Typically when you see a blue helmet on the big screen it means the UN is coming to the rescue.

That’s why they call Hollywood the Dream Factory, one supposes.

In “The Whistleblower,” the UN is part of a nasty racket covering up sexual abuse in war-torn Bosnia. The film, now available on Blu-ray and DVD, is based on Nebraska cop turned whistleblower Kathryn Bolkovac’s revelations about the UN peacekeepers’ monstrous behavior.

Yes, the film implicates the private security firm working alongside UN officials, but it does so in a matter of fact fashion rarely seen in politically charged films. And best of all is how star Rachel Weisz makes the lead character’s plight worth our admiration without any sanctimonious speeches to overrule our emotions.

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William Shakespeare once wrote, “To thine own self be true.” It’s an ironic line, considering that hundreds of years after his death, some still question whether or not Shakespeare is actually the one who wrote all of his famous plays.

The new film ‘Anonymous’ explores the theory that Shakespeare, played with relish by Rafe Spall, wasn’t the great writer readers know him to be. In fact, the film depicts him as an incompetent, manipulative monster who is all too willing to fraudulently accept the credit for writing some of the greatest plays ever written.

In one of the film’s most bizarre twists, it begins in the contemporary world, where an actor introduces the theory that Shakespeare, who he states came from a poorly-educated family, is not a great writer at all. The story then flashes back to the destruction of the Globe Theater. A man in the theater hides some documents underneath the stage and soon enough, the story then flashes to another time period.

If this doesn’t sound disjointed, it should. The story doesn’t really know where to begin and throughout, it flashes backwards and forwards lacking the sophistication of smarter films that could handle such transitions more smoothly.

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This is the most recent installment of exclusive interviews with Dr. Paul Kengor, professor of political science at Grove City College, on his book revealing how communists, from Moscow to New York to Chicago, have long manipulated America’s liberals/progressives. Dupes: How America’s Adversaries Have Manipulated Progressives for a Century is based on an unprecedented volume of declassified materials from Soviet archives, FBI files, and more.

Big Peace: Professor Kengor, Hollywood is celebrating its Academy Awards, a look back at great actors and actresses and films.

Kengor: For me, it’s a moment to look back at Hollywood’s worst communists, communist sympathizers, Stalinists, and duped liberals and progressives—as well as the good guys (and gals) that fit none of those categories.

Big Peace: Fair enough. This should be fun. Let’s start with communists.

Charlie Chaplin comment, “Thank God for
communism!” will make you see (him) red.

Kengor: How about the Hollywood screenwriters who liberals still insist were innocent lambs? Dalton Trumbo, Communist Party code “Dalt T;” Albert Maltz, party no. 47196; Alvah Bessie, no. 46836; John Howard Lawson, no. 47275. Or, if you turn to page 191 of my book—if you don’t have a copy yet, shame on you—you can view Arthur Miller’s party application. Miller wrote The Crucible, about how Joe McCarthy pursued “liberals” unfairly suspected of being communists—“liberals” like Miller, Trumbo, Maltz, Bessie, Lawson.

Big Peace: As you say in Dupes, Hollywood produced “quite a cast.” Let’s narrow the focus to the Academy Awards. (more…)

If you’re a history buff and you’ve got HBO, then have I got a movie for you: Into the Storm. (And if you’re cable-less, add it to your NetFlix queue.) Yes, it’s made-for-HBO, but it’s from the John Adams/Band of Brothers wing, not the Recount/Angels in America department.

It’s a sequel of sorts to The Gathering Storm, known informally around my home as the Greatest Churchill Movie Ever Made. And in answer to the first question on your mind right now, no, the new HBO/BBC co-production is not quite as good as Gathering Storm. (But then, we just have to resign ourselves to the fact that nothing ever will be.)

Partly it’s Albert Finney’s fault. They say nobody’s perfect, but they haven’t seen Finney play Winston Churchill. (He most deservedly won both an Emmy and a BAFTA.) You’ve heard the phrase “tears of joy”? A largely alien experience to me, a pretty stoic, manly guy. Alien to me no more, my friends, once I watched Gathering Storm for the first time.

I regret to report that Brendan Gleeson, who essays the role in the sequel, gives it a yeoman’s try, but can’t quite measure up. There are simply more and richer layers to Finney’s performance, perhaps due to nothing no less unfair than a longer and more experienced life, even (dare I say it, oh what the hell) more talent. Janet McTeer, who plays wife Clemmie in the new movie, fares better, nearly matching Vanessa Redgrave’s marvelous performance in Gathering Storm. (Why, they even look alike.) (more…)