As too many of us know, there are 2 things that motivate News Corp. (in this order) - making money and propagandizing the conservative message.
While the vast majority of the time these objectives are in lockstep with each other, at times (Family Guy, etc.) the entertainment arm moves forward with something that doesn't fit into the nice confines of "Real America."
Robert Rodriguez, never one to shy away from his vision as a director, released a recut Trailer for his upcoming revenge grindhouse movie.
This is Machete, with a special Cinco de Mayo message...to Arizona!
The plot of Machete, set for release on September 3, is simple enough. Danny Trejo plays an ex-Mexican Fed who immigrates to Texas as a day laborer until he's approached by a businessman who offers $150,000 for him to assassinate a caricatured anti-immigrant senator played by Robert de Niro.
What kind of "La Raza-loving, immigrant enabling, reverse-racist" company would associate themselves with this? Well, News Corp. of course...
The film, which is set to be released Sept. 3, is produced by 20th Century Fox, a production company owned by Fox News' parent company, News Corp.
20th Century Fox said that Rodriguez speaks for himself on political issues. The studio was comfortable with the release of the movie trailer on Cinco De Mayo, but says it has no political stake in the immigration debate.
It's situations like this where I pause and question any broader implications. Would it give them too much credit to wonder if by playing both sides of the fence they can trot out Bill-O and Hannity to show the violence escalation by the "brown side" on the poor Arizonans.
Then again, I don't see Robert Rodriguez as a pawn or a fool. Controversy sales and Fox can't back out of their relationship with him. What you have here is a classic case of News Corp. going against their mission's preconceived notions for the sake of money.
Will the pro-SB 1070 crowd rail against this movie for its "violent, racist" undertones? Will they be smart enough to connect the dots back to News Corp. or will they stop with the brown at Robert Rodriguez?
As far as the substance of the movie itself, this seems pretty par for the course for RR. I don't want to divert this diary into any overall film critique, I'm sure some people here love his work and others don't care much for it, but as a Hispanic I want to make a couple points about the substance of the movie itself.
- Those on the right will argue this is PC one-sided racism. If the roles were reversed and it was a white person going on a rampage Hispanics would cry foul they would say. That's technically incorrect, they're called Westerns.
- The substance and message of the film was alive and well before SB 1070. The "bring it on" shot across the bow should be looked at in the context of what I mentioned earlier, controversy sales. What better way to market the film than using the political climate?
- This is America. We have freedom of speech. Much as it wrenches the stomachs of us to see the stupidity and arrogance of "taking our country back" among the Tea Party through threats of force (and there is some debate on where the 1st Amendment stops and yelling "Fire!" in a crowded theater starts), most of us agree there is pretty broad latitude to say what you want in this country. That right doesn't only extend to White middle-aged "Real Americans." If this kind of stuff "frightens" them...well good, we don't care too much about your threats of a 2nd Revolution either.
So it remains to be seen how Fox News as a whole digests this. But it's times like these that I wish the whole Tea Bagger crowd would realize it's never about the issues. It's always about money.