NoYank. Remove All American Media And Culture From Your Life

Trailer: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=XD_MLvGrGCY / https://vid.priv.au/watch?v=XD_MLvGrGCY / https://invidious.perennialte.ch/watch?v=XD_MLvGrGCY / https://yt.artemislena.eu/watch?v=XD_MLvGrGCY / https://iv.ggtyler.dev/watch?v=XD_MLvGrGCY

IMDB: 7.2 out of 10 at the time of posting. Back to his golden age before the events of "Money Heist," Berlin and a masterful gang gather in Paris to plan one of his most ambitious robberies ever.

Wikipedia: eight episodes, "The Daily Beast's Noel Murray felt the plot and new characters did not hold up to the original Money Heist."

cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/1475608

nevermind, already been done

The moral of the story is to be really mean and inconsiderate of people around you. That plus wishful thinking + Protestant work ethic will make you heroic. That's the entire point, repeated over and over again throughout the film.

It's just constant, really obvious repetition of lines like – "I'm torn between that and the loathing of the self-respect I might lose if I don't do it. I suppose the word is pride. I, uh... I feel that I failed, mentally especially."

Here's a dialogue from it –

You really don't get it, do you? What this is like for us? We're broke. The time, the emotional toll. I mean, it's been years, Diana.

Well, suck it up. We're a team, right?

Wow.

Your superiority complex is really screwed up, you know that?

Yeah. Well, everyone should have a superiority complex. Everyone should feel like the star of their own life.

I'm not even interpreting: it's explicitly trying to glorify pride and using other people for your ego. That's the whole gist of the story, more than I can get across in a few quotes.

cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/1349205

Yesterday I made the mistake of watching random comedians on youtube. One guy I saw had an audience of thousands of people in Australia, and he told nothing except painfully racist anti-China jokes. (Yes, it might have been the algorithm being like: "You like China? Well, howabout a comedian advocating genocide on China?") Everyone on hexbear knows that this is typical for comedians because the audiences at comedy shows tend to be drunk bourgeois scum, etc., etc.

But it's not just comedy. How many movies have you seen or books have you read where any of the characters, at any point, says something incredibly basic like: "capitalism bad, communism good." I'm not even sure Soviet or Chinese movies go that far (with the notable exception of Eisenstein's films...which were made before 1945). Plenty of works of art might imply that there is something corrupt about the military, police, or the powers-that-be, but they will never say that the system is the problem and that a better system exists. One very rare exception I can think of is The Battle of Algiers.

Also think about the dogshit novels Americans have to read in school: Animal Farm or To Kill A Mockingbird. The moral of both stories is basically: "Opposing the system is futile. Accept the system." Nabokov is hailed as the greatest novelist of the latter half of the 20th century, but he's basically a highbrow version of Ayn Rand, and repeatedly condemns communism by name in his books. We also know that the CIA had (and has) its fingers in every pie, and that the PMC also knows that it's not allowed to "get political," i.e., provide context. Even when it comes to classical Russian literature, Dostoevsky is probably the most popular in the USA, and the guy is a reactionary Christian monarchist who recycles the openings to his novels and is apparently nowhere near as popular in Russia.

I've just also been thinking about the greatest works of Statesian literature, how they are few and far between, how they were all written before 1945, and how they rarely were recognized for their greatness until long after their authors were dead. Steinbeck is one exception. The Grapes of Wrath is great (it was also written before 1945), but doesn't advocate for a better system. Poe and Melville are as good as the best writers from any other country, and Melville specifically inveighs against colonialism in his earlier novels, but both of these dudes were dead before they were recognized as titans. (Melville enjoyed some early success but then faded into obscurity long before he finished Moby Dick.) Are any post-1945 Statesian writers as good as Poe or Melville? Maybe just Octavia Butler, who was dead before she was a household name AFAIK. She advocates for communism in Parable of the Sower, but has to hide it behind mystical language ("God is change"). Sorry To Bother You is one possible cinematic exception, but it never goes beyond saying that the system sucks.

I'm wrapping up a trilogy of novels at the moment, and they are blatantly pro-communist, and I'm just preparing myself for the fact that they are almost certainly not going to be a success, not just because of the numbers involved (millions of books published every year), but because of the passionate anti-communism in western countries. These books don't have people saying "capitalism bad, communism good." But they do have workers and peasants forming Soviets (even though they aren't called Soviets), and I know from experience that even if as a writer you never turn to the camera and say "capitalism bad, communism good," readers will still pick up on the fact that something is wrong, from a capitalist perspective—that workers aren't capable of doing anything on our own, we need guidance from our enlightened masters, "human nature" is futile to oppose. I think there's just a dialectical materialist style of writing that liberals and fascists pick up on without necessarily knowing that they're picking up on it (because they spend their entire lives asleep).

Also I thought about this because I just saw and liked Trumbo, even though I was like: the blacklist never ended lol, where is my biopic about Paul Robeson, a Black colossus who never backed down from praising Stalin? Even if your job is dog shit picker upper (which I have done), you’ll lose that job if you praise Stalin.

And yes, this is a Arby's.

https://yewtu.be/watch?v=LEp9UvQAa5c&listen=1

https://yt.drgnz.club/watch?v=LEp9UvQAa5c&listen=1

https://yt.artemislena.eu/watch?v=LEp9UvQAa5c&listen=1

https://invidious.io.lol/watch?v=LEp9UvQAa5c&listen=1

https://iv.ggtyler.dev/watch?v=LEp9UvQAa5c&listen=1

https://invidious.nerdvpn.de/watch?v=ZczP_mqJyYI&listen=1

https://invidious.asir.dev/watch?v=ZczP_mqJyYI&listen=1

https://iv.nboeck.de/watch?v=ZczP_mqJyYI&listen=1

https://onion.tube/watch?v=ZczP_mqJyYI&listen=1

https://anontube.lvkaszus.pl/watch?v=ZczP_mqJyYI&listen=1

https://invidious.nerdvpn.de/watch?v=-fo-8DWe6gE&listen=1

https://invidious.asir.dev/watch?v=-fo-8DWe6gE&listen=1

https://iv.nboeck.de/watch?v=-fo-8DWe6gE&listen=1

https://onion.tube/watch?v=-fo-8DWe6gE&listen=1

https://anontube.lvkaszus.pl/watch?v=-fo-8DWe6gE&listen=1

https://invidious.nerdvpn.de/watch?v=LTll8PHXZ2k&listen=1

https://invidious.asir.dev/watch?v=LTll8PHXZ2k&listen=1

https://iv.nboeck.de/watch?v=LTll8PHXZ2k&listen=1

https://onion.tube/watch?v=LTll8PHXZ2k&listen=1

https://anontube.lvkaszus.pl/watch?v=LTll8PHXZ2k&listen=1

https://invidious.nerdvpn.de/watch?v=slH62Y55GrQ&listen=1

https://invidious.asir.dev/watch?v=slH62Y55GrQ&listen=1

https://iv.nboeck.de/watch?v=slH62Y55GrQ&listen=1

https://onion.tube/watch?v=slH62Y55GrQ&listen=1

https://anontube.lvkaszus.pl/watch?v=slH62Y55GrQ&listen=1

The Pogues – Boys from the County Hell (1984) https://yewtu.be/watch?v=XQKETnoQQKY&listen=1

The Pogues – A Pair of Brown Eyes (1985) https://inv.tux.pizza/watch?v=zNtQ5AnRlz8&listen=1

The Pogues – Dirty Old Town (1985) https://inv.tux.pizza/watch?v=s11BuatTuXk&listen=1

The Pogues – Sally MacLennane (1985) https://onion.tube/watch?v=ym-Oz0TMSb0&listen=1

The Pogues – A Rainy Night in Soho (1986) https://inv.tux.pizza/watch?v=PSyL-TrD_2g&listen=1

The Pogues – Fairytale of New York ft Kirsty MacColl (1987) https://yewtu.be/watch?v=j9jbdgZidu8&listen=1

The Pogues & the Dubliners – The Irish Rover (1987) https://invidious.fdn.fr/watch?v=yAEFKjqPtlU&listen=1

The Pogues – If I Should Fall from Grace With God (1988) https://yewtu.be/watch?v=B4v6aNjGFFk&listen=1

Shane MacGowan and the Popes – That Woman’s Got Me Drinking (1994) https://yewtu.be/watch?v=0YdYJbGwM4A&listen=1

Shane MacGowan and the Popes with Sinéad O’Connor – Haunted (1994) https://inv.tux.pizza/watch?v=_q7307IWwr4&listen=1

e.g. if you execute vlc https://iptv-org.github.io/iptv/countries/kp.m3u, you get channels from North Korea

It seems to have thousands of channels available; I think it's around 6000. That's some world culture right there. Enjoy.

He also refers to his own culture in the past tense smh

• https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0259534/ – 9.2 rating

Runtime 2h15m

The fantastic story of Rama, a young prince who has been banished to the forest by his stepmother. He is under the protection of his wife Sita and his brother Lakshman. When a powerful demon king Ravan abducts Sita, Rama reduces into tears and sorrow but he stays strong and fights. He must fight warrior demons, control his sorrow and fight until his wife is free.

• IMDB – https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27208330/ –8.7 out of 10

A guy who is struggling financially and trying to pay for his father's healthcare gets drawn into a violent crime family in the northeast

Highly recommended, provided you're ok with rough, intense crime stuff

Let's copy American city planning what could go wrong?

Assassin’s Creed and Total War have proven that video games can be better than any tattered textbook at bringing history alive – though they do tend to retread the same old battlegrounds of western Europe. China’s Everstone Studio is hoping to change that, letting players loose on an open world 10th-century China in its debut game, Where Winds Meet.

Here, we are put into the sandals of a nameless young martial artist and transported back to the dramatic fall of the Southern Tang dynasty, where the sudden poisoning of Emperor Li Yu thrusts our hero into a dangerous new world. Despite its indie origins, Where Winds Meet looks like a game with a big budget behind it, drawing comparisons to Sucker Punch’s multimillion dollar samurai epic Ghosts of Tsushima. Its sprawling depiction of southern China is a sight to behold; comb through the gameplay videos and you’ll see its hero roaming across a luscious countryside one minute, stumbling upon a serene wildlife-filled pond the next and then being pursued by bandits after dark, dodging arrows on rain-soaked rooftops.

Where Japanese-made series such as Dynasty Warriors have had players happily cleaving their way across China’s third-century Three Kingdom era since the days of the PS2, Where Winds Meets dials the clock forward, exploring a far more chaotic and uncertain chapter of Chinese history. “Our goal was to offer something different,” say Everstone, who prefer to be quoted as a collective. “The Five Dynasties and 10 Kingdoms period in Chinese history is an extraordinary era characterised by disorder, even surpassing the turbulence of the Three Kingdoms era. As creators, we find this period fascinating.”

Where Winds Meets is heavily influenced by Wuxia cinema – the genre popularised by Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Combining history with a healthy dose of mythology, players can expect to hear philosophical musings from ancient Chinese poets, wrestle wild bears and master an ancient strand of kung fu by carefully observing a bathing frog.

“[Where Winds Meet] encompasses both realistic combat moves and elements that defy physical laws, filled with romantic imagination,” Everstone say. “We are striving to replicate various unique weapons from eastern martial arts, such as spears, swords, fans, dual swords, umbrellas and long knives.”

Where the aforementioned multimillion selling Ghost of Tsushima was a 13th-century Japan-set epic made by a firmly American studio, Where Winds Meets deals with the culture and history of its studios’ own homeland. When it comes to depicting kung fu especially, the team has gone to great lengths to do it justice. “We pay great attention to the portrayal of martial arts,” the team says. “ There are many fascinating kung fu designs, such as Xing Yi Quan, which originated from the simulation of animal hunting behaviour, and Fei Yan Zou Bi (which translates to “flying over eaves and walking on walls”), enabling swift traversal over obstacles.

“This kind of kung fu has appeared before in martial arts literature and films but … this fusion isn’t merely about combining martial arts themes with an open-world game setting; it involves a genuine interweaving of these elements, to the extent that removing either component would render the experience incomplete. The collision and integration of these eastern martial arts abilities … this is what sets us apart from other open-world games.”

In an intriguing touch, outside the blood-spattered main storyline, Everstone promises that players will be free to ignore their heroic quest in order to take up more unconventional roles. You can hone your gift of the gab to become an entrancing orator, study medicine and roleplaying as a doctor or lay down your sword to learn construction or commerce, bringing a life-simulation flavour to this historical epic.

Where Winds Meet’s ambition is commendable at a time when spiralling production costs are leading many studios to produce increasingly safe and conservative open-world games that feel the same, despite their different settings. Its developers are delving into their heritage to create something distinct.

• It starts with an anecdote of how the author was namechecked as a "Black historian". He says, "Who knew? Until then, I was simply known as a historian. The editor was dismayed when I complained about not wanting to be racialised in this way; he imagined I’d be delighted with the capitalisation and upgrade from black to Black." The editor had been advised to do this by Americans.... "America’s obsession with race and its culture wars, focused in recent years on Derrick Bell’s critical race theory (the notion that racism is an ineradicable feature of the US)"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_race_theory – Wikipedia describes the theory as including tenets that "race is... a normalized feature of American society.... and that racism in the U.S. is permanent."

This is about as relevant to the 96% of humanity as gender relations in China. Relevant to a smaller number of people, in fact

• "Owolade contends that Britain continues to cede authority to the US, especially in matters of race.... Britain’s problems with race pale beside the awful day-to-day enmity in the US. Increasingly, though – with the murder of George Floyd, the adoption of acronyms such as Bipoc (Black, Indigenous and People of Colour).... Black Lives Matter, and the mass incarceration of African American men — insights from across the Atlantic are embraced. This is tied up with the allure of America generally, believes Owolade. Which is undoubtedly true: even today British newspapers are more likely to genuflect in front of an African American than a black Briton."

This is right. America has unique race-relations that I don't claim to understand and amn't particularly interested in. An American will screech, "But they're objectively important!". Well they are objectively less important than Amhara-Oromo relations, for example; they cause fewer problems and kill far fewer people.

Racial issues happen everywhere, or almost everywhere. And I believe that the is a global-scale hierarchy of whites over blacks (Europe exploits Africa, not the other way around). But these issues are deeply, complicatedly, finely specific to each country. You can't copypaste the USA's theories on race (or gender for that matter, or right-and-left, or Islam) to another country.

• he warns that America’s battles have been adopted here and should be rejected. “This book argues two main points,” he writes. “We should understand race in Britain through a British perspective, and we shouldn’t reduce black people to their race.”

This is the take-home point.

• An example of how race relations are different in different countries: Britain has Caribbean blacks and African blacks, and they have different social issues, different statistical outcomes. I don't think that's a thing in the USA (is it?)

• "I hold no brief for Andrews but I don’t think his proposition is without merit."

lol @ academics and their excessive use of negatives

• “Even when two nations speak the same language, [race] can be lost in translation.” His book shows that in this country’s polarising culture wars its attitude towards race is being shaped by the enlightened and the bigots in the US. But he concludes: “To define someone exclusively by their race is to acquiesce to the visions of racists.” Amen to that.

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guns_%26_Gulaabs

• Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgEiBaF2mHA

• https://imdb.com/title/tt17524566/ — In a sleepy town, a mechanic struggles to emerge from his dead gangster father's shadow in a mission to win over the love of his life. An honest officer ends up being a chaos agent; whilst a reluctant cartel heir has an identity crisis.

It's more of a comedy than some of these suggest. Or maybe it's a drama that doesn't take itself seriously. The characters are mostly comic buffoons. I'm enjoying it.

• Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dy7zO64aAkA

• https://imdb.com/title/tt10241858/ – It follows four teenage girls living in a futuristic version of Lusaka, Zambia, who are recruited by a retired secret agent to save the world. (Rated 8.2 out of 10 now, uncommonly high)