Disney's Next Hero: A Lion King of Kings (Hollywood Nervous About Christian Narnia)
Dr. Jai Maharaj
By David Kehr
New York Times
Sunday, February 20, 2005
AS the residents of Narnia like to whisper, "Aslan is on
the move." And so he is. But for the moment, Walt Disney
Pictures has him on a very short leash.
Aslan, a talking lion with mystical powers, is the
central figure in "The Chronicles of Narnia," the much-
beloved seven-volume series of fantasy novels written by
the British academic C. S. Lewis in the 1950's. By the
year's end, if Disney marketers have their way, he will
have joined Mickey Mouse, Pinocchio and Buzz Lightyear in
a long line of characters that have periodically provided
the Burbank giant with entertainment's most valuable
asset, a new fantasy to trade on.
This next wave begins with the expected release on Dec. 9
of "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the
Wardrobe," which combines live action and computer-
generated images in a movie adaptation of Lewis's epic.
Sequels may follow. But films are only the spearhead of a
corporate initiative that is likely to include a theme
park presence, toys, clothing, video games and whatever
other tchotchkes the infinitely resourceful Disney team
can devise. Having been criticized for failing to cash in
on the merchandising opportunities offered by 2003's
"Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl,"
Disney is preparing for the kind of all-encompassing
drive it hasn't mounted since 1994, when it turned "The
Lion King" into a pop cultural event that still
reverberates in its retail stores and on Broadway.
Company representatives, however, have little to say
publicly about the "Narnia" cycle, which is being
produced in partnership with the financier Philip
Anschutz's Walden Media. They cite a natural reticence
about promoting work that is still in progress: the
director Andrew Adamson, an animation specialist whose
only previous films are the computer-generated comic
fairy tales "Shrek" and "Shrek 2," is still behind his
digital console.
But this time, the pros at Disney are wrestling with a
special challenge: how to sell a screen hero who was
conceived as a forthright symbol of Jesus Christ, a
redeemer who is tortured and killed in place of a young
human sinner and who returns in a glorious resurrection
that transforms the snowy landscape of Narnia into a
verdant paradise.
That spirituality sets Aslan apart from most of the
Disney pantheon and presents the company with a
significant dilemma: whether to acknowledge the Christian
symbolism and risk alienating a large part of the
potential audience, or to play it down and possibly
offend the many Christians who count among the books' fan
base.
Disney executives say their aim is to capture the largest
possible audience by remaining true to Lewis's work.
"We're lucky that there are millions of devoted fans, who
probably cross four generations," said Dennis Rice, the
studio's senior vice president of publicity. "We want to
reach all of those devoted fans."
To do that, Mr. Rice said, the studio plans to reach out
to middle schools, boys' clubs, girls' clubs, fantasy
fans and, where appropriate, religious groups. Mr. Rice
said the company's message would be: "We are trying to
make this movie to be as faithful to the book as
possible. And if you connect to the book, we think you
will connect to the movie."
Peter Sealey, an adjunct professor of marketing at the
University of California, Berkeley, and a former
marketing executive for Coca-Cola and Columbia Pictures,
nonetheless described the project's combination of
religion and children's entertainment as "an absolute
time bomb in these days of extreme sensitivity."
Mr. Sealey's advice to Disney: "Either don't do it, or
come completely clean, like a 'Ten Commandments' or a
'Passion of the Christ.' It seems duplicitous just to
repress the religious aspects, and certainly they will
all come out in this age of the Internet and strident
voices on both the left and the right."
By contrast, Martin Kaplan, director of the Norman Lear
Center of the University of Southern California and a 12-
year veteran of the Disney Company, finds plenty of
precedent for mingling spiritual ideas and popular
entertainment.
"P. L. Travers, the author of the Mary Poppins books, was
actually a follower of the mystic G. I. Gurdjieff," Mr.
Kaplan said. "Her books were imbued by mysticism, the
idea that all is one and one is all. But the film became
a family drama in which domestic issues, the role of the
children and the prospect of the working world were the
themes, rather than the great chain of being or the
universality of humanity."
Of Lewis's work, Mr. Kaplan said: "There's enough story
and traditional emotion in the 'Narnia' books that they
can let the Christian mysticism in it either be a subtext
or not a part of it at all. I suspect you can portray
resurrection in the same way that E. T. comes back to
life, and that practically every fairy tale has a hero or
heroine who seems to be gone forever but nevertheless
manages to come back."
Still, Disney is already putting out feelers to the
religious audience. It has hired Motive Marketing, a
California public relations firm that specializes in
cultivating Christian audiences, to design and direct a
faith-based marketing and publicity campaign. The
company, founded by Paul Lauer, performed similar duties
for Newmarket Films on "The Passion of the Christ" and
for Warner Brothers on "The Polar Express." Motive
Marketing recently held a reception for some 30 members
of the faith-based press and educational organizations at
Disney's Burbank headquarters, where they were addressed
by Mr. Adamson and Oren Aviv, the president of Disney's
Buena Vista Pictures Marketing unit. According to a
report in the Feb. 12 issue of the Christian newsweekly
World, Mr. Aviv assured the gathering that "our goal is
to make sure that we make and market the movie so that it
has the same significance that the book has had."
If Disney manages to create a "Star Wars"-like,
generalized hero myth of Lewis's work without alienating
its Christian fans, the potential rewards are huge. "The
Chronicles of Narnia" represents one of the last
children's classics unexplored by cinema (though two
British television series and an animated film for
American television have been based on the material since
1967), and the books contain enough sweep, action and
imagination to compete with "The Lord of the Rings,"
which was written by Lewis's Oxford friend, J. R. R.
Tolkien.
Disney hopes at once to add another large cast of child-
friendly characters to its corporate stable, which
already includes the British imports Winnie the Pooh and
Mary Poppins, while capturing the older audience that
took New Line Cinema's recent "Lord of the Rings" trilogy
to a worldwide gross approaching $3 billion. As a
franchise, the possibilities of "Narnia" seem almost
unlimited. It's "Harry Potter" with intellectual
respectability and deep cultural roots.
But how Disney plans to wrestle the Lewis books into line
remains a closely held secret. There appear to be few
screenplays floating through the underground of Hollywood
assistants, where even the most highly protected projects
can usually be found, and Disney declined to make any of
the film's creative personnel available for interview.
Photographs from the New Zealand set, where principal
photography finished last month, haven't yet been
distributed to the media.
Instead, Disney is practicing a shrewd public relations
technique: the slow, carefully controlled release of
information. Web sites that serve the desired fan base
have been given rationed tidbits: representatives from
sites devoted to fantasy films and gaming were invited to
visit the New Zealand locations in October; four shots of
conceptual art were leaked to darkhorizons.com at the end
of November; and the ultimate fanboy site, aint-it-cool-
news.com, became the beneficiary of a short film in which
Richard Taylor, who's overseeing "Narnia's" special
effects, shows off some of the creature models and
costumes that have been developed.
From these fragmentary sources, it's possible to glean a
few facts. Though the project is being directed by Mr.
Adamson, a computer animation expert, for instance, the
"Narnia" adventures will be filmed largely with human
actors (including Tilda Swinton, a critics' favorite, as
Lewis's temptress figure, the White Witch, and the
professionally affable Jim Broadbent as the children's
eccentric guardian). Some characters, like the faun Mr.
Tumnus, will be played by human actors (James McAvoy, in
Tumnus's case), equipped with computer-animated limbs.
Aslan, who will speak in the trained theatrical voice of
Brian Cox, will be a wholly computer-generated creation,
as will Mr. and Mrs. Beaver (with the voices of Ray
Winstone and Dawn French).
And judging from the concept art, Mr. Adamson will be
creating a world far, far from the sunny storybook
kingdom of the "Shrek" films. The London Blitz, which
drives the four children of the Pevensie family to seek
refuge in the country, will be portrayed in explosively
realistic terms. A painting of a battle scene grimly
suggests the violent combat of the "Lord of the Rings"
series, with supernatural and human figures brought
together in a teeming, epic landscape. And in his short
film, the effects supervisor Mr. Taylor shows off a
number of realistic, or perhaps just plain real, weapons,
including a sword that figures prominently in the film's
title treatment and looks as if it could do some serious
damage. (Mr. Taylor is affiliated with Weta Workshop, the
New Zealand special-effects house that also created the
props and costumes for "The Lord of the Rings.")
Based on the available material, Disney seems to be going
for a strict "sword and sorcery" look, as the genre is
known to its fans: dark, muddy, full of clanking metal
and grunting extras. Though the climactic battle scene
occupies only a page and a half of Lewis's original text
for "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," it seems
certain to figure much more strongly in the film. This
looks like Disney's way of appeasing the teenage sword
and sorcery fans, who have a large, well-organized
presence on the Internet and whose early support of the
project is crucial.
The next wave of leaks will probably offer glimpses of
the film's more childlike, whimsical side, Disney's
traditional strengths. Expect concept art of the fauns,
the beavers and the other more cuddly creatures to start
emerging in the next few months as a way of inviting
younger children and their parents into the film. Disney
will almost certainly have to increase the cute quotient
of these creations, who are barely characterized in
Lewis's narration. This is where Disney's pre-eminent
stable of animators will go to work, forging fuzzy
creatures that will project vivid, embraceable characters
in the film, and lend themselves to easy modeling for the
toy manufacturers.
But will that merchandise be palatable if it comes with
religious connotations? As a publicly held company that
must appeal to the widest possible market, Disney does
not want to take a side in the culture wars, as it
demonstrated when it declined to distribute Michael
Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11." Indeed, Disney's privileged
position in American culture is due in large part to the
apolitical image of innocence and cheerful naďveté that
the company has cultivated since Uncle Walt was in
charge. To seem to endorse one religious or political
opinion over another, as Mr. Sealey of Berkeley said,
would be to risk returning the Disney brand to the
routine contentiousness of the everyday adult world.
HarperCollins, the American publisher of the "Narnia"
books, stepped into just such a controversy in 2001 when
a memorandum from an executive with the its
HarperSanFrancisco imprint surfaced with the assertion
that "we'll need to be able to give emphatic assurances
that no attempt will be made to correlate the stories to
Christian imagery/theology." As reported by Doreen
Carvajal in The New York Times on June 3, 2001, the
memorandum was part of HarperCollins's successful effort
to squelch a documentary and teaching aid about Lewis
being developed for the publisher's Christian division,
Zondervan Publishing House. A HarperCollins spokeswoman,
Lisa Herling, responded then, "The goal of HarperCollins
is to publish the work of C. S. Lewis to the broadest
possible audience and leave any interpretation of the
works to the reader."
Indeed, in HarperCollins's recently published adult
edition of the novels, with all seven united in a single
volume of biblical (or at least "Harry Potter")
proportions, there are no references to Lewis's deep and
celebrated religious beliefs. The only supplementary
material is a brief essay by Lewis on the art of writing
for children.
But at the same time, "Mere Christianity," a compilation
of Lewis's wartime radio talks on his Christian faith,
remains a successful title for HarperSanFrancisco,
catching up with the "Narnia" books on Amazon.com. And
there are a number of Christian-oriented guides to the
"Narnia" series in print, including "A Family Guide to
Narnia: Biblical Truths in C. S. Lewis' 'The Chronicles
of Narnia' " by Christin Ditchfield, a syndicated
Christian radio host.
If Disney is tempted to tap the growing power of the
Christian market, it will almost certainly receive a warm
welcome. "The 'Narnia' books are very well loved in
evangelical households," said Mark Moring, the managing
editor of christianitytodaymovies.com, an online film
guide offshoot of the evangelical magazine Christianity
Today. "Just about everyone I know at work and at church
read these books as children, and now they're reading
them to their children. They are definitely on the A-
list."
Mr. Moring finds the prospect of a "Narnia" stripped of
its Christian dimension "a dumb thing to do. It would be
self-defeating."
But the company will probably proceed gingerly. Look for,
at most, study guides to be prepared for Sunday school
classes, local discussion groups to be organized and
blocks of tickets to be offered to churches at a discount
(a technique that figured heavily in the box-office
triumph of "The Passion of the Christ"). Those who want
to see Aslan as a Jesus figure or the White Witch as his
satanic opponent will find little to encourage or
discourage their interpretation, even though that
interpretation was its author's own.
"They're seeing it from 10,000 feet, from which the
religious themes are no longer specific to Christianity,
but part of the great Joseph Campbell tradition of
universal myth," Mr. Kaplan, of the Lear Center, said of
"Narnia's" new caretakers. "When you get to that level,
it's broadly acceptable to the public."
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/20/movies/20kehr.html?oref=login
- - - - - - -
Posted on 2/21/2005 12:43:10 AM PST by nickcarraway
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
End of forwarded message
Jai Maharaj
http://www.mantra.com/jai
Om Shanti
Hindu Holocaust Museum
http://www.mantra.com/holocaust
Hindu life, principles, spirituality and philosophy
http://www.hindu.org
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The truth about Islam and Muslims
http://www.flex.com/~jai/satyamevajayate
The terrorist mission of Jesus stated in the Christian bible:
"Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not so send
peace, but a sword.
"For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the
daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in
law.
"And a man's foes shall be they of his own household.
- Matthew 10:34-36.
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Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
Hollywood should relax. Disney will find a way to screw
this up.
Posted on 2/21/2005 12:44:22 AM PST by DoughtyOne
(US socialist liberalism would be dead without the help
of politicians who claim to be conservative.)
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: DoughtyOne
They would be stupid to not advertise this movie, I've
seen ad campaigns almost designed to cause a flop... if
they did this movie right it would one of those films
that never dies.
Posted on 2/21/2005 12:47:14 AM PST by GeronL
(Bush on the PRESS "They just float sewer out there.")
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: DoughtyOne
It would also be a cash cow for many years.
IF and only IF they do this right.
Posted on 2/21/2005 12:47:46 AM PST by GeronL
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: GeronL
I agree
Posted on 2/21/2005 12:55:53 AM PST by DoughtyOne
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
Disney doesn't even have a clue. They do indeed tiptoe
around the perceived objective; those stupid Christians
out there that can buy a lot of tickets if you can just
stir up 'em enough.
And the Disney people don't even realize how stupid they
look. Walt Disney understood, but his time has passed and
his dream is no more.
Posted on 2/21/2005 12:59:43 AM PST by xJones
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
Ain't nothing like the smell of Holyweird hypocracy in
the morning. How to promote Christian allegory by lopping
off the Christianity and still squeeze every penny
possible from the Christian right. The Chronicles have
possibility to outperform any Disney release in recent
history and as usual the bean counters want it both ways.
Nothing every changes in Hollywood the only altar worshiped
there is Mammon.
Posted on 2/21/2005 1:00:54 AM PST by MKM1960
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
> Mr. Sealey's advice to Disney: "Either don't do it, or
> come completely clean, like a 'Ten Commandments' or a
> 'Passion of the Christ.' It seems duplicitous just to
> repress the religious aspects
Good advice.
I went to the website and it seems they will focus most
heavily on the fantasy and "mythological" elements rather
than any spirituality. The brief bio on Lewis doesn't
even mention his huge influence in the realm of Christian
apologetics.
Posted on 2/21/2005 1:03:38 AM PST by k2blader
(It is neither compassionate nor conservative to
support the expansion of socialism.)
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
"To do that, Mr. Rice said, the studio plans to reach out
to middle schools, boys' clubs, girls' clubs, fantasy
fans and, where appropriate, religious groups. Mr. Rice
said the company's message would be: "We are trying to
make this movie to be as faithful to the book as
possible. And if you connect to the book, we think you
will connect to the movie."
Did anyone see Fox's John Gibson's piece on Hollywood and
America last night? It was great and did a good job of
portraying the hedonistic Hollywood hatred of
Christianity and traditional values. One of the facts
brought out was concerning the rewriting of great movies
to eliminate conservative values or to promote the
Hollywood political world-view. Also, they censor and
rewrite books to do the same. Why change anything about
the Narnia books? Float out there the accurate work of C.
S. Lewis which has been so popular in book form and let's
see what happens. I would say it will be great for the
producer not willing to distort and change in order to
serve his own values. One of the problems for producers
of the more conservative movies is that the Hollywood
crowd punishes anyone who produces anything outside the
prevailing hedonistic value system. They socially banish
them from the community and they do everything they can
to isolate and punish them. What horrible, horrible
people. I have very liberal friends whom I love dearly
and though we disagree mightily on many political, moral
and religious issues, I would never reach out to try and
take away their livelihood or the peace and hospitality
they enjoy in the neighborhood. Gibson did a great job on
that piece last night. America needs to know about this
calloused, cruel and out of touch community.
Posted on 2/21/2005 1:29:24 AM PST by jazzlite (esat)
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: Pride in the USA
Ping for lots of detail about the Chronicles of Narnia
film and the controversy it's destined to create.
Posted on 2/21/2005 1:05:30 AM PST by lonevoice
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
Since this is Disney, Aslan will be portrayed as a gay,
Eskimo, transvestite lion.
Posted on 2/21/2005 1:34:13 AM PST by LdSentinal
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: LdSentinal
LOL! IMO Disney would do well to remember that Aslan is
not a tame lion!
Posted on 2/21/2005 1:42:46 AM PST by maryz
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: DoughtyOne
Ditto, Eisner's cronies will find some way to butcher
this film.
Posted on 2/21/2005 2:28:43 AM PST by Caipirabob
(Democrats.. Socialists..Commies..Traitors...Who can
tell the difference?)
Dr. Jai Maharaj
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: DoughtyOne
Aslan will be gay and have a tempestuous relationship
with the Reepicheep
/removes Carnak's hat.
Posted on 2/21/2005 2:35:44 AM PST by Dr.Zoidberg
(Children classics updated for Islam, "Allah loves me
this I know, For the Koran tells me to explode")
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: Dr.Zoidberg; Caipirabob
I hear you guys. We're probably right, but let's hope for
the best.
Posted on 2/21/2005 2:38:45 AM PST by DoughtyOne
Scream Machine
Christian cultural story a couple months ago.
Jewish hollywood will be sure to screw Christianity yet again.
Typically, jewish-run studios and directors will de-Christianize stories and
remove any reference to Jesus Christ. I guess it's their intolerance to
other religions.
Disney (run by jews) shouldn't be allowed to whore and profit from Christian
culture. They have already bastardized and subverted enough culture as it
is.
The late Walt Disney founded Disney and was a Christian. It fell into jewish
hands in the 1980's and has remained in jewish hands since then. I'm sure
he's just rolling in his grave.
"Dr. Jai Maharaj" <use...@mantra.com> wrote in message
news:QAeLO7314AvEbu@LxaOa...
> apolitical image of innocence and cheerful naïveté that
Dr. Jai Maharaj
[ From: Dr. Jai Maharaj
[ Date: August 3, 2003
Yehudi-Hindu Bhai Bhai (Jews and Hindus are Brothers)
By Ranbir Singh, UK
The Sword of Truth - Issue No. 1999.52
December 25, 1999
"Besides all this, the servants of Huram and Solomon,
who had brought gold from Ophir, brought also cargoes
of algum wood and precious stones . . . The like of
them had never before been seen in the land of Judah.
. . . The king had a fleet of ships plying to Tarshish
with Hurram's men; once every three years this fleet
of merchantmen came home, bringing gold and silver,
ivory, apes, and monkeys." (2 Chronicles 8,9, New
English Bible, The Bible Societies, 1970, pp.324-5)
The above Passage from the Old Testemant refers to
'Ophir'. This mysterious land has been identified by some
scholars as Bharat itself. The Solomon in the above
extract was King of Israel, of the Jews. Like the Hindus,
Jews are an ancient people, and with the above passage,
the relations between the two are very old indeed. The
far-sighted observer might then bemoan how this has not
been utilised to the mutual benefit of both.
New geo-political alliances form in the post Cold War
world as one enters the new millennium. It has taken over
50 years for the Indian government to realise who its
true allies are, as it gains a raj which is reflective of
its majority community, in harmony with its indigenous
traditions, and lack the rootlessness so common of
Congress raj. In 1947, the battle of Kurukshetra was
truly lost when the Kaurava Congressiya of Nehru and
Indira Khan, Rajiv Khan reduced the sacred Punyabhoomi to
further oblivion. Nehru's Panchsheel made Bharat an
unwanted prostitute to the imperialistic designs of
Communist China; entirely fitting to Jawaharal's own
family background but not to Bharat. Indira and Rajiv
Khan mafia crawled like rats to the USSR. Their seduction
by Islam was no less, not entirely surprising as they
flitted from one totalitarian ideology to another. It was
against this political backdrop that they alienated what
could have been Bharat's most supportive ally, Israel.
Indeed the parallel struggles for self-determination by
the Jews and Hindus has been largely ignored. The
domination of India' institutions and organs of education
by a motley collection of Marxists, Islamists,
Macaulites, pseudo-Dalits, and Christians has led not
only to Hinduphobic indoctrination of anyone who aspired
to be intellectual or just plain informed, but a streak
of anti-Semitism in a land where it had no place.
Anti-Semitism and its sister hate of anti-Zionism has
become part of India's pseudo-secular and Hinduphobic
political mainstream. The pre-BJP raj tried hard to show
its solidarity with the Islamic and Communist nations by
a strong anti-Israel stance, in the name of anti-
colonialism and Third World solidarity. Had the
philosophy which manifested itself during the early days
of Hindu and Indian nationalism (as readers will know the
two are harmonised, Gandhism now consigned to the dung
heap) triumphed this would not have been so.
Veer Savarkar, ideologue of Hindutva, saw the Jews as
allies in a common struggle. In his famous Hindutva of
1923, he wrote:
"if the Zionists' dreams were realised, if Palestine
became a Jewish State, it would gladden us almost as
much as our Jewish friends."
Savarkar had been pro-Zionist since 1908 and remained so
as Bharat's betrayers went in the opposite direction. In
1952, Savarkar looked to the Jews an example for the
Hindu to emulate if they wished to be a modern nation:
"Even a tiny state like Israel has sensibly started
developing fish field and sand fruits and because of
that they are able to meet the needs of the countless
immigrants who would have otherwise half-starved. The
Jews are a brave and intelligent people. And although
their State looks like a child before our great state
of Bharat we must emulate its example."
In the post-1947 years Savarker denounced Comrade Nehru's
refusal to recognise Israel, saying quite frankly that he
feared that it would invite the very Muslim opposition
which he was so eager to please. In February 1956 at the
annual session of the Hindu Mahasabha in Jodhpur, he was
clear that this was a suicidal course:
". . . if tomorrow there breaks out a war between
Pakistan and Bharat almost all Muslims will be arrayed
on the side of Pakistan in opposition to us and their
enemy Israel will be our only friend. Therefore I say
that Bharat should give unequivocal recognition to
Israel. If we desire to safeguard the independence of
Bharat we should be militarily strong."
But the fascination with Islam and Communism held by the
Congress raj would never allow for such practical
thinking. Indeed in the name of anti-colonialism, anti-
Israel sentiment became an article of faith, supporting
the PLO terrorists an act of proof of this desire to
shake off the colonial shackles. Yet how did this Non-
Aligned Movement benefit Bharat? Until the BJP victory
India remained a nation ridiculed by others as weak, the
easy punching bag of others' frustrations. Hindus the
world over, self-alienated, eager to please others at how
stupid and backward they regarded their cultural roots.
Anti-Semitism meanwhile seeped into India's political
structure. Islam from the outset has been anti-Semitic,
as the Prophet's own genocide of Jewish tribes of Arabia
attests. That is why Anwar Shaikh is keen to point out
that such an example of extreme nationalism was not
witnessed so early elsewhere. With the pro-Islamic stance
of Hinduphobic groups claiming to speak for Dalits, such
as that led by Rajashekhar, anti-Semitism and belief in a
global Jewish plot were parcel of the ideological baggage
(this has been reviewed by Koenraad Elst in Indigenous
Indians from Voice of India).
The Communist influence on India's institutions was also
a factor, and not just in the anti-Isreali stance. Marx,
though born Jewish, was ashamed of his Jewish origins:
like many latter day Hindu pseudo-intellectuals of JNU
who also shout about how they are just Hindus by birth,
accident, or some other unnatural freak. This factor and
because many Jews joined the Communist movements in
Europe and North America, as well the self-righteous
stance taken by Reds in opposing Fascism, has given the
opinion that Communists were anti-Zionist and not anti-
Semitic per se. Yet a deeper investigation would reveal
that many Jewish Communist leaders in USSR were
liquidated by Stalin, Trotsky being the most notorious
case. The 'liberation' of Nazi Europe by Communists in
1945 brought no respite from anti-Semitism. Keen to play
friends to Arab nations, who remained Islamic to the core
however lax such as Syria, Egypt, Libya and Algeria, and
incensed at Israel's pro-Western stance, the Warsaw Pact
nations fuelled hatred of Jews under the guise of anti-
Zionism. Eastern Europe was also the heir to virulent
anti-Jewish hatred which remained under anti-Zionism, and
almost erupted into a mass pogrom in USSR in 1953 had it
not been for Stalin's death (the infamous Doctor's Plot).
Communism, being born in reaction to Christian dogma,
nevertheless imported its erstwhile foe's (and mother's)
sinister baggage, with anti-Semitism against Jewish
capitalism, Israeli imperialism, rootless Cosmopolitanism
(Judaism), and Zionist world domination.
Yet Bharat's indigenous philosophy was not suppressed,
which is why anti-Semitism never could gain mass
acceptance. Web site articles by Sudheer Birodkar
http://www.hindunet.org/hindu_history/sudheer_history/judaism.htm
will attest to the fact that in a 2000 year presence in
Bharat, Jews never suffered anti-Semitism at Hindu hands.
Such intolerance was an anathema to the Hindu mind. In
1981, RSS Sarsanghachalak, Balasaheb Deoras made this
clear when discussing the once large Jewish community of
Kerela:
"In a book published by the Israeli Consulate in
Bombay [now Mumbai] . . . it says that the Jews were
ill-treated and subjected to all sorts of humiliations
all over the world, the only example being Bharat and
that during their long sojourn in Bharat, there was
not even one single instance of their persecution."
The Jews left India to help build the fledgling state of
Israel, not because of persecution. Israel showed a
marked contrast to India in its dealings with hostile
neighbours. Attacked on its very inception by the Arabs
in 1948, it routed them. While in 1965 and 1971 Bharat
sought peace with Pakistan following two wars instigated
by the latter, Israel not only defeated the Arabs in 1967
and 1973, but also annexed territory for itself. In a
very short space of time, Jewish pioneers transformed a
land of desert into the most prosperous and advanced
nation in the Middle East. It is the only viable
democracy in that region, with a diverse society in stark
contrast to the dull, monotonous, corrupt and
totalitarian regimes of its Islamic neighbours.
The Jews and Hindus have been victims of the dogmatic
totalitarianism which has stalked the earth for two
millennia. Born from Judaism, Christianity nevertheless
was opposed to it, as the Jews remained steadfast to
their ancient beliefs. The conversion of the Roman Empire
was a negative factor for the Jews as the now state
sponsored Church began the anti-Semitism which became an
integral part of its belief whilst stealing many Jewish
cultural aspects. It was this hatred which could not be
suppressed by the Reformation in the 1500s which led to
Protestantism, the Enlightenment in the 1700s which had
rationalism, nor by the emergence of Communism in the
19th century. Fascism and Nazism as the most extreme
forms of nationalism naturally saw Jews as an unwanted
alien presence in a secularised religion in which race
and nation were the pseudo-spiritual pillars. The modern
Christian rejection of overt anti-Semitism does not his
the fact that it is a monstrous being of its own
creation. Pastor Martin Niemoller, imprisoned by Hiler
for opposing the persecution of Jews, as in many ways an
exception. The Roman Catholic Church, especially in
Croatia and Poland was an eager participant in Nazi
atrocities. This was revived following the collapse of
Communism in 1989, most evidently with Pamyat in Russia
which inherits its Judeophobia from the Russian Orthodox
Church itself.
The advent of Islam brought no respite for the Jews.
Indeed it made things worse. Ibn Warraq (Why I am Not a
Muslim, 1995) as well as Anwar Shaikh have exploded the
myth of Islamic tolerance. Christianity after all was the
heir to an earlier age of humanism and rationalism found
in Greek philosophy. It had a possibility of reforming
itself. Though often credited with laying the foundations
of modern democratic traditions, Christianity did the
opoosite. Western democracy is the heir of pre-Christian
'pagan' ideas, the philosophy of ancient Greece, the
glory of Hellas. It was Western Fascism and Communism
which were ejected from the loins of Christianity.
Abba Eban, a great authority on Jewish history and one
who has yielded immense service to Israel, nevertheless
continues with the myth of Jewish prosperity under Islam.
Even a scholar such as Robert Wistricht (AntiSemitism,
The Longest hatred, 1991), who by no means ignores
Islamic Judeophobia, tries to explain it away. Bat Y'eor
is one of the few who does not. Islamic history is not as
clear and reliable as one would be led to believe. The
Quran is full of contradictions, grammatical errors, even
non-Arabic words. To rely on the Hadith is no better as
contradictory accounts occur of the same event. But if
one relies upon the Islamic traditions then it is clear
that Islam was anti-Semitic form the outset. Muhammad's
massacre of Medina's Jews could in no way set an example
for Islamic tolerance. The Prophet stole Jewish ideas,
and claimed them as his own, mixing them with aspects of
Arab 'paganism', and pure unabashed egotism. It is
amazing how this has gone unnoticed and how one is
brainwashed into the myth of Islamic tolerance, as
opposed to Israeli aggression. The Quran, Hadith and
numerous fatwas since all show that Islamic ideology is
replete with anti-Semitic manure of the vilest type.
But the Jews did not just come to Israel from the west.
They were not just the idealistic pioneers from USA, the
survivors of the death camps such as Treblinka, nor the
victims of the sickening 1946 pogrom in Poland. Many came
from Arab lands, the Sephardi Jews, where they had
suffered relentless persecution. It was the coming of the
French to the Maghrib and British to Egypt which gave
greater political rights to these Jewish minorities, even
though these nations were by no means innocent: France
had its own Dreyfus Affair of 1897, endemic anti-Jewish
paramiltary outfits in the 1930s, Vichy pro-Nazi
collaboration, and more recently the largest post-war
Fascist party; Britain's more polite society confined
overt anti-Semitism to Mosley's Blackshirts and the
qualgmire of the post-1945 far right. The rise of anti-
French nationalism in Algeria also had anti-Semitic
overtones. By 1962, most Jews had been driven from
Algeria. Nasser, Egypt's strongman and apparent leader
against Western colonialism, imperialism and racism,
expelled all Jews from Egypt. Israel had all Yemeni Jews
evacuated. Saudi Arabia to this day refuses entry to
Jews. Pogroms, distinctive clothing (preceding the Star
of David worn by Jews in Nazi Europe), degradation, were
as much of the lives of Jews in dar'ul Islam as they were
in Christian Europe. Unlike in Europe, there was no
Reformation, no Enlightenment, no parallel to the French
Revolution. So there was no Emancipation.
In short Jews suffered anti-Semitism in Islamic lands
which was not due to any importations from the west such
as that which led to the rise of modern Arab nationalism.
No doubt that helped but the elements were already in
existence. In no Islamic country were Jews accorded
respect. When Israel was formed, they saw the opportunity
of liberation and left. Some had already chosen the path
of exit. Prominent UK commercial success stories of
Sassoon and Saatchi, are in fact of Iraqi Jewish origin.
The opposition to Israel by Arab and Muslim nations must
be understood in this context. The only exception is
Turkey, and that because Islam was uprooted by Ataturk in
1924. If it was merely a local issue, then why would
Pakistan, Malaysia, Bangladesh, and Indonesia all be so
concerned to bray Judeophobia like an ass. Pakistan and
Bangladesh may wish to court Arab petrodollar, but
Malaysia and Indonesia have had comparative prosperity.
It is due to Islam. It is Islam which has led to the
anti-Israeli sentiment of these nations, and the
statement in 1998 by Mahathir Mohamed of Malaysia that
the East Asian economic crisis was due to the Jews.
Therefore the crisis facing Israel must be seen in the
ideological context. The problem is not Arabs or even
Muslims, but Islamic ideology. Before Islam, Jews had
found shelter with the Arabs. They had prospered in
Medina and elsewhere. In an earlier article, Koenraad
Elst had reviewed David Duke's chapter on India in his
1999 My Awakeining. Duke devotes a large part of his book
on Jewish arrogance, racism, and domination of the media.
He puts the blame of anti-Semitsm on the Jews themselves,
for their chauvanism towards host populations. Yet this
cannot explain why they lived peacefully for 2000 years
in Bharat. The roots of anti-Semitism lie not with the
Jews but the dogmatic ideologies which have twisted and
stolen ideas from their victims: Christianty, Islam,
Communism, Nazism. Even in Ethiopia, one of the earliest
victims to be swallowed by Christian dogma, the Falashas
(Ethiopian Jews) could not escape the shadow of
persecution. The scenario of Arabia is perhaps the best
example. In the pre-Islam period, Arabia, as explained by
Aditi Chaturvedi, was a Hindu Rashtr, which was why the
Jews enjoyed the same tolerance their co-religionists in
India. This changed with Muhammad. There was no evident
change in Jewish thinking or habits, nor a mass change in
the Arab genotype (just to please Duke, who seems
obsessed with genotype, a more sophisticated word for
race he utilises, in his aspirations to be taken
seriously as an intellectual, and perhaps one day as a
normal human being). The only quantifiable metamorphosis
was ideological, that of Islamic ideology, which
introduced anti-Semitism to the formerly civilised an
tolerant Arabs. Israel has failed to take this into
account. It has seen the opposition in a purely political
context. This explains why it has fallen for the trap of
trying to make peace with its Islamic neighbours in the
hope that it will not be a pariah.
One can thus express surprise since the Jews have learnt
much from their history and turned their misfortune into
something positive. Yet this is due to the west's own
fascination with Islam, as a parallel civilisation,
another wonder of human creation. Jewish groups such as
JDL (Jewish Defence League, www.jdl.org ) and Kach, who
take their ideology from the late Rabbi Kahane, are
condemned as extremist or even Nazi. One would hope that
Israel would learn from its treatment at the hands of
Islam as well as the west. A new nexus of Islamists and
Nazis is forming, not content with what Hitler had
committed. Ahmed Rami's site of Radio Islam has long been
the centre of anti-Semitic propaganda, linked to the
sites of white Nazis who would if true to their ideology
expel or even gas this Arab 'wog'. Yet the Nazi-Islamic
alliance is nothing new. Jinnah himself said that India's
Muslims should act like Sudenten Germans, who were trying
in the 1930s to secede from Czechoslovakia. Many ex-Nazis
such as Remer found sanctuary in the Middle East. The
Mufti of Jerusalem was openly supportive of Hilter.
Arabic translation s of Hitler's Mein Kampf have remained
popular in the Middle East, even distributed to soldiers
on the eve of the 1967 Six Day War, by 'socialist' Egypt.
It was that country's later president, the dark-
complexioned Anwar Sadat who had been an admirer of
Hitler (one wonders if Sadat ever heard of Hitler's
reaction to Jesse Owen's victory in the 1936 Olympics)
Saudi Arabia's King Faisal funded Holocaust denial
'research', and encouraged the UK to expel its Jews. In
Kuwait and Saudi the two worst things that one can import
are pictures of scantily clad women (they have to wait
until they reach the Islamic heaven before enjoying those
sort of sights) and an atlas with Israel on it (which is
promptly scrubbed off the map). In UK Islamic groups
Hizb-ut Tahrir and Omar Bakri's new outfit, Al Muhajiroun
have wreaked anti-Jewish (and anti-Hindu) violence on
college campuses, causing the National Union of Students
to establish Campuswatch against such hate groups. So it
is not surprising when one finds David Duke featured on
Radio Islam's self- righteous 'anti-racist' and anti-
Zionist website:
http://www.radioislam.net/duke/index.htm
Hindus should thus recognise that Israel can be one of
its few reliable allies. From Israel Bharat has much to
learn. Instead of peace treaties it should have followed
the Jewish state'' example in annexing the lands of the
aggressor. Pakistan is eager for war again. This time it
will be different if Hindus follow the Israeli example.
The jawans should carry the saffron into Lahore, which is
the natural capital of East Punjab and the city of Lav.
How could Lahore become a city of Islam any more than
Jerusalem? These are just two of the examples of Islam's
theft of the cultural icons of others. If Pakistanis want
to be Arabs they should be sent forth to their imaginary
homeland where they can do the jobs the Arab sheikhs have
reserved for them: mercenaries, prostitutes, menial
workers, nannies, attendants wiping the faeces from the
expensive porcelain toilets of the sheikhs. Islamic
fascists see Bharat as the soft spot to propagate their
irrational creed and foment violence. India tries to
placate them. Israel expels them, This is what Bharat
should do. If they hate Hindu Rashtr so much they are
free to leave for dar'ul Islam.
Bharat can also learn in the economic sphere. Israel was
pioneered via its kibbutzim system, which transformed
desert into lush agricultural land. The opportunity is
there for closer collaboration in both economic and
political spheres. Israeli expertise can contribute into
alleviating some of Bharat's obstacles to becoming an
advanced nation. Military expertise will show how one
survives, thrives, and even turns the tables on its
aggressors. They also retain the memory of their
Holocaust. We Hindus do not, to our eternal shame, even
though it continues unabated in Pakistan, Bangladesh,
Afghanistan, and Assam.
From Bharat Israel can also envisage what would happen
should it fall victim to complacency. It can ill afford
to have an Islamic monster in the form of a Palestinian
state on its borders. It can also ill afford to have its
most sacred shrine usurped by Islam. Just as Babri Masjid
hijacked the site of Rama Janmabhoomi, the al-Aqsa, Dome
of the Rock, sits like a parasite on the Temple Mount. In
Israel as in Bharat, Islam has hijacked 'pagan' shrines
for its own purpose, its own imperialist stamp of victory
on the sub-human 'kaffirs' Jewish as well as Hindu
shrines have been victims of this Islamic colonialism.
Worse than the Iron Curtain of the Cold War, an Iron
Purdah has descended from Kashmir to Karchi in the east,
from Senegal to Sudan in the south, and advances
elsewhere. Bharat and Israel are holding back this Purdah
and Green Menace, but have thus far made inefficient use
of their resources. The Jews and Hindus are two ancient
nations, survivals from a more enlightened era which we
are hopefully once again entering as the new millennium
dawns, and dogmatic ideologies are shelved by intelligent
people. They have faced common enemies, being victims of
the aforementioned dogmas: the religious dogma of
Christianity, the colonialist Orwellianism of Islam, the
pseudo-rationalism of Marxism, and the racial
fundamentalism of Nazism. Presently they face two
challenges. One is from a resurgent Nazism, presented by
figures such as David Duke (www.duke.org) in North
America, and Le Pen and Haider in Europe. Yet the most
pressing danger is Islam, which aims at the conversion or
physical liquidation of Jews and Hindus, and with that
Israel and Bharat.
The arrival of a Hindu led government in Bharat should be
an advent in rejecting earlier myopic political actions.
If any people are the true brothers of the Hindus, it is
the Jews. If any nation is the true ally of Bharat it is
Israel. Let all Jews and Hindus who have the vision for
the new millennium work closer together to achieve the
liberation of their respective peoples from the shackles
of anti-human dogmas.
Israel is Yehudi Rashtr, as Bharat is Hindu Rashtr.
Refrences:
2 Chronicles 8,9, New English Bible, The Bible Societies,
1970, pp.324-5
Dhanajay Keer, Veer Savarkar, Popular Prakashan Private Ltd,
1988, Bombay, p.467.
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, RSS: A Force for Social Change,
Jagarana Prakashana Kempegowda Nagar, 1981, Bangalore, pp.7-8
Source -
http://www.swordoftruth.com/swordoftruth/archives/readersvoice/yhbb.html
Jai Maharaj
http://www.mantra.com/jai
Om Shanti
Panchaang for 6 Shravan 5104, Sunday, August 3, 2003:
Shubhanu Nama Samvatsare Dakshinaya Nartana Ritau
Kark Mase Shukl Pakshe Bhanu Vasara Yuktayam
Chitra Nakshatr Sadhya Yog
Taitil-Gar Karan Shasthi-Saptami Yam Tithau
Hindu Holocaust Museum
http://www.mantra.com/holocaust
Hindu life, principles, spirituality and philosophy
http://www.hindu.org
http://www.hindunet.org
The truth about Islam and Muslims
http://www.flex.com/~jai/satyamevajayate
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are not necessarily those of the poster.
In article <vXCSd.467663$Xk.121484@pd7tw3no>,
"Scream Machine" <FuckMas...@snotmail.com> posted:
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: DoughtyOne
I would love to see an honest effort made to bring Narnia
to life. Could Disney pull it off, certainly. Will they?
Your guess is a good as mine.
Here's to hope.
Posted on 2/21/2005 2:46:31 AM PST by Dr.Zoidberg
(Children classics updated for Islam, "Allah loves me
this I know, For the Koran tells me to explode")
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Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
In my senior year of High School, I had the honour and
the challenge of taking up the role of Aslan the lion,
our mainstage winter production. The drama director was a
dedicated Christian man - an elder of the church I
attended - and he wanted me for the role before the
school year ever started, I later discovered.
The message of Lewis' splendid tale was played to the
hilt - Christianity unobscured - a soundtrack for the
production provided by the Evangelical Christian pop
vocal group "2nd Chapter of Acts" in their 'concept
album' "The Roar of Love".
During the scene when I (as Aslan the Lion) was put to
death by the witch on the great stone table, a plywood
crafted "stone table" was rigged with fast release 'pop-
hinges', and zig-zag cut across the middle. A slot was
carved in the table to accommodate the blade of a medium-
length sword (rather than just the modest knife specified
in the book) which would fit into the hollow of my
underarm thus appearing to have been thrust into my
chest.
Here is why: Once the sword was plunged "into" Aslan's
torso, all the stage lights went totally dark, and an
opaque scrim curtain dropped in front of the platform the
"stone table" rested upon.
Next, a baby spotlight was flipped on from behind the
platform, and trained upon the hilt of the sword; the
light began as a pale greenish colour, but a red gel was
then fade-switched in.
The resulting image cast the shadow of the Cross (the
sword hilt) surrounded in blood-red light onto the scrim
curtain for all in the audience to plainly see.
A circle of red light fully 25 to 30 inches in diameter
surrounded the "Cross" - visible all the way to the back
rows of a 800+ seat auditorium. In every performance,
this was followed by an audible gasp from the audience.
In high school theatre, it is usually axiomatic that a
passable musical production (Guys and Dolls, Westside
Story, South Pacific, Oliver) is the surest ticket, the
best possible moneymaker for the drama department.
This play obliterated that concept outright. We sold out
every scheduled performance in advance, and were
compelled to work in a half-dozen more matinees, and
three extra evening showings. All of them sold out as
well, and we still had people turned away at the door.
People were calling the school (in Oregon) from out of
state (Washington, Idaho, N. Calif.) wanting tickets,
they were calling and asking about the show for more than
a month after the final (extra) performance.
The seating capacity of the auditorium was supposed to be
850, but there were dozens of wheelchairs (when Senior
centers came) and scores of extra folding chairs for the
matinees for metro-area grade school kids. There were
usually at least an additional 50 to 100 folk standing in
the aisles as well, and the drama director and school
principle more than once remarked - only half jokingly -
that they sincerely hoped the local fire marshal did not
make an appearance, or there would be trouble.
Were we such fantastically gifted actors? I would like to
think so - but looking back, maybe not. Was the set
design above and beyond the norm for a suburban high
school in the early eighties? Not exactly. Was our
auditorium so richly appointed. Ha!
What drew the hordes of people was word of mouth about a
strong and uncompromising spiritual message of
unadulterated Christian HOPE. Played completely straight
and true (as much as we were capable) and close to what
we prayerfully believed C.S. Lewis' - and God's -
intentional design was.
There was - and still very much is - an enormous
spiritual emptiness in people's lives. The hunger which
springs out of that cannot be satisfied by less than the
"Real Thing".
If Disney chooses to take a firm hold of Lewis' great
work, and give it a faithful, unblinking rendering, then
they will have their studio's runaway box office hit of
all time. This could sell more tickets than any previous
film which had the Disney name attached.
I no longer recall how much money our "little" play made.
It easily broke all school records previous in terms of
dollars and number of tickets. Probably over twelve
thousand people saw that play. But that's not what stays
with me; what stays in my mind to this day are the
ennumerable comments and compliments from people who met
with the cast members afterward, the many folk who were
crying and asking some of us to pray with them (we
invited pastors and elders from several local churches to
join and help us after the play, once we experienced that
from the first two performances) and the kind people who
told us that seeing the show had changed them somehow
(gosh, I wonder how?)
It really stuck with me that even two years after high
school, I still ran into the occasional person who, when
they learned I had been in the drama department at that
H.S. - would ask if I had any involvement with the "Lion
Witch and Wardrobe" production...and when I told them
what my part had been, their reactions were positively
surprising.
It stuck with me because it stuck with them. There is no
question in my mind that God imbued those stories in the
"Chronicles" with the power to reach out and grab people,
make them confront their emptiness, or sadness, or
spiritual desolation, and ask life-changing questions
about it all.
Disney could create so much more than they perhaps
realise. What the film(s) could do for the spiritual
quality of some people's lives would be immeasurable -
and it might just incidentally restore a bit of the lost
luster to Disney's flagging reputation. Will somebody
PLEASE tell them that?
Posted on 2/21/2005 2:50:08 AM PST by AmericanArchConservative
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: Dr.Zoidberg
Thanks. Agreed.
Posted on 2/21/2005 2:50:18 AM PST by DoughtyOne
(US socialist liberalism would be dead without the
help of politicians who claim to be conservative.)
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-To: nickcarraway
While I trust Adamson, the richer the source material
Disney have to work with the more likely they are to
debase it and render it a lifeless shadow of the original
work.
The best example is the magnificent writing in the
original A A Milne books compared with Disney's banal
reworkings and merchandising efforts. I mean for goodness
sake - Pooh at Thanksgiving? Pooh's first day at school?
The Tigger Movie? Milne is spinning in his grave with
each degradation of his vision...I just hope they don't
try anything remotely similar on Lewis.
Posted on 2/21/2005 3:04:47 AM PST by Androcles
(All your typos are belong to us)
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End of forwarded messages
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
Shouldn't that read "Christians Nervous About Hollywood's
Narnia"?
Posted on 2/21/2005 3:42:41 AM PST by Eepsy
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End of forwarded message
Jai Maharaj
http://www.mantra.com/jai
Om Shanti
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: DoughtyOne
REally.
Everyone with half a brain (or less) knows that C.S.
Lewis was a devout Christian (in the later part of his
life, after years of being an atheist). Everyone knows
that the Narnia story was written as an allegory for
Jesus Christ.
It would be beyond sickening and nauseating to take a
great series like this and butcher it, lopping off any
Christian significance to it. But like you said, Disney
will find a way! Especially with exectutives who are not,
as we say, believers in Jesus or Christianity. THEY would
be the ones who would obviously be trying to hide,
obscure or delete what is integral to the entire work.
If you want a good read, try "Surpised by Joy". It is
Lewis' autobiography of his early life. I recently re-
read it.
Posted on 2/21/2005 4:05:40 AM PST by Conservatrix
(He who stands for nothing will fall for anything.)
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
Disney had the rights to Lord of the rings and had every
intention of wrecking it. One of their comments to pete
jackson was that there were "too many hobbits" so they
were going to have to kill off a hobbit or two. I would
no more trust them with narnia than I would trust
American Atheists or the National council of churches
with this material. Diz has lost the touch it showed with
lion king, little mermaid, beauty, aladdin (not to
mention their classics from Snow White and Dumbo through,
say, dalmations).
Posted on 2/21/2005 4:22:17 AM PST by ImpeachandRemove
(four more years of dubya, then eight more years of
Jeb:))
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
-From - http://www.narnia.com/chronicles/index.htm
"C.S. Lewis once wrote that the idea for the Narnia books
came to him from images: "a faun carrying an umbrella, a
queen in a sledge, a magnificent lion." From these mental
pictures he created the Land of Narnia, a land populated
with a rich diversity of beings, some very like their
counterparts in our world, some derived from his
knowledge and love of myth and fairy tale, and some, like
Puddleglum, purely his own invention. Here you can meet
them all!"
Mommy, what is a Christian?
Well son, according to disney, Christian's are people who
have "crazy unstructured images come to them derived from
their knowledge and love of myth and fairy tale."
nice.
Posted on 2/21/2005 4:51:29 AM PST by The Real Eddie01
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: ImpeachandRemove
"Diz has lost the touch it showed with lion king, little
mermaid, beauty, aladdin (not to mention their classics
from Snow White and Dumbo through, say, dalmations)."
I grew up on the books of Grimm fairy tales, and remember
watching the Disney versions during my elementary school
years thinking "that's not how the story goes". I have no
confidence whatsoever that Narnia won't disappear into a
cauldron of Disney kitsch.
Posted on 2/21/2005 6:15:30 AM PST by Katya
(Homo Nosce Te Ipsum)
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
The only thing I remember from this book is Turkish
Delight.
Posted on 2/21/2005 6:17:22 AM PST by rintense
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End of forwarded message
Jai Maharaj
http://www.mantra.com/jai
Om Shanti
DoOTo7202oQDPo@RgaEw
Forwarded message
-To: jazzlite
> Did anyone see Fox's John Gibson's piece on Hollywood and
> America last night? It was great and did a good job of
> portraying the hedonistic Hollywood hatred of
> Christianity and traditional values.
Yes! It was excellent. I also thought FOX's timing with
it was perfect, on the eve of the Oscars. I especially
liked their historic synopsis: how Hollywood was once a
beacon of Americana and a nice form of escape for
Americans beleaguered by Depression and War. Pretty
stunning how quickly the whole industry went from
patriotic producers entertaining audiences, to strident
socialists pumping out angry agitprop.
> the rewriting of great movies to eliminate conservative
> values...they censor and rewrite books to do the same
Yep. "Sum Of All Fears" was a perfect example. Jack
Valenti's weaselly denials of such behavior were totally
unconvincing! (In fact, I believe Valenti is a big part
of the problem.) Anyhow...for that reason, it wouldn't
surprise me at all if Disney screws up C.S. Lewis's books
profusely.
> One of the problems for producers of the more
> conservative movies is that the Hollywood crowd punishes
> anyone who produces anything outside the prevailing
> hedonistic value system.
That struck me too. I kept thinking it's like the mafia
out there, or some kind of gang organization -- where any
dissidence costs you dearly!
Posted on 2/21/2005 7:00:44 AM PST by TonyRo76 (American
by birth. Patriot by choice. Christian by grace.)
Dr. Jai Maharaj
-To: nickcarraway
Even if they wanted to, it would be very difficult for
Disney to take the Christian allegory out of this story
-- the best and most dramatic parts of the plot, that
would make the best movie scenes, are the ones with
unmistakable (for those with ears to hear) Christian
subtexts.
It would be possible for them to damage "The Magician's
Nephew" (by putting pantheism into the Creation scene) or
"The Voyage of the Dawn Treader" (by changing the final
Aslan-as-lamb scene), but only an extremely perverse
director, who both understands the Christian subtext in a
very refined way AND hates it, could ruin "The Lion, the
Witch, and the Wardrobe". An ordinary blue-state
secularist director, who just sees it as a good story,
won't be able to avoid transmitting the messages he
himself doesn't get, because Lewis was a genius.
Posted on 2/21/2005 7:44:20 AM PST by VeritatisSplendor
Bateau
>I shuddered when I first learned Disney had it's jewish hands on this
>Christian cultural story a couple months ago.
>Jewish hollywood will be sure to screw Christianity yet again.
>
>Typically, jewish-run studios and directors will de-Christianize stories and
>remove any reference to Jesus Christ. I guess it's their intolerance to
>other religions.
>Disney (run by jews) shouldn't be allowed to whore and profit from Christian
>culture. They have already bastardized and subverted enough culture as it
>is.
>
>The late Walt Disney founded Disney and was a Christian. It fell into jewish
>hands in the 1980's and has remained in jewish hands since then. I'm sure
>he's just rolling in his grave.
Would you like a free personality test?
RichA
The tiger is. It is faster, larger and stronger,
able to hunt on it's own and will not shy away
from water.
-Rich
Dr. Jai Maharaj
RichA <no...@none.com> posted:
Have you checked with a lion about that?
Sea Wasp
The lion has the soundtrack, the advertising, and the rep. The
tiger's screwed.
--
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
Live Journal: http://www.livejournal.com/users/seawasp/
Dr. Jai Maharaj
Sea Wasp <seaobvi...@sgeobviousinc.com> posted:
> RichA wrote:
> > A lion isn't king of anything.
> > The tiger is. It is faster, larger and stronger,
> > able to hunt on it's own and will not shy away
> > from water.
> > -Rich
>
> The lion has the soundtrack, the advertising, and the rep. The
> tiger's screwed.
Often, the audience loves the underdog . . . er . . . undertiger.
Sea Wasp
> In article <421D4D4A...@sgeobviousinc.com>,
> Sea Wasp <seaobvi...@sgeobviousinc.com> posted:
>
>
>>RichA wrote:
>>
>>>A lion isn't king of anything.
>>>The tiger is. It is faster, larger and stronger,
>>>able to hunt on it's own and will not shy away
>>>from water.
>>>-Rich
>>
>> The lion has the soundtrack, the advertising, and the rep. The
>>tiger's screwed.
>
> Often, the audience loves the underdog .
Underdog is a different cartoon.
. . er . . . undertiger.
>
Hey, we don't do THAT kind of thing here. Eeew!
Dr. Jai Maharaj
Sea Wasp <seaobvi...@sgeobviousinc.com> posted:
> Dr. Jai Maharaj wrote:
>> In article <421D4D4A...@sgeobviousinc.com>,
>> Sea Wasp <seaobvi...@sgeobviousinc.com> posted:
>>> RichA wrote:
>>>> A lion isn't king of anything.
>>>> The tiger is. It is faster, larger and stronger,
>>>> able to hunt on it's own and will not shy away
>>>> from water.
>>>> -Rich
>>> The lion has the soundtrack, the advertising, and the rep.
>>> the tiger's screwed.
>> Often, the audience loves the underdog .
> Underdog is a different cartoon.
>> . . er . . . undertiger.
> Hey, we don't do THAT kind of thing here. Eeew!
Undertiger, underlion, underdog . . . what's the diff? It's
the topcat that gets going.