Film Festivals are Terrified of Offending Wokes ‘If just one person objects to your film, I can lose my job.’” by Daniel Greenfield
https://www.frontpagemag.com/film-festivals-are-terrified-of-offending-wokes/
Art, comedy, music and film festivals were the four pillars of the counterculture, always ready for a little round of epater la bourgeoisie. But then art became utterly incomprehensible, music became a series of autotuned copy-and-pasted pop songs by social media influencers and comedy became a struggle session.
Film festivals that once gloried in provocation just feature the same black nationalist celebrations of their racism in their programs. Edginess, once a major staple, has receded in American film festivals. And those European film festivals are dependent on American talent and recognition. The film festivals, like the rest of what’s left of liberal culture, are running scared.
Terracino, a one-name indie director with an A-list festival pedigree, has also been on the wrong side of the simmering culture wars on the circuit. In late 2021, he took a rough cut of his latest narrative feature, “Waking Up Dead,” to some of the major festivals that have shown his work in the past…
“But that’s when the ‘woke’ pushback began,” he says of festival organizer resistance. “My gay lead character [is initially] transphobic, which is something I wanted to explore — transphobia within the gay community — and they had an issue with that. They were scared to show a film with a transphobic lead.” He says he was also asked: “‘Why does your Latino lead have to bond with a white woman?’ I was really taken aback by that one. Here I am, a gay Latino filmmaker, and I have to answer about bullshit racial politics?”
Doesn’t everyone now? Why should a gay Latino director be special?
“If you look at what happened to me, look at ‘UnRedacted,’ ‘woke’ is silencing artists of color and women,” he says. “And it’s interesting to me that you have so many people of color supporting something that is actually silencing people of color. I think this will lead to some very dangerous places and it already has, and I think a lot of artists of color very soon are going to regret this woke ideology.”
Wokes are continuing to win friends and influence people, but it’s because they have ideological consolidation and a better network. And much better carrots and stocks.
“You can sense the fear out there among the festivals. They are terrified to show a film that someone may object to,” he adds. “A programmer at a Latino film festival told me, ‘If just one person objects to your film, I can lose my job.’”
That’s how you ensure compliance and obedience. Terrifying the hell of out everyone. Make them afraid of losing their jobs or their lives if they disobey.
And so much for the edginess.
The movie business was infested by leftists who pretended that they were heroes for having quietly criticized McCarthy. Everything they touch turns into tried propaganda. And the culture they occupy dies with them.
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