Comments on: The Quiet American (2002)

By: Arjan

Arjan — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

I dunno why but this title never really appealed to me. It was an option several times but I refrained from seeing it so far. Nice review tho’

By: marisa

marisa — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Yeah, I’ll be honest, I wasn’t drawn to it either … but my mom was in town and it seemed “mom approved.”

By: Arjan

Arjan — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Michael Caine and Richard Gere are always mommy-material

By: paco

paco — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Does it take a movie to (re)view your opinion on your country’s foreign politics? Sounds you’re being heavily indoctrinated in your country if school shows only one side of the issue.

By: weefselkweekje

weefselkweekje — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

The Jodie Foster movie you’re referring to is “Anna and the King” if I’m not mistaking. It features Chow Yung Fat (of Croutching Tiger fame) as well, and is pretty bad nontheless. Watched it on an airplane, while flying to Kenya if I remember correctly.

This is a movie I’ll have to see, as the whole USA vs. the World issue fascinates me.

By: marisa

marisa — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Oh we are totally indoctrinated in school. I know of only a few people who grew up in the US that had any kind of dialogue about US history in public school. Hell, some didn’t even get it in college! And let’s not even mention world history.

But are you asking if I base my views on US foreign policy on a Hollywood movie. No, of course not. But I would say that as someone who has had consistently critical views on US foreign policy that doesn’t mean I jumped on to the conspiracy theory bandwagon of believing that my government may have allowed the events of 9/11 to take place.

Watching this movie and (probably more importantly) having some distance of 2 years from actually being in lower Manhattan on 9/11, did make me reconsider that maybe my government had some involvement in the event that single-handedly galvanized congressional support for the most recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. But notice I didn’t say that I ‘changed’ my views after watching a fictional movie, I said reconsidered my views. The movie made me think ‘ and I don’t know about you, but I usually consider that a good thing.

By: paco

paco — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

I didn’t want to imply that a mere movie would provoke you to re-think these issues. However, not having seen the movie, I am still very interested to know to what extent it made you reconsider. Has it given you another angle on your opinion? Has it created more doubts? Some answers maybe?

I am genuinely interested in your views. If you wish not to elaborate on it on this site (for keeping the review ‘clean’ or whatever personal reason) you are welcome to email me.

I read and reflect a lot on what happens in the world -and the big part your country has in it- and I would think it really cool to hear what a US-citizen thinks on that. I’m also curious to see how one-sided/biased OUR media is on portraying your country.

By: reisneus

reisneus — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

@ Paco
I’d say, a 9.5 on the biased-o-meter.

@ Marisa
I’m also interested in your views on this. Can we keep the thread here?

By: paco

paco — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

You thought I wanted her for myself?

We could also open a thread on our news group. I only proposed to keep it away from the review, because it would maybe become too off-topic. And Marisa could be a bit reluctant to share her views so in the open (to prevent a flame-war).

By: marisa

marisa — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

I’m sure however critical the foreign media is against the US (and I think rightly so) … we are overly patriotically biased in the other direction.

Which (to bring this back to the movie) was another surprising thing about The Quiet American. It was produced as a very mainstream film and even nominated for an Oscar … YET it is very critical of U.S. foreign policy in Vietnam, albeit under the guise of fiction. (Of course … I still hadn’t heard enough about it to watch it until my Micheal Caine-loving mom came around!)

As for flame wars, bring it on. I notice the only people who flame me on my critiques of American culture are other Americans. It’s a pity that they believe patriotism can’t include a healthy bit of critical dialogue.