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Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
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Movie Rights to Godless Ayn Rand Novel Acquired From Catholics

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SaraRueful
07/22/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
I read both The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged in the last year (I'm 38) in my endeavor to read books that are deemed "important" or that I was supposed to read in high school/college but didn't. I didn't like Fountainhead because every single person in it was an asshole. I liked Atlas Shrugged, loved Dagny, but skipped Francisco's party monologue and Galt's radio speech. I don't feel I missed anything. Ayn did go on so.
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Edited by SaraRueful at 07/22/09 8:04 AM SaraRueful was starred SaraRueful was unstarred

PaisleyPajamas
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
Wasn't this supposed to be Brangelina's vehicle? Thus the bartering for their *cough-cough* Oscar nominations last year?

I met one of the early screenwriters on this project about 3 to 4 years ago at the Austin Film Festival. It seems like a meat grinder of a project, spitting out talented, capable people left and right. Another "Apocalypse Now" in the making?
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BoKnowsMagic
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
Anthony Lane, rather than directly review the film adaptation of Great expectations (starring Ethan Hawke and Gwyneth Paltrow), reviewed the novelization of that film adaptation of the Dickens novel, which was of course very different from the Dickens novel. That's funny for the travesty it exposes, but think of the opportunity here for Rand.
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MissNormaDesmond promoted this comment BoKnowsMagic was starred BoKnowsMagic was unstarred

redribbon
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
One ingenious literary innovation of Rand's is that you know exactly how a character is going to turn out by the sound of his name, or by a description of his figure. As soon as pudgy little Bertram Scudder hits the scene, you can be certain he will eventually say something like, "You know, money is the root of all evil." At which point he gets totally ObjectivistPWND by Francisco's 18-page rebuttal. ("Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil?" etc. etc.)

So obviously, we can be sure that once printed word is translated into moving image, the end result will be about as thrilling as watching an inventory of your own spice cabinet taking place.
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Altaira
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
My high school theater class did a production of the Rand play "The Night of January Sixteenth." It is a formulaic choose-your-own-adventure/ courtroom drama /murder mystery. I played a prostitute with a very short skirt because my theater teacher was a perv.

That is what I always remember when anyone tells me what a great writer Rand was.
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Botswana Meat Commission FC
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
I had never seen "Boondock Saints", but my wife, who teaches college lit/writing kept telling me how much all her students loved that shit.

I should have known it would automatically suck when she told me college kids liked it.
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minou
07/21/09

@Botswana Meat Commission FC: Almost without fail, across all borders of gender, class, race, time, space, etc etc, my college comp students love this "Boondock Saints." They have tried to convince me to watch it, but I resist. Still all this adulation leaves me in a mild state of WTF. How is this film the "We are the World" of college freshmen?
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Pope John Peeps II
07/21/09

@minou: It's not. It's just an action movie. But it's an original action movie, with some freshness and humour, and it's well-executed.

Rent it some weekend. It's not bad. But it's only amazing to boys still impressed with fake ways of feeling manly.
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Botswana Meat Commission FC
07/21/09

@Pope John Peeps II:
Usually I'm all over interesting, well-executed action movies. My problem with B.S. had more to do with its philosophy. Just sort of a juvenile mess of bullshit...
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Pope John Peeps II
07/21/09

@Botswana Meat Commission FC: Yah, don't ever tell any male under the age of 24 that you've watched it.
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minou
07/22/09

@Pope John Peeps II: On your advice, maybe I will. I'm amazed at its power to unite my students, so I guess that means it might be worth checking out.
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minou
07/22/09

@Botswana Meat Commission FC: My sentiments exactly. But out of curiosity and the totally fucked-up desire to seem au courant to my students, maybe I'll check it out.
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Chris H
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
We're developing an Ayn Rand Deprogrammer at Denialism Blog: http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/2009/01/the_ayn_rand_deprogrammer_subm.php

Also, Paul Pickrel of Harper's wrote a divine review of Atlas when it was released: "...It makes life wonderfully simple, and in a way that is agreeable to many of us, probably to all of us at some moment in our lives: according to its argument there is no contradiction or strain between man's inner life and his social role, for unrestrained egoism solves all problems. In addition, Miss Rand is able to enlist some of the more disreputable human emotions--hatred, contempt, anger--in a pretty powerful way. Oddly enough, though I do not believe in her characters for a moment, I do believe in their wrath."
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TheHonJudgeSmails promoted this comment Chris H was starred Chris H was unstarred

TheHonJudgeSmails
07/21/09

@Chris H: Sweet, buddy.
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Unsolicited Advice
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
I'm up for this, and a sitcom based on Plato's Republic starring Bill O'Reilly as Thrasymachus and Fox News as the cave.
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RonMwangaguhunga
07/21/09

@Unsolicited Advice: Only if next up is a webisode of Meno featuring Sean Hannity as the slave boy.
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J. Frank Parnell
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
Let's take the unreadable, and make it unwatchable. Great. Idea.
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MissNormaDesmond promoted this comment Edited by J. Frank Parnell at 07/21/09 3:39 PM J. Frank Parnell was starred J. Frank Parnell was unstarred

hilikusopus
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
Trivia: John Galt Corporation was implicated in the fire at the Deutsche Bank downtown that resulted in the deaths of firefighters. Life imitating art imitating delusional world view of Ayn Rand?

"Public and private records give no indication of how many employees it has, what its volume of business is or who its clients are. There are almost no accounts of any projects it has undertaken on any scale, apart from 130 Liberty Street. Court records are largely silent. Some leading construction executives in the city say they have never even heard of it."

You can't make this stuff up. Well, you can, and it's just as liable as the real thing to end up as a miniseries on Lifetime.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/23/nyregion/23company.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
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MissNormaDesmond promoted this comment Edited by hilikusopus at 07/21/09 3:32 PM hilikusopus was starred hilikusopus was unstarred

onebadclam
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
Well, there goes my plan to marry Charlize Theron.
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Edited by onebadclam at 07/21/09 3:13 PM onebadclam was starred onebadclam was unstarred

kathotdog
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
How about Charlize Theron as Dabney Coleman as Francine M. Hart Jr. in a reversed role remake of 9 to 5. The three male secretaries will be played by Ryan Reynolds, Paul Rudd and Jason Seigel. I
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eleusiswalks
07/21/09

@kathotdog: I would watch this movie.
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MissNormaDesmond
07/21/09

@eleusiswalks: I'd watch it before I'd watch Atlas Shrugged, that's for sure.
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Edited by MissNormaDesmond at 07/21/09 10:44 PM MissNormaDesmond was starred MissNormaDesmond was unstarred

atlasfugged
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
Who the fuck is John Galt?!
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J. Frank Parnell
07/21/09

@atlasfugged: Probably Dean Cain.
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Edited by J. Frank Parnell at 07/21/09 3:41 PM J. Frank Parnell was starred J. Frank Parnell was unstarred

atlasfugged
07/21/09

@J. Frank Parnell: I was hoping Bobcat Goldthwait, so he could incomprehensibly scream, squeak and squeal Galt's 90 page soliloquy to the moochers. Him or a drunken Gary Busey. ::Sigh:: Oh well, who is John Galt ....
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MissNormaDesmond promoted this comment Edited by atlasfugged at 07/21/09 6:19 PM atlasfugged was starred atlasfugged was unstarred

MissNormaDesmond
07/21/09

@atlasfugged: I want a bumper sticker that says, "Who gives a shit who John Galt is?"
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atlasfugged
07/21/09

@MissNormaDesmond: I'll print up some on Cafe Press. We'll split the profits.
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MissNormaDesmond
07/22/09

@atlasfugged: Okay, seriously? We should make t-shirts, too. I would totally buy one.
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kneetoe
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
Never have "sex" and "climactic" been so dissatisfyingly placed in the same paragraph.
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MissNormaDesmond promoted this comment kneetoe was starred kneetoe was unstarred

RonMwangaguhunga
07/21/09

In reply to Atlas Shrugged Miniseries Will Bore the Motor of the World
Boy, they picked a damn fine type to film a hymn to ultracapitalism, no?

Maybe they should make it a comedy?
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