MovieChat Forums > The Girl in the Café (2005) Discussion > I fail to see what is so 'insulting' abo...

I fail to see what is so 'insulting' about the 'politics' of this movie

posted 20 years ago by Mythos_Ruler
13 replies | jump to latest

I fail to see what is so "insulting" about the "politics" of this movie. I see these words thrown around here so much, but with no one qualifying what was so insulting about it. Surely you can handle it? Any movie that makes one think about the problems of this world is a-ok with me. I found nothing insulting about it. In fact, I saw neither a leftish, rightish, authoritarian, nor anarchist bent to the viewpoint the movie was trying to make, unless idealism has been trumped by one side or the other.

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[–] tetrahex 20 years ago

its not an issue of being a republican or democrat. it is simply a bad movie with a simplistic preachy "message". if you think people don't know there are poor africans you are simply ignorant yourself. if you think a piss poor sappy condescending movie about such an issue will change minds, you are beyond niave.

You Look So Cute When You Stamp Out World Poverty
HBO's The Girl in the Café is a treacly mix of romance and politics.
By Dana Stevens
http://slate.msn.com/id/2121601/

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[–] tetrahex 20 years ago

people that don't usually tune into political films? are you talking about the hbo subscriber here? the generally affluent generally well educated premium cable subscriber? dont kid yourself. its nothing more then one of those issue of the week movies. such as the ones on womens channels about domestic violence or rape. it preaches to the choir at best.

they only state the obvious. i mean really. do you need a tacky film to tell you theres gang violence and poverty in the inner cities today? of course not.

the attitude of people that seem to think this movie is good is one of condescension. the commoners, the stupid yokels will benifit from seeing this movie to combat their ignorance, a kind of medicine for the masses. because obviously most are not as smart as i am, and i fear their stupidity:P....propaganda to manipulate the masses is a must!!:P

nothing to do with the quality of the movie. a movie must be good before it tries to preach or else its simply a waste of screen time and frankly does harm to the cause itself.

"I just can't accept that every three seconds a person dies due to extreme poverty.

[snaps fingers every three seconds]

Just say NO to censorship!"

when has anyone called for censorship? is critisism censorship in your world?

really? surely people dying should necessitate you donating your computer right away to help feed them:P and feeding people alone is not enough. read the pulitzer prize winning author jared diamond's new book called collapse and its section on rwanda. feeding people and supporting a system that leads to overpopulation and overstretching of resources can lead to worse then children starving. in rwanda it led directly to genocide. where the hutu's found no tutsi's to massacre, they killed other hutu's. there simply was not enough land for the amount of people at the rate they were reproducing. this unsustainable system was propped up by aid. so don't pretend its simple. and don't pretend silly idealism is enough. ignoring the long term or unforeseen consequences is unethical.

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[–] iamcraig 18 years ago

It's remarkably juvenile to question why someone is expressing their opinion here. This is a discussion forum, not merely a one-sided cheerleading venue for popular reviews and interpretations.

aihyah brings up valid points, and it's one of the nice things about this movie in that it sparks debate and makes people think.

Perhaps in time you'll learn to "agree to disagree."

[–] anniemine 18 years ago

Didactic movies can be good as well as sending a message.

No two movies can be more different than Blood Diamond and The Girl in the Cafe . Both had a message we need to hear and both were well done with excellent casts.

We read sad, horrendous stories all the time… Everyday US news seems to begin with: A car bomb in Iraq killed (fill in the blank). All the people involved have a story. They had families and dreams and died or were injured in a nightmare. One day 32 people were shot to death at a US campus and it is all the talk… but in Iraq a couple days before 154 died and 271 were injured and the day after the campus shooting the Iraqi death count for the day was even worse. No one mentioned it at work…

[–] thulars 18 years ago

I tend to agree with you. People must learn to help themselves before anybody else can help them. It isn't our fault that they are dying every 3 seconds. Why did they have a lot children if they couldn't feed them? Helping the poor should be part of human nature but there's a limit to it. I grew up in Burma and I lived below poverty line until I was 18. I know how it feels like to be poor but it isn't somebody else's problem but ours. Usually countries are poor for reasons, a bad government system is the first thing come into mind. A country has to be willing to change. If it isn't, all the aids are just going downhill and people like the G8 Summit won't be there to witness it. The poor people will remain poor regardless of which country is giving what country whatever amount of aid. It is endless.

[–] thulars 18 years ago

Don't take it personally guys. Movies are purely entertainment. This one, I would like disagree with you on one point, it was poorly made movie. No it was a well made movie, however, the story might be poor. It's about a person representing G8 summit. The whole thing is British. I don't know how the whole republican issues came about. Could have simply viewed as a parody of G8 Summit Representatives.