I Hate and Renounce as a Coward (September 2015)

1.) 1.) I hate and renounce as a coward anyone who has allowed all of the above (in my initial 1999 rant) to continue and proliferate over the last 16 years. 2.) I hate and renounce as a coward anyone who attempts to create a movie franchise and doesn’t realize "their product" has more in common with a McDonald’s hamburger than a film. 3.) I hate and renounce as a coward any filmmaker who makes a film that encourages the audience to become a SPEAR-CATCHER for ANY organization or ideology whatsoever. 4.) I hate and denounce as a coward any filmmaker who makes yet another film about anything even remotely related to what we laughingly call "celebrity". 5.) I hate and renounce as a coward any actor or actress who spends more time at the gym than in acting class. 6.) I hate and renounce as a coward any and all fans (including both of mine) who use their fandom as a crutch to switch off their critical facilities. 7.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those American directors who have never grown up while making a career out of pandering to adolescent male fantasies and perpetrating a mindset that views arrested development as a virtue, no matter how much money they make or how famous they become. 8.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those "media professionals" who have contributed to the creation of POLICE STATE TV, where the only poor people visible on screen are either being arrested, imprisoned or harassed by some self-righteous moron enforcing "THE LAW" in that totally contrived and formulaic monstrosity known as "Reality TV." 9.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those foreign filmmakers who have rejected their national identities to churn out Hollywood-clones-with-subtitles or worse yet, dubbed into "American English." 10.) I hate and renounce as cowards all those brain dead cretins in film audiences whose life is so dull and meaningless they can’t resist checking their cell phones for the duration of the movie they’re attending, but only intermittently watching. 11.) I hate and renounce as a coward any unreflective jerk who believes our celebrity culture is anything but a cynical BAIT & SWITCH CON-JOB perpetuated by those in power employing "celebrities" to divert our attention as all those increasingly rich bastards proceed to rob us blind while they remain undetected and unhindered. 12.) I hate and renounce as a coward any website and/or website owner who charges filmmakers to review their film, no matter how lamely they attempt to defend their greed and stupidity. 13.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those filmmakers who have contributed to the castration of horror films, transforming them from a refuge of truly subversive thought into a formulaic recipe for return on investment. 14.) I hate and renounce as cowards all those "new media advisers" who encourage the few remaining, truly independent filmmakers to recycle the same old grocery-clerk/bean-counter tactics that came from Paramount in the 80’s. 15.) I hate and renounce as a coward any filmmaker who recounts their childhood-movie-going-experiences as an inspiration for anything other than puerile nostalgia designed for the emotionally stunted. 16.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those BIG STARS compelled to take a high-paying-role in something they wouldn’t have been caught dead in 20 years ago AND not use at least some of that money and/or prestige to back a film they actually believe in. 17.) I hate and renounce as cowards all filmmakers who feel the need to end their film with some bloated, bombastic, CGI inflated finale that has little or nothing to do with the proceeding hour or so. 18.) I hate and renounce as a coward those "creative" cretins who continue to churn out countless crappy remakes whose sole redeeming value is to remind us how good the original was. 19.) I hate and renounce as a coward anyone who doesn’t believe there is a direct relationship between the pervasive depiction of torture on our movie and TV screens and the systematic use of torture by our government. 20.) I hate and renounce as cowards all those editors who cut every two seconds in an a vain attempt to disguise the director’s lack of craft and/or poverty of invention, especially in all those high-budget/low-concept/action-extravaganzas. 21.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those directors who insist on an endless barrage of static, shallow depth of field compositions. 22.) I hate and renounce as a coward any filmmaker who makes a film featuring a strong female lead who is nothing more than a male action figure with tits. 23.) I hate and renounce as cowards all those "Fine Artists" who have switched to film, transforming what was once "the lively art" into something as dull and boring as all the other arts they have managed to embalm during the past century. 24.) I hate and renounce as a coward any film reviewer who spends more time and/or space recounting the plot than explaining what they thought about the film and why. 25.) I hate a renounce as a coward anyone who thinks boredom in a film is anything but a trick to make the audience believe they have to endure an equally boring life. 26.) I hate and renounce as a coward anyone dumb enough to still believe in heroes or heroines. 27.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those sound editors who feel the need to place loud audio "stings" on every little moment they want the audience to react to; like some kind of Pavlovian dog. 28.) I hate and renounce as a coward any actor or actress who turns down a role because it may damage what they perceive to be their "image". 29.) I hate and renounce as a coward all curators, who are nothing more than ass-kissing-gate-keepers for the rich and powerful, creating lazy audiences who are discouraged from thinking for themselves. 30.) I hate and renounce as a coward any screen writer who resorts to Aristotle’s Poetics as well as that vast army of Hollywood-script-gurus, constantly recycling the Poetics without even acknowledging their bare-faced-thievery. 31.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those aging filmmakers, who made their reputations churning out pop-corn-fueled-blockbusters and now complain about being unable to make "serious" films, that is, the very ones they helped kill off. 32.) I hate and renounce as a coward those filmmakers who spend most of their movie showing us the back of some performer’s neck as their camera keeps following behind them. 33.) And once again, I hate and renounce as cowards all those who know the truth of the above and continue to profitably remain silent.

I Hate and Renounce as a Coward (1999)

1.) I hate and renounce as a coward anyone who thinks they can cast a TV star and still be independent. 2.) I hate and renounce as cowards all those poseurs attempting to pass off their craftily conceived conformity as cutting edge. 3.) I hate and renounce as a coward every director who wastes film stock shooting a radio play disguised as a movie. 4.) I hate and renounce as a coward the next producer who tries to pass off another drab, middle class generation X model as white trash. 5.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those lazy bastards who use the lyrics of a song to set the emotional tone of a scene or name their film after some 60's pop tune. 6.) I hate and renounce as a coward those who have destroyed glamour in the name of some silly simplistic notion of realism. 7.) I hate and renounce as a coward any filmgoer who sits through a universally praised film they think is a piece of shit and doesn't stand up and scream at the screen. 8.) I hate and renounce as a coward any creative artist who chooses a difficult subject and punks out in their execution. 9.) I hate and renounce as a coward any filmmaker who hasn't taken the time to learn their craft. 10.) I hate and renounce as a coward those who would convince me that the "American Independent Film" has become anything but a greedy, cynical attempt to shove the European Art Film off American screens. 11.) I hate and renounce as a coward any editor who allows themselves to be persuaded by any being (whether living or dead ) to cut back and forth on every line of dialogue, as if Dragnet wasn't bad enough. 12.) I hate and renounce as a coward any filmmaker whose every character doesn't reveal some aspect of their soul. 13.) I hate and renounce as a coward any filmmaker who isn't' constantly struggling against the reality of their being paid to perpetuate the lies we live by. 14.) I hate and renounce as a coward those artists who have made "updated" film noirs that would more at home in a Vogue spread on Mr. Roger's Neighborhood. 15.) I hate and renounce as cowards all those countless film festival organizers whose sole goal is to make money. 16.) I hate and renounce as a coward every movie critic who has allowed themselves to become nothing but a high paid movie studio flunky. 17.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those cretins who believe that film history begins in the 60's, 50's, 40's, 30's or 20's... 18.) I hate and renounce as a coward any moron who makes or believes in 10 Best Lists, let alone 100 Best Lists. 19.) I hate and renounce as a coward the next discovery who passes of their credit card financed, dull as dishwater, coming of age "epic" as anything but a drab piece of shit. 20.) I hate and renounce as a coward those idiots who attempt to pass off their lack of style as somehow being more "honest." 21.) I hate and renounce as a coward those marketing geniuses who tell me that they have to know how to sell a movie before they make it. 22.) I hate and renounce as a coward writers who pass off their bland, pathetic, politically correct whining as insightful social criticism. 23.) I hate and renounce as a coward anyone who recycles old movies as a substitute for personal experience. 24.) I hate and renounce as a cowards the vast industry that's sprouted up to assist technically inept, spiritually bankrupt, morally corrupt, culturally deprived individuals make their "personal vision." 25.) I hate and renounce as a coward any brain-washed cretin who thinks scripts are anything but an invention of producers to control the creative process. 26.) I hate and renounce as a coward anyone who doesn't believe that the camera and microphone are the only true writing instruments of a film. 27.) I hate and renounce as a coward any director of photography who lights a scene that looks like a battle between three different schools of painting. 28.) I hate and renounce as a coward anyone who makes another irredeemably terrible movie from one of Jim Thompson's darkly, sublime books. 29.) I hate and renounce as a coward the very next "indie" filmmaker who recounts how they financed their film with credit cards, luring ...countless suckers to subsidize some conglomerate's independent film division's development fund. 30.) I hate and renounce as a coward anyone, whatsoever, who appears in TV commercials for independent film with some stupid, curly-headed little witch. 31.) I hate and renounce as a coward all those simplistic, moronic, critics who contribute to the creation of a simplistic, moronic audience. 32.) I hate and renounce as cowards all those who know the truth of the above, but profitably continue to remain silent.

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