Strange World (2022)

[Frank Cox]

I notice smoking in movies far more than I used to, probably because it's getting to be a rare sight.

[Steve Guttag]

Leo, have him watch the Get Back documentary. There was a LOT of smoking going on in that one (as would be the case for everything back then). Don't have 8-hours to kill (and I wish it was the longer cut because I couldn't get enough of that one)...have him watch a video of Eddie Van Halen performing "Eruption" live. I noticed that Dave Chappelle smoked, while on stage for his recent SNL performance. I wonder what sort of wavers had to be had for that one. It was like they were all so worried about what he had said in the past (or would say on stage) and let him have a free-pass on smoking around others, indoors when it wasn't even part of some sort of historical period piece.

[Jarod Reddig]

No one made smoking look more cool than Eddie Van Halen. TV wise Madmen is a smoke fest.

[Steve Guttag]

No one made smoking look more cool than Eddie Van Halen.

He did have throat cancer, lung cancer and tongue cancer (removed a ⅓ to get rid of it) but died of a stroke at age 65. It would be hard to believe that smoking didn't contribute to his health issues. If you want to see what he looked like shortly before his death (I think a couple of years)...this video where he is interviewed about his American Experience https://youtu.be/yb26D8bBZB8 It was recorded at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. He looked real good though very little like his former self.

[Jarod Reddig]

Ya i think it most definitely lead to his cancer along with his drug and alcohol addictions. Thanks yes I have seen that video and was amazing to see him look and sound so good.

[Leo Enticknap]

Leo, have him watch the Get Back documentary.

I like that idea. I recently tried to soften his resistance to having his hair cut by warning that if he kept it up, he'd look like a 1970s hippie. Showing him some actual 1970s hippies might have the desired effect more successfully than my description of them. Woodstock would be even better on that score, but at least the Beatles doc would give him the rock 'n roll without the sex and drugs (apart from tobacco).

[Geoff Jones]

I haven't seen Strange World yet. (In my area, it's only played on small screens not worth leaving home for.)
What "controversial content" does it include?

[Leo Enticknap]

Not possible to discuss without getting political. Search for "strange world controversy" on any of the main search engines (when I did so just now, DuckDuckGo returned a good selection of articles covering the different viewpoints;Google and Yahoo less so), and the results will answer your question.

[Mark Lane]

I haven't seen Strange World yet. (In my area, it's only played on small screens not worth leaving home for.)
What "controversial content" does it include?

I add this information to our website so parents can determine if this film is right for their family. I post on the theater page and direct people to our facebook page for more detailed information.
None of this matters to me.. I have seen more in the 1960s and 70s from prime time TV but there is a lot of strong feelings on it so I addressed it so people could decide for themselves.

The family is interracial. The beginning of the movie it is established that the teenage son is gay and has a teenage awkward secret crush on another boy. It is never known if those feelings are mutual. Two other times it is brought up in the movie, once when the teenager talks to his grandfather and towards the end when it is mentioned in passing. At the end we see the two teens with his arm around the others shoulder which could be taken as just being buddies. I personally did not think it brought any depth to the character and did not add to the story. It was not needed. Knowing the teens sexual preference either way, did not add to the story. I would think it will be easy to adjust the script for the oversea's market.

My concern with the character was he did what he wanted even though his parents told him not to. He put his family's life in danger by thinking basically of himself. There was no life lesson with this part of the character. The character got what he wanted with no concern for others and no remorse or negative consequences for of his actions. This doesn't seem to be an issue with people, but the other parts of the movie are what people are talking about.

[Mike Blakesley]

I long for the days when kids movies didn't have to get larded up with "life lessons."

Just let the kids be kids and have a fun time at the movies, forpetesake.

Our booker was not expecting this movie to do all that well even before the controversial content was revealed. He told me probably around early October when we were talking about the possibilities for fall, that he thought it looked too weird to do much. He's usually pretty spot-on and he sure nailed this one.

[Bobby Henderson]

I notice smoking in movies far more than I used to, probably because it's getting to be a rare sight.

It raised my eyebrows when movie studios and TV networks added "smoking" as a parental warning activity in TV and movie ratings. I don't have a big problem with that, but I don't get offended by seeing people smoking either unless they're smoking in an inappropriate location.

I've never been a smoker. My brother and I took it pretty hard when my mother's father died of lung cancer in 1977. My grandfather was one of those old school guys who rolled his own cigarettes. He taught my brother and I how to ride dirt bikes when we had only been riding bicycles for maybe a couple years. He was pretty cool. Doctors had removed his left lung as a last ditch attempt. Both of my parents were heavy smokers up until then. I didn't like it because the smoke was noxious. On road trips my mother had a habit of trying to flick her ashes out the car window; half the time the ashes would blow into the back seats at me and my brother. I caught a flaming "cherry" in my eye one time. My parents were so upset with how terrible my grandfather looked the last time we saw him. My dad had orders to Japan. We were overseas when my grandfather died a couple months later. Both of my parents quit smoking cold turkey style. And they stayed quit ever since.

Cigarette smoking commercials were banned from TV in the early 1970's. Cigarette advertising remained very common in magazines, billboards, etc. Throughout the 1970's and 1980's smoking was a very common activity. I remember catching a good amount of shit from friends in high school for refusing to smoke. Back then it seemed like more women than men smoked. It wasn't so fun tasting cigarette breath from girls I kissed back then.

It doesn't seem like all that long ago that indoor smoking bans went into effect. I understand the anger smokers felt about those bans. Then again, if I hang out with some friends at a night club or bar I enjoy not having to take a shower to wash off the cigarette smoke before going to bed.

These days I'm getting knocked down by a different aroma: pot. We have so many medical marijuana dispensaries here that if you blindly throw a rock you'll hit one. I'll be out grocery shopping or some other mundane activity and someone will pass by just reeking of some skunk-like weed aroma. Did they blaze it up in their car before entering the store or what? At least I'm not breathing second hand smoke, so at least that's nice. Some of my co-workers still smoke, sort of. Vaping is pretty popular. But even that's off limits in most indoor locations.

[Mike Blakesley]

Although I "dabbled" in smoking a little bit, it was never a habit for me. My mom and dad were both smokers - Mom was a "closet" smoker the last 10 or 15 years of her life. She picked up the habit after Dad did, when they were both in their 20s. (Dad was in the Army.) Mom told us kids every time she got the chance, "Never start smoking, it's a filthy habit and it's expensive." That was before all of the "health warnings" started happening. So none of us have ever been smokers, except for my "experimental" stage that I went through. Even then it was more like a pack a month for me, about one a day if that.

It does floor me how things have changed regarding what people are "OK" with seeing or hearing in movies. In the '70s you could use any racial or ethnic epithet you wanted. Nowadays that kind of stuff will get your movie production stopped completely, let alone get you a restrictive rating. Yet there are people trying to slap an R on a movie that shows a guy smoking a cigarette. You can have knock-down drag-out violence and "almost" all of the known swear words and still just get a PG-13, but if your director gets caught on a hot mic uttering one N word, no matter the circumstances, your movie may not get made at all and your director's career may be over.

[Bobby Henderson]

It does floor me how things have changed regarding what people are "OK" with seeing or hearing in movies. In the '70s you could use any racial or ethnic epithet you wanted.

Even back then the use of racial slurs in movies was controversial. Blazing Saddles had a hard R-rating. Cast members were not comfortable saying lines co-written by Richard Pryor. That movie was released only 10 years after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawed segregation.

From the 1980's up into recent years quite a few movies and TV shows have had words like the N-bomb included in their scripts. And not just Quentin Tarantino movies either. I'm not really complaining about that because of the context. Actors are portraying a role. Bigots still do exist in real life, as do all sorts of violent, evil people. Movies occasionally incorporate that reality into their plots. Perhaps they do so less than in the past, but it's still possible to make a movie featuring characters behaving like racist bigots.

You can have knock-down drag-out violence and "almost" all of the known swear words and still just get a PG-13, but if your director gets caught on a hot mic uttering one N word, no matter the circumstances, your movie may not get made at all and your director's career may be over.

Technically, I think a movie is allowed one F-bomb and still get under the PG-13 wire. I agree that a lot of violence today in PG-13 rated movies or even on basic cable TV series episodes would have been hit with an R-rating in the past. I watched Bullet Train on Netflix and was kind of shocked at how bloody that movie was. It seemed every bit as graphic as the "X-Rated" cut of Robocop. It still got an R-rating.

It's one thing to have an actor portray a bad/flawed character in a movie. It's another thing to behave that way in real life. The movie industry blatantly asked for a cultural phenomenon like the "me-too" movement to happen after decades of institutionalized mistreatment of women. Certain repugnant things people say or do aren't tolerated like they were 50 years ago. Cameras and other recording devices are everywhere now. Our society is a lot more integrated than it was in the past. The number of mixed raced marriages is increasing (now that it's more accepted by society). I have a black girlfriend. A group of all-white guys at a restaurant table is no longer a safe space to try out telling a new racist joke.

A lot of people are angry that they have to be more careful about what they say or do. Knowing what I do now at my age, I very much prefer being a white guy not allowed to say the N-bomb than be a black guy who can. Even still, my girlfriend hates hearing other black people use that word casually.

If some black guy called me "cracker" or "honky" I'd laugh and shrug it off. Those slurs have no power at all. The N-bomb has a far more sinister sting. It instantly labels someone as being less than or not even human. And there is 400 years of history going with it. When I was a kid living in Japan some of the neighborhood kids would laugh and tease me and my brother, calling us "gaijin." Loosely translated the word means outsider. That seemed more rude than being called "honky" considering how Japanese culture stresses being part of the group or team. It's the opposite of American culture championing the individual. Where we lived 40 years ago there were plenty of Marines marrying Japanese women and lots of old fashioned Japanese parents not too happy about it.

[Mike Blakesley]

A group of all-white guys at a restaurant table is no longer a safe space to try out telling a new racist joke

The term "racist joke" is interesting. It's odd to me that nowadays white people can't even REFER to some other race in a joke without it being called racist. Yet many black comedians base their entire act on how dumb white people are, or their mannerisms, the way they talk, etc. but it's NOT OK for white folks to be upset about that. Not that I want to add more "upset-ness" to the world. I just wish people would lighten up when it comes to joking around.

A white guy should be able to tell a joke about four black guys going into an elevator the same way a black guy should be able to tell a joke about four white guys. It's just a JOKE, it's not necessarily racist, and even if it IS, who gives a shit? If it's a joke and it's funny and not hurtful, then enjoy a chuckle and try to come up with an even better joke as a topper. I'm Catholic and I love a good Catholic joke.

[Bobby Henderson]

The term "racist joke" is interesting. It's odd to me that nowadays white people can't even REFER to some other race in a joke without it being called racist. Yet many black comedians base their entire act on how dumb white people are, or their mannerisms, the way they talk, etc. but it's NOT OK for white folks to be upset about that. Not that I want to add more "upset-ness" to the world. I just wish people would lighten up when it comes to joking around.

Here's the problem: jokes about black people versus jokes about white people are not an apples to apples comparison.

I can't feel all that bad or offended if a black comedian like Eddie Murphy says "y'all can't dance." One reason is there's some truth to the stereotype, at least when it comes to dancing to pop or R&B music. A bunch of us suck at it because we're too uptight and haven't put in the effort to get better at it. The stereotype isn't as prevalent as it was 30 years ago when Murphy did his "Raw" act. Lots of younger white people listen to a lot of R&B, hip-hop and other popular music and dance to it better now. I don't go to night clubs very often anymore. When I see a bunch of 20-something aged white people dancing to Kendrick Lamar or Beyoncé they look more natural than they did in the 1980's. That white people dance step Eddie Murphy acted out on stage was pretty accurate for white people dancing in the 70's and 80's.

Still, I don't know how to dance, or I don't talk deep enough? That's supposed to make me feel bad in light of the fact white people have been ruling much of the world for the past couple or so thousand years?

When I was growing up I heard plenty of jokes about black people that were far more ugly and mean than anything I've heard Eddie Murphy, Chris Rock or Richard Pryor say about white people. I also heard lots of jokes about Polish people, Irish people, Jewish people, etc. My family tree is largely Scottish and Irish. The jokes about black people always felt like they were on a whole other level.

I've heard plenty of white comedians do material that involved black people without torching their careers. It's a matter of how they deliver it and the spirit of the material itself. They can't explicitly say the N-bomb, unless it's Louis C.K. actually taking apart the use of that word. Of course he got into big trouble for things he was doing off stage than anything he was saying in his stand-up act.