wasn’t much you could do about them, just keep her clean and brushed out and know that was part of her getting older. She was groomed every couple of months and was for the most part an indoor dog. She didn’t make too much of a mess except if there was a ball that you didn’t know about laying around somewhere. She didn’t eat too much and when she was exercised, her weight was pretty normal. Even her joints, which had bothered her when she first came to my house, eventually gave her little problem as she was exercised by chasing her ball repeatedly.

Lady’s kidneys failed last week and she went downhill very quickly. She no longer ate her food, she threw up in Dawn’s house twice, and she was having a difficult time getting up the stairs Saturday morning. Dawn took her into the vet clinic where she grooms dogs and the vet confirmed that Lady’s kidneys had failed. Dawn made a very difficult decision to put her to sleep rather than let her suffer even for one more day.


Dawn called me about 9:00 Saturday morning and I drove over to be with Dawn and Lady on Lady’s last day. I brought Doc and he got the chance to say goodbye as well. After Dawn had finished all her dogs, the vet came in, administered the proper drugs, and we sat in a quiet room with Lady and stayed with her until she was gone. We both cried and felt a terrible loss.


Some people might say (as I’ve heard people say before), “It was only a dog.” But they do not understand how much a part of the family that “only a dog” becomes. I will miss Lady. I got the privilege of being one of the humans that got to care for her in her life. Her photos are my screensaver for now. And her impact will be felt in my heart for a long time.


If there’s a doggy Heaven, all the balls are fuzzy and they never get stuck or taken away. And Lady is having the time of her life.