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Al Gore Plugs Sci-Fi Thriller That’s Aiding Climate Campaign
Al Gore is giving two thumbs up to the new science fiction thriller "Inception" that stars fellow environmentalist Leonardo DiCaprio - a film that is aiding one of Gore's climate change advocacy groups.
Proceeds
from the film's July 13 premiere in Los Angeles went to the
Gore-founded Alliance for Climate Protection, which is pressing Congress
to approve legislation that caps greenhouse gas emissions.
"I have never recommended a movie before on algore.com, but I am making an exception this weekend for a movie that I had an opportunity to see when it premiered in Los Angeles last Tuesday: ‘Inception,'" Gore, the former vice president, wrote on his website Friday afternoon. He also tweeted the recommendation.
"Do yourself a favor and see it! It is, in my opinion, a real work of genius by the writer and director, Chris Nolan, with brilliant performances - especially by my friend and fellow environmentalist, Leo DiCaprio - incredible special effects, and a truly great musical score by Hans Zimmer," he added.
Gore admits he's not an impartial observer: "Warner Brothers devoted the proceeds from the ‘Benefit Premiere' to the Alliance for Climate Protection - so you could say I am biased," he notes. But Gore adds: "This movie really is one of the best, most entertaining, and most thought-provoking I can ever remember seeing."
The film is receiving good reviews and, according to Entertainment Weekly, took in over $21 million Friday when it opened nationwide and could earn $60 million over its first three days.
DiCaprio has for years worked with environmental groups such as the Natural Resources Defense Council and the International Fund for Animal Welfare.
49 Comments so far
Show AllIt appears that CD's editors are mixing in "light" summer/weekend fare.
I'm a little surprised this is getting top bill, though. Maybe Michael Winship didn't finish his latest article about, say, what we can all learn from watching kids eating ice cream cones in the hot sun.
I'm not exactly an Al Gore fan, but as a "Futurama" fan I enjoyed his multiple guest appearances on that show. I was hoping the "sci-fi thriller" was a new Futurama movie!
O.S, i noticed the same thing.
Although i couldn't help saying a few things regarding the Passion of Mel Gibson movie, because i think it is very relevant on many fronts.
Although, Gore is a big cap and trade promoter, and i am not an al gore fan!
rita
Why do you own a television? Do you not understand that all information coming from that idiot tube is designed to make you into something you're not? Do you think your mind is your own? I suggest to you that you don't understand the power of suggestion. Please... turn that f#@ing thing off.
Al also made South Park, "serially"!
I'll wait and see it when it comes to Netflix or encore. Then I can turn it off if it offends me. There is so much crap out now you have to be careful. When all is said and done, it's just a Hollywood movie. Meanwhile, all is corrupt and the world is going to hell in a handbag. But yes, life IS good and it's always best to forgive, Shadow Dancer. But not to forget.
Hi Shadow Dancer,
Your post reminded me of this poem by Czeslaw Milosz:
A SONG ON THE END OF THE WORLD
On the day the world ends
A bee circles a clover,
A fisherman mends a glimmering net.
Happy porpoises jump in the sea,
By the rainspout young sparrows are playing
And the snake is gold-skinned as it should always be.
On the day the world ends
Women walk through the fields under their umbrellas,
A drunkard grows sleepy at the edge of a lawn,
Vegetable peddlers shout in the street
And a yellow-sailed boat comes nearer the island,
The voice of a violin lasts in the air
And leads into a starry night.
And those who expected lightning and thunder
Are disappointed.
And those who expected signs and archangels’ trumps
Do not believe it is happening now.
As long as the sun and the moon are above,
As long as the bumblebee visits a rose,
As long as rosy infants are born
No one believes it is happening now.
Only a white-haired old man, who would be a prophet
Yet is not a prophet, for he’s much too busy,
Repeats while he binds his tomatoes:
There will be no other end of the world,
There will be no other end of the world.
Warsaw, 1944
TRANSLATED BY ANTHONY MILOSZ
Nevermind.
Al Gore, as Frank Zappa would say, "Strictly commercial"!
I am interested in the ideas of purism that drift through these posts. I think we need to decide what we do and do not need to be pure about.
Granted that we have every right, even responsibility to be suspicious of Bill Clinton's vice president. Granted too that we have reason to suspect that a production associated with Di Caprio will involve commercial investment with profit motive, regardless of what Di Caprio's own motives may or may not be.
That said, how does one create a movie for mass consumption in current American society and actually distribute it to those masses without engaging these forces?
If we don't imagine that la Victoria Siempre will flash upon us like Assumption, we must envision some manner of transition. Surely we will know transition before we know anything we can call a "final outcome," declared victories and ends-of-history notwithstanding. As nearly as I can discern, no finished states exist over the last thousands of years of history and prehistory, only transition and transition from transition to transition.
Accordingly, to reject the actions of others that accord imperfectly with our wishes cannot work as a blanket policy.
At the same time, ideas get usurped by claims of compromise. Citizens of western demi-democracies live in a disinformation age, when information is not so as effectively suppressed as supplanted.
Why can we not maintain our distinctions of words and ideas in ideas and words and in pieces of art, yet put in practice the practical and do the doable?
If there is a problem with a movie that would donate money to ecological causes, it must come from some act of co-opting the movement in some way. If this be true, it must come from or come with some distortion of ideas in the work itself (I have not seen it).
If so, why would a correction not involve seeing the movie and discussing or extending the ideas, and involving the naive in more extensive or more accurate information?
None of this constitutes a reason to not criticize Al Gore, but not even a stint in the American vice presidency means that nothing a man says can be correct or that nothing he attaches his name to can have value.
Nicely stated, but I fear it falls on deaf ears.
As doubledee said, nicely stated, but Al hurts more than he helps at this point.
I love what you said,"I think we need to decide what we do and do not need to be pure about"
My wife and I saw the movie "Inception." What an annoying movie. You go through the movie caring nothing for the characters, caring nothing about what will happen or why and feeling absolutely nothing. This is in the midst of a constant barrage of gun shooting for no reason, and all sorts of mayhem and violence. All this to the drone of a soundtrack that takes the place of an actual story. I would not recommend this movie to anyone. This movie was the biggest waste of time and money.
"Inception" is quite inventive and original and demands close attention from its audience. The plot is complicated and intricate but hardly non-existent. The violence is integral to the story; there would be little tension without it.
I'm sorry that you failed to enjoy "Inception" but your assessment is completely inaccurate.
q
Uh, no, my assessment is not completely inaccurate--it's my assessment. In this movie, you care nothing whatsoever about the characters. It's one long bout of nonstop violence and mayhem. There is no tension created when you end up not caring about the characters.
That assessment can sum up many if not most of Hollywood's efforts. It is a nice thing that some proceeds go to a worthy cause however.
With the exception of depictions of violence as part of an anti-violence message, like say, the violence in Del Toro's "El Labarinto del Fauno" I don't go to movies with violence - period.
Consequently, I don't go to very many movies anymore - at least those from Hollywood.
Especially, this 3-D crap portends no good.
I guess I'll be the judge of what is and what is not inaccurate.
Have you actually seen the film in question?
q
I'm only interested in the premise of the lucid dream which is supposed to be a large part of the plot. I've had lucid dreams since I was a child. I don't care a whit about anything else any other comment in this thread has mentioned. Sometimes a movie is just a movie.
100% agreed. The concept of layers of dreaming is vaguely interesting, but the themes they used to express the concept were narcissistic, over-violent, and mind-numbing. Not to mention that the so-called "dreams" are nothing like real dreams at all.
P E A C E ! ! !
While Al Gore is giving thumbs up and making movies w/ himself in it he is pouring his money into hedge funds. He has made over 38 MILLION dollars in the last 9 years. Hedge fund share holders are NOT ALLOWED to know where their money is invested. How much do you want to be he is invested in lots of nuclear, coal and oil stocks? Of course everyone knows during his 2000 election campaign he owned stock in Occidental Petroleum...right? MR PERVERT/PHONY! He can stick his thumbs where the sun doesn't shine.
Is das kapital in service to art or is art in service to das kapital?
Bizarre comment? Also, the first character of "Kapital" should be in upper case as is the usage for all German nouns.
Capping is good, trading on it is evil.
Environmental protection is good.
Trading in anything to do with environment protection is evil.
Al Gore's promoting cap and trade is evil.
mcoyote's treatise on Al Gore's evils has nothing to do directly with environmental protection but only with mcoyote's animus toward Al Gore.
mcoyote's treatise is irrelevant in this context.
Correction - mcoyote's treatise on Al Gore's inclination toward evil is accurate and so in this context is relevant, but in any context has little to do directly with environmental protection.
No massage therapist came up with the very funny words "crazed sex poodle." This is obviously from a wine drenched meeting of creative wingnuts. I have to give them an "A" for their high entertainment value. I'm still laughing.
Right Wingnuts stop at nothing as they continue their time worn tactics of destroying people's reputations in order to score political points. When you see people doing that, a red flag should go up telling you that such people have no logic or evidence to support their agenda, so they go negative and attack people's reputations as a distraction. Look what they did to the Kennedy's over the past 40 plus years! There is no place too low for them to stoop to. This is essentially a rehash of the Joe McCarthy era tactics as he kept calling people card-carrying communists, and ruined the careers of many in the process.
This particular message is so vulgar I think it might be well to shield it from the eyes of young people, at least. I don't need this crap in my reading, that's for sure.
It does seem like you really,really want this to be true. Yet neither you nor I nor anyone not in that room know the truth.
Your anger blinds you and leads you astray, and it will most of the time. That women went to that room ostensibly to perform her job, a massage, and by the by what the hell is an "abdominal massage" anyway? As I read that smelly report I noted that she seemed to have had opportunities to simply leave the room, yet the report shows she did not avail herself of any. That makes me wonder, as does the continual right wing propaganda machine that spews out crap about anyone to the left of Atilla the Hun nonstop, 24/7.
One may not agree with the direction Gore takes, but at least he seems to be trying to effect a solution to a dire problem. The question is not whether or not he is a pervert but whether or not his solution is a practical one. I do not know why you refuse much of the propaganda on the right yet seem so eager to believe this story, perhaps you let your aforementioned anger and your willingness to dislike Gore affect your judgement, so many do the same, and far too often in fact.
This isn't a rightwing nut story as you so wrongly put it.....it did happen, was in the news, and sounds legit to me (why wouldn't the woman report it at the time it happened? maybe because she didn't want to cause embarrassment or trouble for herself?....what would she have to gain from a story now??). This guy is a super ego ("I invented the internet") from a long line of wealth and power.....face it Bodryn he is not some environmental hero or Democratic God as you and others who are TOTALLY BLINDED BY THE DUMB-ASS PARTY want to portray. And by the way....I am not a right-winger either....I am a radical leftist who knows the election system is RIGGED!
I checked the IMDB and found it gave Inception a score of 9.4 out of 10 as of today. That is the highest rating I think I have ever seen on IMDB and that says something. People who visit IMDB realize that the people there do not generally give high ratings to mindless blockbusters.
Nah, IMDB tends to dramatically overrate recent blockbusters from popular directors.
Anyway, saw the movie a few hours ago. It had nothing to do with Al Gore and environmentalism. It was the matrix meets old caper movies meets generic hollywood action. Chris Nolan gave us his trademark unintelligible action sequences. Worse, the action scenes served no person other than self-glorification. The script wasn't too original. Most characters were flat.
On the other hand the actors performed reasonably well, the script wasn't atrocious, and the special effects were ok.
So while I don't know what this movie had to do with mother nature or Our Magnificent Master (Member Of The Elite) Al Gore, it was watchable, though certainly not anything special.
---
Haha, for fun, you could even notice how the world is and is supposed to be:
You have the Elite, who go wherever they want, look hawt, work for the corporations, and play with fancy toys...
And you have the Projections, who do all the work and get shot just like that.
In which class are you?
Your characterization of IMDb's ratings is very ill-informed. Please give us an example of such an overrated blockbuster.
q
Nevermind
I cannot believe the petty discussions on this website. Let's just support the cause and do the right thing regarding the environment. You all might not be an Al Gore fan (I am not a Ralph Nader fan nor a Rush fan) so let us just put a cap on our mouths and do something constructive. Anyway, it is our planet and the time is now to support the earth. So attack me now because I stood up for the environment. This website's approach to comments by not moderating is not very conducive to listening since everything is in "attack mode". You will not get a penny from me. This seems to be a rightwing undercurrent here.
Your post is rather confusing, I am sorry to note. Further,"putting a cap on ones mouth" is a rather boring suggestion and one that seems to favor the status quo, is that what you meant? Thinking you would be attacked for "standing up for the environment" begs the question as to how you are doing such? Many think Gore is leading the environmental charge in a wrong direction, and that is their right to their own opinions.
I doubt that folks who come to a political forum to express their own ideas and ideals and read those of others will be cowed into silence by what appears to be a centrist desire to shut up those who "dare" to disagree with your own views. Certainly there are those here who do not add to the discourse. I think that you might very well be one such.
I think the undercurrent (although I do notice some blatant right-wingers here- they do love to go to comment sections and show how ignorant they are) on this site is that people GET IT.
They are past believing that ANYONE from the elite has the planet's best interests at heart. When someone like Al Gore gets up (someone from in the system) and starts touting ANYTHING, I just figure it's all bullshit and nickles. He is one of the assigned propaganda ministers on the "left."
All Al Gore is doing is trying to get us to think we can re-tool the entire world into BUYING GREEN. The truth is, the system is sick, it's beyond redemption (was from its inception) and it's KILLING THE PLANET!
Now, if Al Gore got up and told us THE TRUTH, that would be one thing, but he's not. He's the liar from the "left." Just like Rush is the liar from the "right." Left and right are just distractions so we won't notice THE CORPORATIONS run the world. And Al Gore is as much a part of that as Rush Limbaugh or anyone else that won't step outside the system and tell us the TRUTH.
Now how much energy and pollution will be used in the making and distributing of this film?
And who really thinks it's going to change anything?
I recall a vast amount of people saying a year ago that 'Avatar' was going to change the world....