COMEDY POLL ANNEX--which film is more racist: Napoleon Dynamite or Ghostbusters?

as long as I get a paycheck I don't care WHAT it is.

A: The Party

I have seen SHIT that'll turn you WHITE

i can see why someone might think that napoleon dynamite is racist (personally, i think it's more misanthropic than racist and no i'm not a lol fan of this piece of shit). i don't get why anyone would think ghostbusters is racist -- would someone who does please explain?!?

why on earth would you ask Morbs to explain himself

oh it was him that made this claim? figures -- asking him to explain himself or proffer evidence for his assertions is the very definition of "exercise in futility."

Calling either of these movies racist is like disgustedly pointing out a bruised apple in a vat full of rotten fruit.

ghostbusters is pretty rightwing, but not particularly racist (esp as 80s comedies go). napoleon dynamite otoh...

correct me if i'm wrong but original plan for ghostbusters was belushi, murray, ayckroyd, john candy in the moranis role (they had a totally different idea for the character i think), and eddie murphy in the hudson role w/ that role substantially larger.

http://images.wikia.com/ghostbusters/images/6/69/Janinenewbio.png

yeah and it was gonna be in space

love annie potts so much, maybe my fave designing woman

trawling through the comedy poll thread, morbz's sole (and very flimsy) piece of evidence for the alleged racism in ghostbusters is a black maid whose eyes pop out when she sees a ghost.

and as far as i can remember never appears in the film again.

http://i43.tinypic.com/295spar.png

does it count that Winston bugs his eyes when addressing the mayor

"dogs and cats sleeping together"

like that would be a bad thing

there are also a bunch of Hasidim praying and looking very super-Jewy just as all hell is breaking loose in Manhattan and are also never seen again in the film. therefore, ghostbusters is also vile anti-Semitic garbage on a par with Jud Süss.

it's pretty racist against spacedogs

napoleon dynamite is racist only to time travelers' balls

office space is anti-Semitic b/c they had the joke about how the Nazis had flair that they made the Jews wear.

Pee-Wee's Big Adventure is fat phobic. Of course they made Francis the bad guy. I have lots of overweight friends, and none of them has ever stolen a bicycle. Oh, but I guess they're just some of the good ones, huh? Disgusting.

so inspired by the thread that inspired this thread - i just watched Blazing Saddles.
that is all.

also: n-bombs. so many n-bombs.

this is your last warning to STFU, T0dd.

http://i.ytimg.com/vi/CjLBb1YX0F4/0.jpg

LOL. I was looking through some past polls and remembered this exchange from the 2000s film poll. People have been questioning my taste/giving me shit over my Napoleon Dynamite stanning for at least two years now:

MD is a worthy #1, but is anyone else hoping it isn't?

deric w. haircare

― 鬼の手 (Edward III), Wednesday, February 10, 2010 9:43 AM (2 hours ago)

Okay, ha ha ha, I'm completely perplexed at what might've inspired this, but I will pre-emptively spoilerize my ballot this one time by saying that you are as wrong as you could possibly be.

― SNEEZED GOING DOWN STEPS, PAIN WHEN PUTTING SOCKS ON (Deric W. Haircare), Wednesday, February 10, 2010 1:04 PM (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

prolly your upthread defense of napoleon dynamite and cameron crowe, missed your expressed love of MD tho

xp to deric

― 鬼の手 (Edward III), Wednesday, February 10, 2010 1:10 PM (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

How is Ghostbusters even right wing? I don't remember any explicit or implicit political stance in that movie (let alone racism)?

well, the ghostbusters are a small business and the bad guy is a government regulator.

the villain is an epa guy w/ no dick, 'i've worked in the private sector - they expect results' type jokes, priest taken seriously when he speaks in the mayor's office.

i mean don't get me wrong, it's not red dawn or anything but reagan's definitely in the air

what if John Milius had written Ghostbusters

now there's a thought

yeah IIRC Ghostbusters heavily supports Austrian school economic models...

walter peck was right though, they shouldn't be operating unlicensed reactors just sayin

RIGHT?

I think people might be reading a little too much into this. The 'EPA dude as villain' thing is probably about as deep and meaningful as Aykroyd and Ramis thinking, "Okay, we need a character with a logical motivation for fucking up the Ghostbusters' steez at the end of act 2. WHO WILL IT BE?"

xpost

Exactly. They set their proton packs, etc. up as a potential obstacle almost from the start.

also smog emissions from ecto-1 probably off the charts.

yeah, i'm not saying it is right-wing, just that i can see as how others would draw that conclusion. and dan aykroyd is a conservative, or so i hear.

yeah i'm not saying it's rightwing propaganda, just that it definitely reflects the climate it was made in (see also back to the future). it's not an active agent of conservatism like red dawn or even john hughes movies maybe but it's not surprising to see it pop up on 'best conservative movies' lists and when it does it's not a case of some nro hack totally missing the point like when they have a 'best conservative rock songs' list littered w/ springsteen and the clash.

Ha, our social democrats are all about small business. But I suppose Ghostbusters may be anti-regulation in the way that School of Rock is anti-professionalism or Ferris Bueller is anti-education. Didn't remember the priest thing.

Ferris Bueller is anti-education

Actually, there's probably a stronger case for this. Anyway, no one seems to be arguing very strongly that Ghostbusters is all that right-wing.

ghostbusters 2 is a screed against the NEA, or at least public museums.

yeah in practice american conservatives could give two tenths of a fuck about small businesses, support strictly limited to rhetoric only.

obviously balls and Philip Nunez deserve to drown in molten marshmallow

I'm more amused at how it's trendy to say "the original years of SNL were shit" on ILX, but the most tiresome nerd obsession of the coulda-been-great Dan Aykroyd -- the paranormal -- is what you guys think is a classic for the ages. Dave Kehr nailed it with this opening line:

http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/ghostbusters/Film?oid=2456705

Still can't find a clip or still of the maid in question (it's NOT the "what the hell are you doin?" scene).

balls is right ... ghostbusters is a product of its times and it is small c-conservative. and OF COURSE in real life peck would be right but lol ghostbusters isn't real life.

so Kehr agrees with most of us then.

lol that opening line matches my feelings pretty much and i'm definitely pro-ghostbusters. morbs you really hate abbott and costello?

who thinks the original years of snl were shit? name names.

I suspect Meet the Mummy is not one of A&C's better efforts.

I've never said I hated Ghostbusters -- in '84 I thought it was 2.5/4. And like Kehr, I though the FX essentially ruined the comedy.

yeah balls, I'm gonna hunt that down for you. off to the laundry

Yeah, ball, he's gonna substantiate a claim for you.

i mean i saw some of the ballots for that comedy poll i avoided so i can believe such a contingent exists but i can also believe you're freaking out that someone somewhere might think phil hartman was funnier than chevy chase or robert smigel was funnier than tom davis.

I'm "on record" as saying that season 1 of SNL is pretty hard to watch, but I also acknowledge that they were experimenting and trying to hash out a format and that doesn't always make for the best television.

i am glad to say that since i hate one of these movies and dont really care about the other i am officially the least racist person on ilx, as proven by math

But jjjusten, Ghostbusters is the best horror movie of the last 30 years. How can you not care about that?

(Sorry, bro, gotta get started early.)

hahahaaa

wow Victoria Jackson is a moron

^iirc the beginning of a lengthy 'SNL suxx' conversation; I haven't read it recently so I don't remember which eras were being maligned or anything...

Twistin' the tracks on this epic derail...

The problem (which shouldn't be as much of a problem these days, what with the availability of the entire series on Netflix) is that the general impression of old-school SNL eras get inevitably colored by nostalgia and critical acclaim/disdain. I've probably seen half of all the episodes at this point, from all different eras, and the truth is that it's always been of about middling quality. Some will argue for an uptick in quality during those first five years or during the tenure of the classic '80s cast (I will make that particular argument), but by and large it doesn't really get much more noticeably worse. The only distinct exception I can think of is ca. '95-'96, which was pretty bad. I'll even rep for the Doumanian season. Even when it's not great, there are usually at least some solid performers/writers on board, which is most of why I watch and enjoy the show.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

but by and large it doesn't really get much more noticeably worse. The only distinct exception I can think of is ca. '95-'96, which was pretty bad. I'll even rep for the Doumanian season.
― 1 of paper = 4 of coin (Deric W. Haircare), Thursday, April 5, 2012 1:05 AM (4 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

There was one season in that whole piscopo/robert downey jr. era that was just totally wretched.

I actually really enjoyed the critically reviled 90s years. The show was really weird then.

The show is also really terrible right now btw

All mainstream American comedies are right wing

everything is terrible and/or racist

lock thread

TRY TO BATTLE MY BOYS, THATS NOT LEGAL

"terrible" and "racist" are not mutually exclusive

gotcha

unlock thread, as you were

Wait what about and/or?

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

welp

huh

I have no idea what this means

it means Morbs didnt vote?

never seen these results before

This poll should have included that all-white production of The Wiz.

The Wiz was sooooooooo close to making the comedy poll; if it had only been nominated.

trawling through the comedy poll thread, morbz's sole (and very flimsy) piece of evidence for the alleged racism in ghostbusters is a black maid whose eyes pop out when she sees a ghost.

having just seen this on the big screen the other day (for the first time ever, unless you count catching a scene here and there on cable), i can swear that this scene is not in the movie. unless it's a subliminal image or something.

next, The Shining and Scatman Crothers

Scatman is definitely more racist than The Shining