I was wrong about the ATLAS SHRUGGED movies

On July 17, 2014 I posted the following blog (www.henrymarkholzer.blogspot.com) concerning the third Atlas Shrugged alleged motion picture. The title was “The Final Desecration of “Atlas Shrugged.”

I am aware that among the hundreds of people who receive this blog not everyone is devoted to Ayn Rand’s ideas, or believes that her magnum opus Atlas Shrugged is a masterwork. Thus, what follows will probably be of no interest to them. 

However, for those who revere Rand’s 1957 novel as a superb example of romantic realism—let alone brilliantly predictive—the recently announced third motion picture installment of Atlas Shrugged must be considered the final desecration.

Of the many points I could make, here are only two of the major ones.

The feature film rights to Atlas Shrugged should never been sold (let alone several times over) because the scope, characters, plot, and ideas of Atlas are inherently impossible to dramatize in two hours. 

I say this because of two personal experiences. 

One is because in 1968 Erika Holzer and I found the missing Italian film of We the Living, a much shorter and easier story to tell than Atlas. In its original form, WTL was three-plus hours long. Only due to Rand’s personally suggested edits, a bit of her restructuring, and some 4,000 subtitles written by Erika Holzer and Duncan Scott, did the film become the international motion picture success it deserved to be. 

The second is because toward the end of Rand’s life she worked with a TV producer and writer to create a network miniseries which would have been at least seven hours long. The writer was Oscar-winner Stirling Silliphant, whose writing achievements included the TV series Route 66 and the feature film In the Heat of the Night. At dinner one night in Los Angeles Stirling told the Holzers that there was no way Atlas Shrugged could, with any fealty to the novel, be done as a typical two-hour feature film.

As further proof that it was folly to try, I submit that the eventual producers themselves realized that a standard feature was impossible. So they made three, somewhat connected, but still standard feature films.

I repeat, the feature film rights should never have been sold, and when it was clear the current producers intended to dissect Atlas into three standard feature films, they should have been stopped.

Instead, the producers’ “solution” to the unsolvable length and complexity problems—driven also by the need to begin principal photography before their rights-option expired—was to quickly make one-third of Rand’s magnum opus, with the other two-thirds to come along in two later installments.

As to Atlas I and II (and doubtless the forthcoming Atlas Shrugged III), not a single nationally or internationally household name was associated with the project. This failure was most egregious regarding the script. While it would have been too much to expect that the producers would hire a journeyman writer like William Goldman (All the President’s Men, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid), there were some well-credentialed Hollywood writers who understood Rand’s novel and could have created a faithfully powerful script. I know one of them.

Worse than all this, by far, is that the well-intentioned producers apparently believed that even though they were making an “entertainment” not a documentary, it was incumbent on them to provide “philosophical oversight.” So they hired the equivalent of a philosophical commissar, to keep the production on the Objectivist straight-and-narrow.

(There’s more. For example: difficulties with distribution, changing actors from one of the parts to the others, miscasting, the impossibility of showing Atlas Shrugged I, II, and III together in a movie theater or even on television.)

The noise you hear is Ayn Rand spinning in her grave. The feature film rights should never have been sold.

In the days of the Italian version of We the Living (1940-1941) it was possible for the film’s negatives and prints to vanish, as nearly happened because of Nazi hostility to Rand’s story about the impact of the Bolshevik Revolution on a fiercely independent woman and the two men who loved her.

Unfortunately, in today’s world of the Internet, cloud storage, digital recorders, and DVDs, there is no way Atlas Shrugged I, II, and III, unlike We the Living, will ever be lost.

Pity.

I was wrong.

Apparently those of us who admire Rand’s work have not yet seen the end of desecration of the much-admired author and her writing.

Today, I (and doubtless many others) received a pitch for money in an email offering an Atlas Shrugged comic book and an Ayn Rand cozy fleece winter blanket. See below.

For these moral obscenities, and perhaps even violations of law, we have to thank The Atlas Society’s new CEO’s “outreach” to the younger [and cold] generation.

Jennifer, this desecration is shameful squared. You are cheapening Ayn Rand’s name and insulting her work.

TAS founder, board member, and “Chief Intellectual Officer” David Kelley should be doubly ashamed.

And the other four board members, well, they should resign.

If this happened years ago when I was Ayn Rand’s lawyer, on her behalf I would have sued all of them.

For free!

From: The Atlas Society [mailto:tas@atlassociety.org]
Sent: Thursday, January 5, 2017 2:01 AM
To: hank@henrymarkholzer.com
Subject: 2017: Rand Will Roar! 💸

Atlas Society Weekly Newsletter

Scene from Atlas Shrugged Graphic novels are all the rage...so why not one of Atlas Shrugged?  That was the dream of artist Agniezka Pilat when she created these panels from Ayn Rand's magnus opus many years ago.  We've set a few to music...and narration!  You can watch the magic by clicking below.  Watch Now CEO Jennifer Grossman  on WSJ Op-ed In this interview with Mark Michael Lewis, Grossman responds to attacks by Yaron Brook & Onkar Ghate on her Wall Street Journal op-ed, "Can You Love God & Ayn Rand."  What she says may surprise you.  "To lead with vinegar is to be irrational." Agree? Watch Now Donate Now One Cheer for Legalization, Three Boos for Pot This week, as recreational use of marijuana became legal in four states -- to cheering from many libertarians -- we remember the words of Ayn Rand: "I would fight for your legal right to use marijuana; I would fight you to the death that you morally should not do it, because it destroys the mind."  Writing for TAS, libertarian Jeffrey Tucker echoes her view in his piece, "Pot is Gross." Read More Why Do New Year's Resolutions Often Fail? The philosophical roots of failed resolutions.  Bradley Doucet's classic piece on why evasion of reality, a disorganized hierarchy of values and placing "duty" before "desires," leads to disappointments.  David Kelley also weighs in. Read More "Speaking the language of values instead of the language of duty, ‘want-to’ instead of ‘have-to,’ is a daily reminder that we live by choice, with both the freedom and the responsibility that that entails."  David Kelley, Founder Nicole Sanders The Atlas Society would like to welcome Nicole as our Director of Student Programs!   She started her career in the Liberty movement after she read Atlas Shrugged. She then enrolled at Blinn College in Brenham, Texas and started a Young Americans for Liberty(YAL) chapter in February of 2015.  Nicole soon became disenfranchised when she learned of unconstitutional speech codes and a free speech area at her college. With the help of The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), she placed a first amendment lawsuit against Blinn College and won the lawsuit in March on 2016.  READ MORE eShop Ayn Rand Fleece Blanket  Baby it's cold out there! So why not cuddle up in your very own Ayn Rand fleece blanket this winter? Buy Now

A thought for Veterans Day: In Flanders Fields

In Flanders Fields

John McCrae, 1872 - 1918

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row, 
That mark our place, and in the sky, 
The larks, still bravely singing, fly, 
Scarce heard amid the guns below. 

We are the dead; short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, 
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields. 

Take up our quarrel with the foe! 
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high! 
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Hillary: Immoral or amoral, revisited

In a typically incisive essay yesterday, "The Clintons -- At the End of All Things" (National Review), Victor Davis Hanson twice referred to Hillary as "amoral." His use of that word reminded me of an essay I wrote several years ago on that very point. Since then, as recently as today, our characterization -- amoral -- has been proved correct time after time. My essay -- "Hillary Clinton: Immoral or Amoral?" is reprinted here:

*          *          *

Sunday, May 19, 2013

Hillary Clinton: Immoral or Amoral?

During her recent Congressional testimony about the notorious Benghazi Affair Hillary Clinton uttered the now infamous rhetorical question “What difference, at this point, does it make?” Note my emphasis on the word “it.” In the context the question was asked and answered Clinton’s “it” referred at least to the murder of four Americans, and probably the State Department’s antecedent failure to provide adequate security and the White House’s subsequent stonewalling cover-up. 

In other words — according to the former First Lady, United States Senator, presidential aspirant, Secretary of State, and putative 2016 democratic party presidential candidate — it made no difference that the government of which she was then a high-ranking member exposed Americans to high-risk danger, left them defenseless in a hotbed of terrorists, made no effort to rescue them, literally watched them being murdered, and then tried to cover up apparatchik  malfeasance by lying through officialdom's teeth to the people of the United States.

“What difference?” indeed.

But beyond what has become obvious about Clinton’s and her colleagues’ betrayal of the deceased Americans and the rest of the government’s malfeasance, the Benghazi Affair reveals something even more sinister.

Over the years, some of Hillary Clinton’s questionable conduct has not involved issues of morality. She has been a poseur, playing the role of victimized, yet forgiving, wife during the Lewinsky scandal. She has been a hypocrite, castigating George W. Bush for warrantless surveillance but using purloined tapes to her own political advantage. She has been a paranoid, complaining to the world about the alleged “right wing conspiracy.” She has been a conniver, ousting career White House travel office employees in favor of her cronies. She has been a dilettante, presuming to make over America’s health care system. 

While this conduct, and much more like it, has been unseemly and at odds with the dignified and trustworthy image that had been projected by modern-era First Ladies from Bess Truman to Laura Bush, none of Hillary Clinton’s conduct raised serious moral questions.

On the other hand, Clinton has done many other things that have raised serious questions of immorality (immoral defined as “not in conformity with accepted principles of right and wrong behavior; contrary to the moral code of the community” [Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language (13^th ed.)]; in other words knowing, but disregarding, principles of morality).

Mrs. Clinton authored a brief reeking with fraud while a staff lawyer for the Watergate Committee. She was a beneficiary of illegal commodities transactions that turned her a large profit.  She fraudulently stung lenders in the Whitewater land scheme. She bought votes and campaign contributions with criminal pardons issued by her husband. She lied about Chinese contributions to her political campaigns. She participated in slandering and intimidating women whom her husband sexually and otherwise abused, and was complicit in covering up his salacious conduct. She blithely desecrated the presidency by selling the Lincoln Bedroom to donors and celebrities. She stole furniture and furnishings from the White House. And much more, including her recent complicity in the murder of four Americans in Benghazi and the attempted cover-up of the entire sordid affair. All immoral conduct.

There’s more, but to elucidate all of it would be to gild the lily. Hillary Clinton’s immoral conduct— rationalized by her adherence to the “Rules for Radicals” promulgated by her mentor Saul Alinsky — has been detailed on the public record for decades, especially since her abortive campaign for the Democratic Party presidential nomination in 2007. 

At that time, I raised the question of whether Clinton’s decades-old questionable character traits and corner-cutting conduct demonstrated that she was merely immoral or, worse: Whether she was amoral—and whether there’s any important difference between the two concepts.

The answer is that there is a difference, a profound one, and with Hillary Clinton’s eye on a 2016 presidential nomination it’s crucially important for the future of the United States of America that the voters of this country understand it.

I begin with the concept of “morality” itself, one which Americans instinctively understand.  Rooted in fundamental notions of “right” and “wrong,” most Americans know (or knew!) that it’s right to pay our bills and protect our loved ones; that it is wrong to defraud creditors and abuse children. It’s immoral to buy votes, lie to investigators, release terrorists for a political quid pro quo, attack the defenseless, steal from the White House — all conduct Hillary Clinton was a party to — as well as to engage in countless other actions which, by anyone’s definition, must be characterized as immoral.  That this prospective candidate for the presidency of the United States has acted immorally time and time again is clear beyond any legitimate disagreement.

But what about amorality?—defined as “being neither moral nor immoral; specifically: lying outside the sphere to which moral judgments apply; lacking moral sensibility . . . .”  (Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (10^th ed.); emphasis in original.)

A person who is amoral does not accept any moral standard by which her conduct is to be judged by others.  She simply does not care about the concept of morality, about right or wrong, in what she thinks, says, or does.  Morality does not apply to such a person. “What difference, at this point, does it make?” could well be such person’s mantra.

 Thus, the questions arise: Does all of Hillary Clinton’s dubious conduct over the course of decades reflect a simple, garden-variety immorality—knowing but eschewing the right, and deliberately doing the wrong? Or does Alinsky’s acolyte — the leading candidate of the Democrat Party for the presidency of the United States — at root care nothing for morality and deem it to have no application to her? Is Hillary Clinton amoral?

Her record (let alone her character) leaves no doubt about the answer.  Yet Clinton and her supporters ask: “What difference, at this point, does [morality] make?” 

To ask the question is to answer it.