Over the past ten years, the young actor has played supporting roles in several major films and starred in one of the most acclaimed mini-series of the past decade. One of his first juicy roles occurred in 2003 when he played Chase Edmunds, a CTU agent working under the tutelage of Jack Bauer on “24.”

In 2010, Dale played a lead in the HBO mini-series, “The Pacific.” Since then, he has acted in “The Conspirator,” headlined a television program called “Rubicon” and starred alongside Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan in the critically-acclaimed film “Shame.”

His latest project, “The Grey,” finds Dale facing his own mortality alongside Oscar-nominee Liam Neeson. I recently had a chance to talk to Dale about his emotional scene in the new thriller, his work on “The Pacific” and the Oscar nomination that never arrived for Fassbender.

“The Grey,” which is based on Ian MacKenzie Jeffers’ short story “Ghost Walker,” focuses on a group of plane crash survivors who are stranded in the Alaskan wilderness and must face off against a group of ravaging wolves. The story shows these men facing their own mortality as both the wolves and the cold temperatures attack them mercilessly.

Dale told me that “fell in love with [the script] right away” and thought it was a “very strong piece of writing.” He added that he made director Joe Carnahan an audition tape and put down every character in the film because he was so intent on being in this film.

His biggest scene in the thriller is an emotional one where he faces Neeson after their plane has crashed. But Dale joked that the intense scene was easier to film with Neeson there. “You just stare into Liam’s big baby blues and everything blows away,” he said.

To prepare for the scene and at Dale’s request, Carnahan—who enjoys playing music on set—played the song “Simple Are the Ways We Say Goodbye” from the musical “Nine.” “That song was a big part of my life growing up from watching my mother onstage,” the actor said. “It was also the song we played at my mother’s funeral.” He added that the “song is a goodbye song to me” and “helped set the tone” for the scene.

Dale also spoke to me about his role as Pfc. Robert Lackie in the Emmy-winning “The Pacific.”

“No job will ever be like that again,” he said, adding that “nothing could prepare us for what we were thrown into on that job.” The cast, he noted, are still close and are planning to meet for a reunion in a couple of weeks.

I also spoke to Dale about his role in last year’s critically-acclaimed film “Shame,” which co-starred Fassbender and Carey Mulligan. I asked the young actor what he thought about Fassbender—who many critics believed gave one of the performances of the year—being denied an Oscar nomination for his performance.

“I was shocked. I was surprised,” he noted as if he had just heard the news. “Michael Fassbender is one of the most concentrated specific actors I’ve ever worked with, and he can tell a story with a look,” Dale said. But Dale thinks that Fassbender has a long career ahead of him. It’s “definitely not the only performance people are going to be talking about in his career.”

The same can be said for Dale, who may not be a household name yet but who—if he continues choosing his roles carefully—could be one soon enough.

“The Grey” arrives in theaters nationwide today.

—–

Since 2010 only got me out to the movies twice (that I can remember) to see The Town and The Social Network, the internet became one of my main forms of entertainment.  That was where I found Drinking with Bob. Sure, he looks a little angry, but so am I.  However, thanks to Bob, I don’t need to get my blood pressure to the boiling point; he’s here to do it for me.  I was starving for an alternative viewpoint.  Sick and tired of being distracted by liberal celebrities and their need for attention, I needed some meaning.  And strangely enough, Bob delivered.

Somewhere in between Facebook, Sean Hannity, and the occasional Tivo’d Red Eye, I found Bob’s rants.  His website and YouTube channel represent the reason the internet has become an alternative venue for entertainment for so many.  It doesn’t have any sponsors or politically correct audience to temper its intent or its delivery.  Sure there is a lot of crap, but when you come across a gem like Drinking with Bob, it makes it all worthwhile.  Each installment starts off with: “What’s next? I’ll tell you what’s next…” and then blasts off into a tirade over anything from the NFL cancelling a game due to snow to why he thinks Ben Affleck is a hypocritical d-bag.  He covers it all and no one is safe, especially President Obama and his nonsensical policies.  You know the ones that make you want to punch your own head, like spending millions on a census commercial during the Super Bowl? 

I don’t know Bob’s last name and I don’t care.  He thinks like I do, shares the same insights as I have, and even gets as angry as I do.  But the difference is that Bob can rant with the best of ‘em.   He crams more rational thought into a two-minute video than you ever thought possible.  His tirades reach such a fever pitch that it leaves you wondering if he’s going to have an aneurysm right before your eyes. When I hear something in the news that annoys me, I wonder if Bob is feeling it too.  I imagine that, somewhere in New York City, he is forming the perfect response with the right dose of humor, anger, and common sense.

—–

I contacted Bob and he was more than happy to answer some of my questions. He began making videos in 2004 about celebrities and bad drivers.  It wasn’t until the last Presidential campaign that Bob got political.  Motivated by anger, Bob was tired of people being “silenced by the politically correct shackles of the mainstream media” and decided to do something about it.   He considers himself “an independent fighting for the ideology of common sense.”  Check out his classic rants for an introduction.  Warning: Once you start, you’ll be hooked.  Oh, and they are not for the kids — strictly adult entertainment.

Bob is a New Yorker. This means he has no problem telling you how he really feels. Whether it’s disgust in the prolonged feigned interest in the Chilean miners or sending relief money we don’t have to Haiti. It’s a swift kick of reality right where it counts.

You’ll be relieved to know that Bob tries to take care of himself so he doesn’t have a heart attack.  He sounds like a good guy to me.  The type of guy that appreciates what he has and is grateful for being born in the greatest country in the world.  He respects the military and seems to know what is important and what’s frivolous.   I thank goodness there are people like Bob out there daring to make sense of so much senseless behavior.

Hollywood and the mainstream media will be a thing of the past if they don’t wake up and see what the majority of this country wants.   The entertainment industry has a monopoly on our film, television, and news that is forcing people to go elsewhere.   I wanted to be entertained but there was no outlet worthy of my hard-earned cash.  Instead, the web caught my attention.  It offered the diversity, values, and sense of humor that reflect my ideology.  If Hollywood won’t do or say it, someone else can with nothing more than a webcam. I can’t wait to see what’s next.

Big Hollywood hater Patrick Goldstein of the Los Angeles Times jumped right into full “gotta defend our pals in the Industry” effect with a hysterical (in both senses of the word) counterattack supporting Glee creator Ryan Murphy.  The LAT, for those not residing here, is a small, local pamphlet of uncertain financial stability which recently reduced the physical size of its dead tree edition to about that of an Applebee’s menu.  Its innovative marketing strategy of providing its dwindling readership with even less content for their money has somehow failed to halt its downward spiral toward Chapter 11.

Pat writes:

Poor Ryan Murphy. I guess it would’ve been oh-so-much simpler if he’d just had Jane Lynch tell the silly cheerleaders that they were the dumbest teens she’d ever seen. And that was saying something, since she’d once taught cheerleading to … Megan Fox. It would’ve gotten a nice knowing laugh without prompting any hysterical shrieks of angst from the right-wing blogosphere, which is so paranoid about Hollywood’s oppressive Marxist-Obamaism that it seems bent on getting worked up every time anyone in show business shows any signs of liberal bias.

Poor Ryan Murphy indeed!  He insults the large portion of the American people who respect and support Sarah Palin – you know, the same Sarah Palin who the LAT reported had an approval rating within one point of the President’s – and those vicious monsters dare to respond!  With shrieks of angst no less!

We hicks are getting downright uppity.

And, of course, it’s because we’re sexist, racist, and imperialist to boot!  Pat links our anti-Glee agenda directly to our mindless hatred of the idea of tolerance:

“Glee” was already in hot water with the right wing, since the show’s creator, Ryan Murphy, had in previous episodes made fun of abstinence education and, as Newsbusters puts it, “tried to normalize teen homosexuality.” Apparently on the right, treating gay kids as regular folks, instead of as scary deviants, is cause for alarm.

Oops, sorry!  Looks like I forgot “homophobic” – we’re so many awful things that I sometimes get mixed up and overlook some of our flaws.  Yes, Pat, you’ve figured it out.  We conservatives love being mocked to our faces by people who expect us to consume their products.  That’s cool, but our real problem with Glee is not that it calls people we support – and by extension us – “stupid,” it’s that the show is insufficiently hateful to gay kids.

You caught us, Scoop.  We’re so busted.  Only a reporter of your keen skills could sniff out the clarion calls for more hassling of gay kids that dominate our Tea Party rallies/cross burnings.  That’s the kind of ace reporting and deep insight that’s made the LAT into the unstoppable journalistic success story it is today.  BTW Pat, can you yell across the room to the folks at the subscription phone bank and ask them to stop calling me during dinner to beg me to re-subscribe?

The fact is that Pat and those like him hate the idea of outsiders like us presuming to challenge the Hollywoodoids.  He reasons that, “The conservatives rule talk radio and cable TV, the liberals rule Hollywood and that’s the way it goes.”  Except we never got the memo relegating us to the nether regions of the AM radio spectrum plus one cable news network while granting Pat’s team sole title to the rest of the cultural playing field.  Just like we never got the one dated January 20, 2009, making dissent unpatriotic again.

And our refusal to be satisfied with our assigned seat at the kids’ table in the back of the banquet hall is actually starting to drive them nuts.  For example, Pat whines that we even dared question the deep thoughts of that guy from Bosom Buddies:

As you may recall, the righties were up in arms for weeks when Tom Hanks seemed to imply, while doing interviews promoting HBO’s “The Pacific” series, that there was some link between our war against Japan during World War II and the modern-day war on terrorism.

Pat, you’re the professional, government-licensed and approved journalist here.  Surely you can see that Hanks didn’t imply anything.  He said it.  Your own article even repeated his quote:

Back in World War II,” he told Brinkley, “we viewed the Japanese as ‘yellow, slant-eyed dogs’ that believed in different gods. They were out to kill us because our way of living was different. We, in turn, wanted to annihilate them because they were different.  Does that sound familiar, by any chance, to what’s going on today?

Well, maybe who said what about how we’re just as bad as the people we’re fighting just isn’t important to Pat – celebrities utter this sort of nonsense so regularly that it’s hard to keep which celebrity is making what numbskulled comment straight.

But Pat’s too busy posing as a lonely defender of Murphy’s right to speak freely to bother with things like facts.  Now, it is refreshing to see a LAT writer taking a stand for free expression, in light of the LAT’s strong editorial stand against free speech for those it deems unworthy – us.  But Pat isn’t really defending the concept of free speech, free inquiry or free anything except the notion that the liberal establishment should have free reign to treat popular culture as an undisputed free fire zone for slamming conservatives.

Welcome to the dispute, Pat.  We’re the popular culture insurgency, and the day of the unchallenged, unanswered insult is over.  Your unspoken assumption is that our place is to sit quietly as our betters instruct us on our myriad failings and to dully nod our slack-jawed noggins in agreement.

Not.  Going.  To.  Happen.

Here’s our assumption – popular culture belongs to all of us and when your buddies say something obnoxious, insulting or just plain stupid, they are going to hear about it.

Ryan Murphy is no martyr to free speech.  No one is saying Murphy shouldn’t write what he wants.  We’re just saying that we can, and will, call him on it.  Sure, people might not watch because we’ve exposed his agenda.  We call that a “consequence.”  If Murphy feels so strongly about the powerful, unprecedented, and brave artistic statement that is calling Sarah Palin “stupid” – the political comedy equivalent of a ten minute hack stand-up set on how airline food tastes bad – then he should say it and the Nielsen numbers be damned.  This is a free country, no thanks to and despite the best efforts of modern liberals, and that’s Murphy’s right.

But we’re also free not to watch his stupid show.  You know, Pat, just like you exercise your freedom not to listen to those dirty, nasty, mean old right-winger radio programs by the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Big Hollywood’s own Stage Right.  Although it goes against everything you’ve ever known or believed, we conservatives have the same right to choose what we watch as you lefties do.  And we’re choosing.  And there are a lot of us.

Pat, we sympathize.  We understand that this new media-fueled change is having the effect of breaking your gang’s hold on the flow of information and control of the message.  Change can be painful, but your loss of your coveted gatekeeper status is something that we can live with.  And hey, here’s an idea for you.  When the LAT goes under you can always get a new job where your distaste for conservatives and ability to ignore facts will be fully appreciated – working for the Obama administration like so many other liberal ex-journalists.  Well, at least until January 2013.  And unless you’ve paid your taxes.

But before I get into the stomach-churning details of the Hollywood Left’s shattered moral compass vis-a-vis directors Polanski and Panahi and other Iranian film artists, I would like to take a moment to honor more of the true heroes who have spoken out loudly on Mr. Panahi’s behalf and signed petitions for his release. The National Society of Film Critics. The Boston, L. A. and  Toronto Film Critics Associations. Arin Paul of the New York Times. Filmmaker Ken Loach. Rutger Wolfson, director of the Rotterdam Film Festival. German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle. Human Rights Watch. French Minister of Culture Frederic Mitterand. Iranhumanrights.org. The list really is long.

Of course, noticeably absent from those petitioning and publicly calling for the release of Mr. Panahi from his unjust tomb-like captivity in Tehran are all of the prominent Hollywood A-List petitioners for Polanski. So Mr. Polanski’s arrest for child rape is worthy of international pressure and outrage, but famed director Jafar Panahi being tossed into a crypt in Tehran on “unspecified charges” is not? Welcome to Lefty Hollywood. And it only gets worse. The most tragic case of Jafar Panahi is yet one more sorry, perplexing and infuriating chapter in leftist Hollywood’s incredible blind side to any human rights violations in Iran, never mind only those perpetrated against Iranian filmmakers today.

Gay rights zero Sean Penn’s PR jaunt for the Mad Mullahs in Tehran in 2005, praising the Islamists even as then president-elect Mahmoud “No Gays in Iran” Ahmadinejad was jacking up the regime’s barbaric anti-gay pogrom. The sordid and embarrassing Team Oscar trip to Iran in March 2009, in which actress Annette Bening praised the regime’s women’s rights record even as Roxana Saberi rotted in Evin prison across town, and as Iranian-American filmmaker Esha Momeni awaited an Islamist kangaroo court for the crime of filming a women’s rights documentary. She awaits trial still.

The Academy’s posting of the self-aggrandizing Road to Isfahan promo last summer, with no mention that many of the Iranian filmmakers featured in it had been blacklisted by the regime. In essence, the Academy profited from their McCarthyite misery. AMPAS knew, in the same way that you now know. I told them. The Academy’s emailed response? They don’t get into politics, don’t you know. Same with the AMPAS Iran film seminar in L.A. last October. Two blacklisted Iranian film artists, including renowned actress Fatemeh Motamed-Aria, were barred from leaving Iran to attend.

The show went on, the blacklisted whitewashed from the Academy’s program in Orwellian fashion. Also noticeably absent from Hollywood’s list of cause celebres’ is renowned Iranian director and President of the Asian Film Academy Mohsen Makhmalbaf, who now serves as official spokesman for Mir Hussein Mousavi and the Greens outside Iran. Who in Hollywood has invited Mr. Makhmalbaf to speak on the plight of the Greens and Iranian film artists? None I can find. How can you explain any of this to where it makes any sense at all? Why not any peep out of Hollywood on Iran at all?

Theo Van Gogh

Is it the Islamist Fear Factor? Are they just too enamored of blood-drenched dictators like Chavez, Castro and Ahmadinejad that they can’t find it within themselves to say a bad word about them? Or is it just plain endemic Hollywood racism? Polanski is white, after all. Panahi and most Iranians are not. I’d like to believe that, but I don’t really. I just believe leftist Hollywood is so morally corrupt that child rape and cop killing are morally defensible, yet dissent in a fascist dictatorship is not. Perhaps if Mr. Panahi had drugged and raped a tween, he would be getting the rabid and unqualified support of the lefty Hollywood establishment today. How I only wish to God that were a sick joke.

For those of you who do still have some shred of morality and human decency left in your souls (unlike some people), here are two petitions for the release of entombed director Jafar Panahi. One is at Facebook, the other at Petitions Online. Thank you, on behalf of Mr. Panahi and his family. And thanks to the many worldwide voices who have NOT remained silent in the face of this abomination of justice for a cutting-edge director, whose only crime is being cutting-edge in a fascist dictatorship where such innovation is rewarded with the death of a thousand cuts. I can think of many lefty Hollywood film types more deserving of that fate than the brave Jafar Panahi.

Here’s an idea. Why don’t we petition the Iranian government and work out a trade? They send us Jafar Panahi and all their blacklisted film artists, and we send them all the signatories to Roman Polanski’s petition. Let’s Make a Deal! And no, I’m not joking. I would make that trade in a heartbeat. I am at my wit’s end with Lefty Hollywood, people. For over a year now I have been pressing the case of Iranian film artists, and they were all just as dead silent on the subject then as they are toward Jafar Panahi and other persecuted filmmakers in Iran today, some of whom they once called friend.

I have even tried to shame them into action. But how do you shame the shameless? How do you explain morality to moral reprobates who equivocate the drugging and anal rape of a child? Who believe critics of dictator Hugo Chavez should be thrown in jail? Who believe that we were as racist and terrorist as the genocidal Imperial Japanese in the Pacific War? Who believe America is evil and everything it stands for sucks, even as they lead lives of freedom and luxury not possible anywhere else on earth? What happened to the Hollywood heroes of old who made fun of fascist dictators, often at risk to their own lives, instead of jaunting off to run PR campaigns for them?

Maybe it’s time for a new and revolutionary tack, people. Maybe it’s time to found a new Hollywood built on the principles of the old. The Hollywood in which the brave Victor Laszlo was a hero, not the murderous Che Guevara. In which America’s greatness and heroism was praised, not vilified. In which the American people were enlightened with great film stories that made them proud to be Americans, not browbeat with leftist anti-American propaganda. There is a great hunger in America for that brand of storytelling in film. A market of hundreds of millions just waiting to be tapped.

A huge undertaking, no doubt. But nowhere near the task faced by our Founding Fathers, and look at the miracles that ragtag band of rebels wrought. We Americans can do anything we put our minds to. But that is a piece for another time. For now, forget those useless leftist Hollywood idiots. We can deal with them later. Right now, Jafar Panahi and his family need each of us to speak out on his behalf. His life is hanging in the balance. Please sign the petitions at Facebook and Petitions Online linked above. As I have said in Part One, concerted voices raised in outrage have saved lives in Iran before, and can do so again. To save one life is to save the world entire. That is all that matters now. Hollywood lefties can go fuck themselves. History and their silence will damn them for all time.

I asked Uncle Pete about Melbourne.  He said that, while 1st Marines stayed at the Melbourne Cricket Grounds (M.C.G.), 7th Marines stayed at a place called Mt. Martha that was about 15 miles outside of Melbourne.

Pete told me that Australia was “a lot of fun.”  He was a little surprised by how it was portrayed in the series saying, “It wasn’t as bad as all that.”  He “didn’t see any bummin’ around or bar brawls” and informed me that, unless a Marine was squared away, he wasn’t getting any liberty.  “That’s not to say there wasn’t no drinkin’ goin’ on,” he laughed.

So, with Episode 3 we got a little drinking, a little romance (will someone please get Leckie a shoehorn?) and the Marines were off again.

For one reason or another, the series skips right to Cape Gloucester and the terrible conditions there.  Uncle Pete confirmed that it was always wet and miserable, “The only time you were dry was when you were in your hammock.”  When I asked whether morale was bad, he simply said, “Well, I never went to no kook farm.”

Uncle Pete had been with C Company, 7th Marines since he left boot camp.  On Cape Gloucester, he was transferred to Headquarters Company and became Chesty Puller’s driver.  Unfortunately the new duty only moved him about 50 yards back from the line.  Cape Gloucester would be the last time Uncle Pete saw combat.  Soon, he’d be heading back to the States.

That, however, is a story for later.

I don’t know if I’ll be continuing to follow each episode here at Big Hollywood.  I will, however, be posting supplemental pieces inspired by the clippings in Uncle Pete’s scrapbook to coincide with happenings in the series.

Before signing off, I wanted to share something from the scrapbook with you.  Jean from Melbourne had rewritten the lyrics to the song “Thanks for the Memory” in the last page of the book.  She dedicated it “To the United States Marines” but I have a feeling it was really for Uncle Pete.

Thanks for the memory,

Of coloured campaign bars,

Blossoms and stars,

Of rum and cokes and moron jokes and dining in staff cars,

How lovely it was.

Thanks for the memory,

Of castles in the air,

Fingers in my hair,

Of Collins Street and kisses sweet and those medals that you wear,

How lovely it was.

Oh, many is the time that we flirted,

I don’t think we’ll ever regret it,

I know I shall never forget it,

I love you so but there I go,

So,

Thanks for the memory,

Of tidy little flats,

Trying on your hats,

And overcoats and fishing boats, of cozy fireside chats,

How lovely it was.

He further clarified his remarks on CNSNews.com, standing by his statement, but generously allowed that we’ve made some progress:

“I’d like to think that as our time has gone by and as Americans have found themselves in 2010, ignorance is being replaced by a certain amount of enlightenment and racism is going to be replaced eventually by an acceptance. It’s just taking an awfully long time.”

Very big of Mr. Hanks, wouldn’t you say? You’re making progress…it’s slow, but it’s happening. Pat yourself on the back, since Tom’s too busy to do it himself.

We here at Big Hollywood like to give credit where it’s due, and so we decided to see how progressive Hanks is when it comes to racial equality in his own industry. We decided to take a look at his major works after Forrest Gump, which garnered him his second Oscar win and made him a true power player in Hollywood, with plenty of pull. He’s certainly come a long way from playing a cross-dressing advertising agency employee in the 1980 sitcom “Bosom Buddies!”

See the list below: We’re including movies he’s acted in and those he wrote/produced/directed, although we are not including animated films or films he simply narrated. Who does Tom work with, both on camera and behind the scenes? Is he as devoted to diversity as he thinks the rest of us should be? (Not diversity of thought; progressives are more concerned with skin color than what’s inside your head or whatever else you might have to offer.)

We look at the stars and big names behind the camera: directors, producers, cinematographers and composers. Main cast members reflect first billed according to IMDB.com. Who gets the big bucks and all the glory? (A set of three asterisks behind a name denotes a minority.)

By our count, that’s 25 minorities out of 289 people in 14 movies (Tak Fujimoto makes an appearance twice; Tom himself was not included in the count). That’s about 8.65 percent. Compare that to 2007 estimates, which had the non-white population at 34 percent, just over one-third the total population. I guess Tom’s right; fully leaving racism behind is certainly taking a long time if we’re to judge by his own standards.

To make sure we’re as fair as possible, and on the off-chance our math was wrong or someone was overlooked, we’ll go ahead and double Tom’s “inclusiveness” to 17.3%. Still doesn’t help. Mr. Racially Sensitive is still WAY behind “looking like America.” Does someone need some racial-sensitivity training, because there are Tea Party gatherings less Caucasian than most Tom Hanks movies.

Could it be that Tom doesn’t think about skin color or ethnicity when putting a project together, but concentrates on whether a person fits the role or can do the job properly? What a novel idea. But while Tom is capable of it, the rest of us must not be; which is why he feels the need to lecture us on our sins.

Then there’s this little news nugget from just five years ago with the claim that the Japanese themselves are guilty of racism in their own nation, while Hanks opines about how Americans were racist against the Japanese during the difficulties of wartime. Racism occurring anywhere but America? Inconceivable!

Apollo 13

Main cast: Tom Hanks, Bill Paxton, Kevin Bacon, Gary Sinise, Ed Harris, Kathleen Quinlan, Roger Corman, Clint Howard, Joe Spano, Loren Dean, Todd Louiso, Tracy Reiner, David Andrews, Michele Little, Chris Ellis

Main crew: Ron Howard (director); James Horner (composer); Brian Grazer (producer); Al Reinert and William Broyles (screenwriters); Dean Cundey (cinematographer); Todd Hallowell (executive producer); Lorne Orleans (producer)

That Thing You Do (directed)

Main cast: Tom Everett Scott, Liv Tyler, Johnathon Schaech, Steve Zahn, Ethan Embry, Tom Hanks, Charlize Theron, Obba Babatunde***, Giovanni Ribisi, Chris Ellis, Alex Rocco, Sean Whalen, Bill Cobbs, Peter Scolari, Rita Wilson, Chris Isaak

Main crew: Tom Hanks (screenwriter/director); Howard Shore (composer); Tak Fujimoto*** (cinematographer); Mike Piccirillo and Adam Schlesinger (songwriters); Keith P. Cunningham, Suzan Wexler, Stella Fumer and Masako Masuda*** (set designers)

Saving Private Ryan

Main cast: Tom Hanks, Tom Sizemore, Edward Burns, Barry Pepper, Adam Goldberg, Vin Diesel, Giovanni Ribisi, Jeremy Davies, Matt Damon, Ted Danson, Paul Giamatti, Dennis Farina, Joerg Stadler, Max Martini, Dylan Bruno

Main crew: Steven Spielberg (producer/director); John Williams (composer); Janusz Kaminski (cinematographer); Tom Brown (art director/co-producer); Robert Rodat (screenwriter)

You’ve Got Mail

Main cast: Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, Katie Sagona, Greg Kinnear, Parker Posey, Jean Stapleton, Steve Zahn, Heather Burns, Dave Chappelle***, Dabney Coleman, John Randolph, Hallee Hirsh, Jeffery Scaperrotta, Cara Seymore, Katie Finneran

Main crew: Norah Ephron (director/producer); G. Mac Brown (executive procducer); Delia Ephron (executive producer); Lauren Shuler Donner (producer); George Fenton (composer); John Lindley (cinematographer)

The Green Mile

Main cast: Tom Hanks, Michael Clark Duncan***, David Morse, Bonnie Hunt, James Cromwell, Michael Jeter, Graham Greene***, Doug Hutchison, Sam Rockwell, Barry Pepper, Jeffrey DeMunn, Patrica Clarkson, Harry Dean Stanton, Dabbs Greer, Eve Brent

Main crew: Frank Darabont (director/screenwriter/producer); David Tattersall (cinematographer); Thomas Newman (composer); David Valdes (producer)

Cast Away

Main cast: Paul Sanchez***, Lari White, Leonid Citer, David Allen Brooks, Jelena Papovic, Valentina Ananyina, Semion Sudarikov, Tom Hanks, Peter von Berg, Dmitri S. Boudrine, Francois Duhamel, Michael Forest, Viveka Davis, Nick Searcy, Jennifer Chloe***

Main crew: Robert Zemeckis (producer/director); Tom Hanks (producer); Alan Silvestri (composer); Jack Rapke (producer); Steven J. Boyd (screenwriter); Steve Starkey (producer); Joan Bradshaw (executive producer); Don Burgess (cinematographer)

Road to Perdition

Main cast: Tom Hanks, Tyler Hoechlin,  Rob Maxey, Paul Newman, Liam Aiken, Jude Law, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Daniel Craig, Ciran Hinds, Craig Spidle, Ian Barford, Stephen P. Dunn, Paul Turner, Kathleen Keane, Brendan McKinney

Main crew: Sam Mendes (producer/director); Richard D. Zanuck (producer); Thomas Newman (composer); Conrad L. Hall (cinematographer)

Catch Me If You Can

Main cast: Leonardo diCaprio, Tom Hanks, Christopher Walken, Martin Sheen, Nathalie Baye, Amy Adams, James Brolin, Brian Howe, Frank John Hughes, Steve Eastin, Chris Ellis, John Finn, Jennifer Garner, Nancy Lenehan, Ellen Pompeo

Main crew: John Williams (composer); Steven Spielberg (producer/director); Janusz Kaminski (cinematographer); Michel Shane (executive producer); Jeff Nathanson (screenwriter); Barry Kemp (executive producer); Daniel Lupi (executive producer); Tony Romano (executive producer); Walter Parkes (producer)

The Ladykillers

Main cast: Tom Hanks, Irma P. Hall***, Marlon Wayans***, J.K. Simmons, Tzi Ma***, Ryan Hurst, Diane Delano, George Wallace***, John McConnell, Jason Weaver***, Stephen Root, Lyne Odums***, Walter K. Jordan***, George Anthony Bell,*** Greg Grunberg

Main crew: Ethan Coen (screenwriter/producer/director); Barry Sonnenfeld (producer); Joel Coen (screenwriter/producer/director); Roger Deakins (cinematographer); Carter Burwell (composer); Barry Josephson (producer); Tom Jacobson (producer)

The Terminal

Main cast: Tom Hanks; Catherine Zeta-Jones; Stanley Tucci, Chi McBride***, Diego Luna***, Barry Shabaka Henley***, Kumar Pallana***, Zoe Saldana***, Eddie Jones, Jude Ciccolella, Corey Reynolds***, Guillermo Diaz***, Rini Bell, Stephen Mendel, Valeri Nikolayev

Main crew: John Williams (composer); Stephen Spielberg (produce/director); Janusz Kaminski (cinematographer); Andrew Niccol (screen story/executive producer)

The Da Vinci Code

Main cast: Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou, Ian McKellen, Jean Reno, Paul Bettany, Alfred Molina, Jurgen Prochnow, Jean-Yeves Bertelot, Eienne Chicot, Jean-Pierre Marielle, Marie-Francoise Audollent, Rita Davies, Francesco Carnelutti, Seth Gabel, Shane Zaza***

Main crew: Hans Zimmer (composer); Ron Howard (director); Brian Grazer (producer); Avika Goldsman (screenwriter); Dan Brown (book author/executive producer)

Charlie Wilson’s War

Main cast: Tom Hanks, Amy Adams, Julia Roberts, Philip Seymore Hoffman, Terry Bozeman, Brian Markinson, Jud Tylor, Hilary Salvatore, Cyia Batten, Kirby Mitchell, Ed Regine, Daniel Eric Gold, Emily Blunt, Peter Gerety, Wynn Everett

Main crew: Mike Nichols (director); Aaron Sorkin (screenplay); George Crile (book author); Gary Goetzman (producer); Celia Costas (executive producer); Ryan Kavanaugh (executive producer); Jeff Skoll (executive producer); Stephen Goldblatt (cinematographer); James Newton Howard (composer)

The Great Buck Howard (producer)

Main cast: John Malkovich, Colin Hanks, Emily Blunt, Ricky Jay, Steve Zahn, Tom Hanks, Griffin Dunne, Debra Monk, Adam Scott, Patrick Fischler, Wallace Langham, Jonathan Ames, Jacquie Barnbrook, Paul Darricarrere, Terry Scannell

Main crew: Tom Hanks (producer); Tak Fujimoto*** (cinematographer); Marvin Acuna (executive producer); Blake Neely (composer); Sean McGinly (screenwriter/director); Steven Shareshian (executive producer); Gary Goetzman (producer)

Angels and Demons

Main cast: Tom Hanks, Ewan McGregor, Ayelet Zurer, Stellan Skarsgard, Pierfrancesco Favino, Nikolaj Lie Kaas, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Thure Lindhardt, David Pasquesi, Cosimo Fusko, Victor Alfieri, Franklin Amobi, Curt Lowens, Bob Yerkes, Mark Fiorini

Main crew: Ron Howard (director/producer); David Koepp and Akiva Godsman (screenwriters); Dan Brown (book author/executive producer); Todd Hallowell (executive producer); Marco Valerio Pugini (executive producer Italy); John Calley (producer); Brian Grazer (producer); Hans Zimmer (composer); Salvatore Totino (cinematographer)

***

Thanks goodness for people like Tom Hanks to remind us of our imperfections from his self-made pedestal. It’s because of people like him that I can sleep easily at night, knowing he has the reins of America’s cultural direction firmly in his grip.

As I carefully made my way through the contents of this box, I realized that I was holding history in my hands.  It was quite a feeling let me tell you.  I hope to share some of the items as the weeks commence.

PFC Pete Cavo with 7th Marines, 1st Marine Division

Episode two returns us to Guadalcanal.  The Marines have been here a while and they are tired, hungry and low on supplies.  I’m beginning to recognize some of these guys.  Marines at rest are an amusing bunch.  It’s an attitude that’s difficult to capture and almost impossible to reproduce.  Too often, Hollywood goes for the stereotypes.  Director David Nutter handles the men in these situations deftly.

The age-old rivalry between the US Army and Marines made me chuckle.  Marines have always been asked to do more with less and that is a tradition that continues today.  The pride that is instilled in every Marine is demonstrated by Chesty Puller’s order that all personnel be freshly shaved upon the arrival of the Army.  Then, rather than call attention to their tattered uniforms, Puller praises his “raggedy-ass Marines,” declaring that they “look this way for a reason.”

While going through the box that Uncle Pete had sent, I found a form that listed all of Pete’s citations.  I was surprised to learn that he had received the Purple Heart.

“Well they gave it to me, y’know… uh, I got shot in the ass.  I was tryin’ to crawl from one hole to another to get a cigarette,” he laughed.  “I was back on the line the next day.”  Raggedy-ass Marine, indeed.

When I asked him about the episode, he said he was a little disappointed that they didn’t show more patrols or “when we were at the Matanikau River three times and couldn’t get across… those were pretty important battles.”  Overall, he thought it was a “good show,” though.

He talked briefly about the major battle depicted in the episode and about being aware at the time that the Japanese had broken through the line and I considered what it must have been like to face down a massive frontal assault knowing the enemy had gotten behind you.  That thought chilled me a bit.  Meanwhile, Pete talked breezily about water-cooled machine guns overheating and men having to piss into them to cool them off.

I watched the episode again while writing this piece.  It got me this second time.  After talking to Uncle Pete about his experience on Guadalcanal, the last scene (the one with the Navy cook) resonated much more deeply.  Pete Cavo is a hero.  I’m grateful for this opportunity to learn about his service and to share some of his story with you.

Thanks for reading.  See you next week.

I don’t know about you, but I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take them anymore. Prime example. Sean Penn calling for the arrest of anyone who tags dictator Hugo Chavez as a dictator. That must now include the mass arrest of the entire leadership of the OAS, which just slammed Pennhead’s hero El Chavista on his horrific human rights record. I will say it: that statement is as un-American as it gets, and is dictatorial in itself. Those are fighting words, IMHO. Tell me where I’m wrong.

Then we had Tom Hanks effectively saying that the Japanese and Americans wanted to destroy each other only because they were different breeds of racists. That intellectually vacuous statement not only slanders America’s most honorable record in the war against a genocidal Imperial Japan, it slanders the sacred memory of every US service member who fought and died in that conflict. As a Navy veteran myself, and the son of an Army veteran of Normandy Beach on D-Day? Fighting words.

And now, actress Megan Mullally believes that Jay Leno’s attempts to attract red state viewers is “insane.” Is it? Gee, I thought Hollywood studios, networks and creative film artists sought the widest audiences possible. Aren’t we all Americans here? I guess not, huh? How do all you red staters feel being effectively declared insane by the esteemed Dr. Mullally? Fighting words? I believe it is time they are met head on and challenged. My answer? Impact statements. By that I mean Americans making a punitive statement to said Tinseltown offenders to let them know just how numerous and offended we are. We accomplish that through temporary one-time boycotts of the offenders’ projects.

Here is The Plan. It is too late to make an impact statement on the premiere of the Hanks/Spielberg HBO series The Pacific. But it is not too late to make a statement on Episode Two next Sunday night. Here is how we let Mr. Hanks know of our rank offense at his fighting words re the Pacific War. This Sunday, don’t watch it. For one night. Don’t even TiVo it. Then next week, everybody tune it in whether you were going to watch it or not. The ratings dips and jumps will send a very clear message. If it helps, think of it as being The Joker for a Day. Be an Agent of Chaos in the ratings! That work for ya?

I consider that a very balanced yet powerful response. As to Mr. Penn, he has four upcoming film projects, none of which has an official release date. One is Fair Game, the story of Joseph Wilson and the Valerie Plame “scandal.” No impact statement necessary there. I’ll bet five-to-one that film is DOA at the box office. Bush-bashing is so yesterday. No, the only juicy prospect in Mr. Penn’s future is the Farrelly Brothers’ reboot of The Three Stooges. I say totally avoid the film on its release weekend. Give him a taste of what rectal cancer at the box office feels like. Make him scream.

As to Ms. Mullally, there doesn’t seem to be much of anything of hers at IMDB that won’t collapse financially or ratings-wise of its own accord. You can beat a dead horse, but what’s the point? Perhaps that’s why she said what she did. You know. Get in good with Sean Penn and Tom Hanks. I’ll keep an eye on Ms. Mullally and any impact statement-worthy projects she may get attached to.

I never forget fighting words. Ever. And I will do my part. I fully intend to contact every major US veterans’ organization on the matter of The Pacific, and will recommend they make an impact statement of their own this coming Sunday. Will you do your part? Is missing one TV show or opening weekend at the box office too much to ask in response to fighting words by those creative film artists most concerned with the project’s financial and viewership success?

Lastly, a blackly comic punchline. A spec script I have been laboring on for eighteen months, my fourth, is finally wrapping this week and going to market after rewrites based on coverage. That’s why I’ve been mostly MIA as of late. I know. Alex Perez, aka Hollywood Scab Writer, probably has a better shot at the Biz than I will after this. But I’m a writer. I write. Telling me to stop writing is like telling a charter NAMBLA Member in Good Standing to lay off the young boys. It ain’t happening.

I may have to move on to another field of writing in the end, but at least I take a clear conscience with me. I also take with me a huge, loving and most supportive family, lots of great  friends, and a lot of most promising young people I have befriended who adore me as I do them. I even have today’s Oscar Schindler for LGBTs and some real gay advocates on my side via my reporting on the LGBT human rights horrorshows in Iran and Iraq. Not like the professional fakes at HRC. Larger point being, I am an Army of One. I may never get rich in Hollywood, but I will never be poor with all I have, either. In point of fact I am already rich, and there is nothing Lefty Hollywood can do to hurt me in the slightest. What’s another word for nothing left to lose again? I’m sure our Founding Fathers knew.

I also have a bit of a fan base here at Big Hollywood. Love you too, Jimmy Arone! It is we who are are the true Hollywood rebels now, with clear ideals and senses of mission and purpose. It is the Lefty Hollywood establishment that is totally fucked, ideologically floundering and completely out of touch with the American people.  All I’m saying is that it is time to lay down some dope smacks as fighting words demand. Can I get an Amen, some tuned-out TVs and deferred movie attendance on that?

—–

I especially like this:

“You know, they are there, they do their jobs, they know how to do their jobs, they look forward to coming home and often they turn around (and) go right back in there again.”

“Go right back in there again.”

More here.

Okay, fine, but let’s look a little closer at the real context, which is always found near the bottom of anything written by the MSM. On Sunday nights, the series “True Blood” averages 5 million viewers. “Blood” might air in a different time-slot than “The Pacific” but how fine do we want to split these hairs? Most telling is that when the History Channel aired a re-broadcast of “Band of Brothers” in 2004, 4.6 million tuned in. This bears repeating…

A rerun of “Brothers” delivered 1.5 million more viewers than the heavily promoted debut of “The Pacific.”

HBO has over 30 million subscribers and it’s just a fact that Sunday night less than 10% bothered to watch ”The Pacific,” even with the dual pedigree of Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks combined with a very, very heavy promotional blitz and a lingering universal affection for “Band of Brothers.”

So what changed?

No doubt, there are all kinds of factors and to lay the blame completely at the feet of Tom Hanks’ ignorant and offensive comments would be impossible to prove and therefore unfair. However, it’s doubtful anyone wants to debate that having the high-profile face of Hanks — the face of the publicity blitz — defame our country and the troops who fought WWII and today’s War on Terror was at all helpful.

For the most part the MSM tried to spike the story through their normal sin of omission (ignoring news that doesn’t further the Leftist cause). Unfortunately for Hanks, the days of the MSM completely controlling the narrative are over. The inter-web-nets were and are all over this story, Fox News picked it up and though my work gets in the way of talk radio listening, I’m assuming it got some attention there as well.

And what was Hanks’ biggest mistake? Well, his arrogance and the bubble of his A-list life allowed him to forget the world’s changed and that the MSM can no longer make all the bad right-wingers go away; he stepped right into the ongoing and growing narrative of the anti-American, anti-troop Hollywood leftie and then found himself subjected to something completely new in the world of the stah — what the rest of us call Being Held Accountable For What We Say.

Bottom line: This was the very worst publicity the Oscar-winner could have given his miniseries at the very worst possible time.

Certainly, the $200 million HBO production could still rebound, pick up viewers as it rolls on and sell well on DVD. There’s still a lot of life there, and the merits of “The Pacific” should stand apart from the glib hostility one of its creators let slip in what he must have felt was the safe and cuddly environment of MSNBC.

Like all Americans, Tom Hanks has every right to defame our country and warriors in whatever forum he wishes. No one’s arguing that. What the actor might want to consider, though, is keeping up with the times. The days of lobbing political bombs while cowering behind your publicist and then counting on the butt-boy Leftist media to memory-hole anything that might hurt your product are over. 

The disappointing debut of “The Pacific” might have nothing to do with the words of “Our Jimmy Stewart.” However, because his indefensible comments received the kind of thorough airing in our national conversation they would not have just a couple years ago, that possibility is now lingering in the minds of every individual who invested their time, talent and millions into what must have looked like a slam-dunk just a few minutes before Mr. Hanks took a chair with Morning Joe.

The Only Jimmy Stewart