The Pursuit of Happyness (2006) has to be up there. Literally glorifies the stock market and presents a finance bro job as the key to happiness. There’s a scene near the start where Will Smith is outside the NYSE looking at all the suits going in and out and narrating how he was inspired by how happy everyone was, and how this inspired him to bootlick his way into some internship, the pursuit of which literally requires him to alienate his friends and family and sleep in subway bathrooms with his five-year-old son. Everyone in the movie is a lazy, unscrupulous asshole, except for the rich people, of course, who are portrayed as generous and open-minded for allowing Will Smith in the door after he kisses their asses the whole movie. All of his struggle with homelessness and poverty etc. is portrayed not as injustice but as the ideal scenario, rewarding the hardest, most dedicated worker with a job. It is literally r/upliftingnews: the movie.
Forrest Gump. Forrest is basically rewarded for being a pawn of imperialism while Jenny is punished for being a radical. The movie reinforces the notion that the USA is good and just.
on that note, Forrest Gump is an intensely conservative movie. Forrest represents “traditional values” whereas Jenny is the symbol of the radical counter-culture of the 60s. One ends up a rich and adored war hero, the other dies of canceraids.
‘mama says i was named after my great great uncle Nathan Bedford Forrest’ set’s up the tone for the whole movie
Apparently the novel it was based on was a satire about boomers where Forrest goes to space, which everyone who made the movie totally missed.
Oh damn, that adds so much to the story. I am shocked that isn’t part of it
It is! Could have been a different film if forest and bubba was portrayed as fighting in mcnameras morons or any other situation where you could have some proper criticism of any of the shit hes ending up in. So much happened in that period, and what they chose to portray was desegregation (while not doing anything with it), anti war (but mostly hippie bs) and water gate (so we know where safe in lib territory) The only real legit parts are the implied abuse Jenny grew up in, and cl. Dan shedding his stoic notions of honor, but it just sort resolves itself or is forgotten. Lib movie through and through.
