Posts Tagged ‘Brad Pitt’

Movie Review: Fury

Sunday, April 26th, 2020

Yesterday’s post featured Sherman tanks facing Panzers on the Golan Heights in 1967, so let’s do a review of a movie about a Sherman tank crew late in World War II to make it an All Sherman Tank Weekend, because why the hell not? (Plus it’s a chance not to talk about the Wuhan coronavirus, China or the lockdown.)

Title: Fury
Director: David Ayer
Writer: David Ayer
Starring: Brad Pitt, Shia LaBeouf, Logan Lerman, Michael Pena, Jon Bernthal
IMDB entry

Fury is the story of the crew of a M4A2 Sherman tank crew driving deep into Germany in April of 1945. It starts with the aftermath of a battle where where the crew had to haul a dead crewmate out and every other American tank but the titular Fury was wiped out. Soon tank commander ‘Wardaddy’ Collier (Brad Pitt) welcomes green recruit Norm (Logan Lerman) as their new assistant driver/machinegunner. They’re sent with a new platoon of tanks to rescue a trapped unit and the lead tank is promptly taken out by a panzerfaust. Fury leads an assault on a German antitank unit in a treeline, then participates in taking a large German town, where the tank crew spends some occasionally tense R & R with two German fraulieins before moving out to help defend a key crossroads. On the way, all the tanks in the platoon but Fury are destroyed in an encounter with a Tiger tank. The last 45 minutes or so of the film depict Fury’s crew, one tread taken out by a mine, defending the crossroads against an SS company.

Fury succeeds when it focuses on being a World War II tank film, and loses momentum when tries to Make Serious Statements About The Human Condition And How War Is Hell.

The scenes that work best are the everyday lives of the crew. They used real Shermans in the film, and the scenes inside the tank have the convincing claustrophobia of a real tank interior. (Though they vastly understate how noisy a tank interior is; some of that is inevitable, as no audience would want to watch an entire tank movie with the noise as loud as an actual tank, but the nosiebed here should have been louder to at least give a hint of the real thing.) The battle scenes are gripping, and the attention to detail pretty good; I especially liked the improvised log armor on the sides, and the use of different types of main gun ammunition for different purposes, including laying down smoke just like in the instructional videos.

A video tour of the interior of a Sherman (with some clips from the movie) is here:

Ignore the guy in the knight’s helmet.

On the other hand, no World War II unit used that many tracer rounds in daylight, and they didn’t look like lasers.

It’s the Deep Meaning Of It All Scenes that drag the movie down. Norm fails to machine-gun teenage German troops with the panzerfausts, with Dire Consequences. Collier forces Norm to shoot a German prisoner to Prove His Loyalty. A burning soldier shoots himself in the head. Another falls on a live grenade. After Norm makes out with a hot frauliein, want to guess who gets killed in a random artillery barrage?

No cliche will be left behind.

Despite that, the acting is very good. Pitt is fine as Hardened Stoic Leader Who Will Get His Men Through. Lerman is good in the green ostensible-viewpoint character role. Michael Pena (Luis in the Ant Man films) is solid as driver (and semi-comic relief) Gordo. Jon Berenthal does fine in the thankless “rude redneck with bad hygiene” role of gun-loader Coon-Ass.

Weirdly enough, the actor who comes out best is Shia LaBeouf as gunner Boyd “Bible” Swan. He brings a quiet, understated dignity to a role as a devout Christian, and “quiet,” “understated” and “dignity” are adjectives that seldom accrue to LaBeouf in any aspect of his life, and whose acting usually tops out at “only mildly annoying.” Jason Isaacs is also excellent in a supporting role as a gritty, unsentimental, matter-of-fact Captain.

Fury is worth watching, but it really could have been about 45 minutes shorter. The best war movies tend to be those that focus on soldiers just trying to do The Task At Hand (Das Boot being the classic example) and not worrying about making Deep Meaningful Statements.

6/10

Also, Hollywood needs to make more movies about tanks.

Here’s the trailer:

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Posted in Military, video | 3 Comments »

LinkSwarm for January 17, 2020

Friday, January 17th, 2020

Trade deals and Iran dominate today’s LinkSwarm:

  • President Donald Trump gets his trade deal with China.
  • Also, the senate just passed the USMCA trade agreement.
  • Iran is closer to regime collapse than ever before, says one of Obama’s National Security Advisors:

    Asked about the possibility of regime collapse, General James Jones, who was Obama’s national security advisor in 2009 and 2010, said the risk for Tehran cannot be ignored.

    “I think the needle is moved more in that direction in the last year towards that possibility than ever before with a combination of the sanctions, relative isolation of the regime, and then some catastrophic decisions have been made — assuming that we weren’t going to respond, which turned out to be a very, very bad decision,” Jones told CNBC’s Hadley Gamble at the Atlantic Council Global Energy Forum in Abu Dhabi on Sunday.

    The response Jones referred to was the U.S. drone strike that killed top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani on Jan. 3, a move that shocked the region and prompted a response from Iran in the form of missiles strikes on two military bases in Iraq that housed U.S. forces. No one was killed in the strikes. Washington says the strike was in response to the storming by Iranian-backed Iraqi militias of the U.S. embassy in Baghdad and purported threats cited by the White House of impending attacks on Americans.

    “I think it’s clear that the regime in Iran has had a very bad couple of weeks,” Jones said. “And one of the things that people don’t talk about too much is the degree of unrest that there is in the country, which I think is significant.”

    “So you take the removal of Soleimani, you take the accidental downing of the civilian aircraft coupled with the amount of popular unrest — the needle towards possible collapse of a regime has to be something that people think about. It’s probably not politically correct to talk about it, but you have to think about it.”

  • More on the same theme.
  • Strangely enough, Europe is also tried of Iran’s BS:

    Germany, France and the United Kingdom have launched a formal dispute mechanism against Iran which could end up putting international sanctions on the regime. The measure was announced on Tuesday following recent Iranian violations of the 2015 nuclear deal. The dispute will now be brought before a Joint Commission made up of Iran, Russia, China, the three European signatories, and the European Union. If the panel fails to resolve the dispute, the matter will then come before the United Nations Security Council.

    Even if the process gets stalled at the UN, Iran could end up facing comprehensive international sanctions — in addition to the current U.S. sanctions, media reports suggest. “If the Security Council does not vote within 30 days to continue sanctions relief, sanctions in place under previous UN resolutions would be reimposed – known as a “snapback”,” British newspaper The Telegraph reported.

    Tehran formally abandon the nuclear deal last Sunday by announcing its plans to scrap the limits on enriching uranium put in place by the international agreement, Iranian state TV confirmed. The move brings Tehran within striking distance of procuring sufficient weapons-grade uranium needed for a nuclear arsenal. The regime already possesses advanced missile delivery systems capable of carrying nuclear warheads.

  • Florida Republican representative (and veteran) Brian Mast at congressional hearing on Soleimani “If you walk out this hallway, and you take a right and a right and another right, you’re going to come to several beautiful walls that have the names of our fallen service members from the War on Terror,” Mast began. “And I would ask, can any of you provide me with one name on that wall that doesn’t justify killing Soleimani?” Dead silence ensues. (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)
  • Illegal alien crossing down 78%. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • Plus President Trump is transferring another $7.2 billion for border wall construction. (Hat tip: Director Blue.)
  • More swamp follies: “Federal Judge Orders Justice Department to Explain Why Awan Documents Are Being Kept Secret.”

    An apparently frustrated federal judge ordered attorneys for the Department of Justice (DOJ) to appear Jan. 15 for a “snap” hearing to explain why the government isn’t producing documents sought by Judicial Watch concerning former Democratic information technology aide Imran Awan.

    U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia Judge Amit Mehta’s unusual order followed a sealed submission by DOJ attorneys Jan. 10 in the case prompted by the nonprofit government watchdog’s November 2018 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit.

    Such hastily convened hearings are extremely unusual in a federal judicial system so jammed that months can pass before cases are litigated in courtrooms.

    “In a hearing last month, U.S. District Court Judge Amit P. Mehta expressed frustration and ordered the Justice Department to explain its failure to produce records by January 10 and to provide Judicial Watch some details about the delay,” Judicial Watch said in a statement Jan. 14 about the snap hearing.

    “Instead, the Justice Department made its filing under seal and has yet to provide Judicial Watch with any details about its failure to produce records as promised to the court,” Judicial Watch said.

    Federal attorneys previously said in December 2019 that they were unable to provide the documents sought in the Judicial Watch FOIA requests because they include materials from a “related sealed criminal matter.”

    I think we all know the real reason the DOJ won’t produce the documents: Because they’ll prove deeply damaging to Democrats. (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)

  • Another week, another Muslim child sex grooming gang in the UK, this one in Manchester.
  • U.S. to Iraq: Hey, if you don’t want our troops there, we can always take all our military aid dollars and go home.
  • Crazy Canadian tranny Jonathan “Jessica” Yaniv assaults a reporter.
  • Arizona Republican Senator Martha McSally calls CNN reporter Manu Raju a liberal hack. Good for her. (And yes, coverage of CNN’s putting it’s thumb on the scale for Elizabeth Warren and against Bernie Sanders is coming in next week’s Clown Car update.)
  • More about our crappy media: “So many of the people in foreign affairs journalism imbibed the “Bush lied us into war” rhetoric so deeply that they’ve concluded that American officials must be treated with way more skepticism than officials in secretive and serially dishonest authoritarian regimes. They say generals are always fighting the last war; apparently journalists are always covering the last one, too.”
  • Another real winner from the Islamic State:

  • Knife crime at 10 year high in England and Wales.
  • Hempstead, Texas mayor indicted on felony theft of services charges. Namely, he felt that being mayor meant he didn’t have to pay his utility bills. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Creepy porn lawyer Michael Avenatti jailed after bail condition violation. There’s not a violin small enough.
  • Interesting thread about emergency care in America.

  • Oh come on! I’ve got nothing for or against Odell Beckham, Jr. (he’s a talented wide receiver; bit of a chucklehead, but far from the worst among wide receivers (*coughcoughAntonioBrown*)), and people committing actual assault against police officers should be arrested. This isn’t remotely it.
  • Every Brad Pitt performance ranked. Haven’t seen every one of these, but from the ones I’ve seen: Yeah. Fair enough.
  • Vince Vaughn, good guy.
  • Michigan town buys electronic nose to smell marijuana. I can’t see this as a good use of taxpayer money.
  • “Que es mas macho?” This guy! (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
  • Enjoy the nightmare-fueled sounds of the apprehension engine.
  • This week’s dog tweet:

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    Posted in Border Control, Crime, Democrats, Foreign Policy, Jihad, Media Watch, Social Justice Warriors, Texas, Waste and Fraud | No Comments »

    Your Obligatory 2020 Democratic Party Presidential Horse Race Roundup

    Wednesday, January 2nd, 2019

    I hope you appreciate my extreme laziness restraint in not putting a 2020 Presidential Race Roundup up until now.

    Here’s the list of Democrats widely contemplated as be willing to climb into the clown car. I’ve divided them into two categories: Shiny Things and Old Warhorses.

    Shiny Things

  • Losing Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams: Doubtful. Says she’s open to the idea but hasn’t made any moves to run. Hard to see national donors backing her over Kamala Harris’ more obviously viable campaign.
  • Creepy Porn lawyer Michael Avenatti: Out, much to the disappointment of conservative pundits nationwide.
  • Montana Governor Steve Bullock: Maybe. He formed an exploratory PAC in 2017 and nobody noticed.
  • South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg: Acting like he’s running, despite no one knowing who he is. As a 36-year old gay white man, he only checks off one box in the Social Justice Warrior sweepstakes. He has twice Andrew Yang’s chance at being elected (2 x 0 = ___).
  • Former San Antonio Mayor and Obama HUD Secretary Julian Castro: Probably running. Evidently he didn’t want to let Beto O’Rourke take the “can’t win statewide in Texas so might as well run nationally” sweepstakes by default. Has the advantage (unlike O’Rourke) of being an actual Hispanic, but hasn’t made much of a national impression (or even a statewide impression).
  • Maryland Representative John K. Delany: Definitely in. AKA “Who?” Announced in 2017. He’s competing for the same “rich old white guy with the blue collar Catholic background” niche as Joe Biden, assuming that niche even exists for Democrats in 2020. You may think the guy has zero traction, but he’s already raised nearly $5 million.
  • Hawaii Representative Tulsi Gabbard: Running. As hard-left as Kamala Harris, except younger and prettier (not that any Democratic activist would admit that, even with a gun to their head). Doesn’t have Harris’ fundraising base or national media following. Sanders supporter in 2016, and she could be poised to pick up some Bernie Brigades if Sanders opts out.
  • Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti: Leaning toward a run. Hard to see where he finds running room, with Kamala Harris sucking up all the California money. Thomas Bradley is the standard for Los Angeles mayors running for higher office: A series of stinging defeats. But Democrats could do worse, and almost certainly will.
  • Former Tallahassee Mayor and failed Florida Senate candidate Andrew Gillum: Probably not. Beto O’Rourke raised a zillion dollars to overperform and still lose in 2018, while Gillum raised far more modest sums to underperform to lose a winnable race.
  • California Senator Kamala Harris: Almost certainly in: Hasn’t announced yet, but is acting like a candidate and raising money. The Social Justice Warrior and New York Times (but I repeat myself) favorite.
  • Former Texas Representative and failed Senatorial candidate Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke: Probably In. Hasn’t announced, but Ann Althouse thinks he’s running based on this video, and I don’t see any reason for him not to run, with high favorables, strong polling and having just received a zillion fawning national media profiles. The rules used to be that you couldn’t run for President if you lost your last race. But Hillary Clinton ignored that and won the nomination, and Richard Nixon won the presidency despite two high profile losses (the 1960 Presidential race and the 1962 California Governor’s race). And all sorts rules got thrown out with Trump’s election.
  • Incoming New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio Cortez: Constitutionally ineligible to run, as she won’t turn 35 until October 13, 2024. Duh. Listed only for the sake of completeness.
  • Ohio Democratic Representative Tim Ryan: Probably running. Seen most recently getting pantsed by Nancy Pelosi. Basically Beto without the fake Hispanic name, the senate run, the huge fundraising, or the fawning media coverage. So not like Beto at all…
  • California Representative Eric Swalwell: Probably running. Why is anybody’s guess. Joking about nuking gun owners may attract media attention, but voting for an unknown white guy with 1980s hair doesn’t seem to be on the Democratic Party activist agenda these days.
  • Venture capitalist Andrew Yang: Running but no one cares. He’s only a multimillionaire, which won’t get it done as an unknown outsider.
  • Wildcard Random Celebrity: You know some Democratic consultants must be looking high and low for “the Democratic Donald Trump,” the celebrity outsider that comes in and takes a crowded field by storm. Who has the gravitas to pull it off? George Clooney or Brad Pitt, maybe. Other A-listers I can think of have too much baggage (Robert Downey Jr.’s drug convictions, Tom Cruise’s Scientology, Ben Affleck/Matt Damon backing #MeToo targets, etc.) to be serious contenders. Dwayne Johnson says he’s not running (and might be a Republican).
  • Wildcard Random Billionaire: No idea who that would be, except it’s not going be to Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates. (Have you seen those guys speak?) Tom Steyer, maybe. Given the effectiveness his financial backing has had thus far, he could top the John Connelly in 1980 campaign for most money spent for fewest delegates garnered record.

    • Old Warhorses

    Some are old, and some are very old.

  • Former Vice President Joe Biden: Waffling. Biden has to think he could have taken Trump if he hadn’t left the field to Hillary. He seems to be laying the groundwork for a run. If elected, Biden would be 78 at his swearing-in ceremony.
  • Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg: Maybe. Says he’ll decide in the next couple of months. Can self-fund, but it’s hard to see how a guy less popular than Rudy Guilianni could do what he didn’t, and he’s sure to get dinged by Democrats for having been elected mayor as a Republican, no matter how nominal.
  • New Jersey Senator Cory Booker: Probably in. Spartacus said he’s considering it. He’s probably in because New Jersey law lets him run for both the Presidency and for reelection to the senate simultaneously. Second only to Elizabeth Warren in diminishing his chances in 2018.
  • Outgoing California Governor Jerry Brown: Maybe. His aura smiles and never frowns. But that speculation is from 2017, and Brown would be 82 come inauguration day. Brown first ran for president in 1976 and ran an effective, underfunded insurgent campaign in 1992.
  • Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown: Considering a run. A moderate from a swing state, Brown has the sort of resume Democrats used to consider for President, but these days he’s looking a lot more like the safe Old White Guy VP choice.
  • Pennsylvania Governor Senator Bob Casey, Jr.: Maybe. Hasn’t said yes or no. I could cut-and-paste most of the Sherrod Brown verbiage here. His primary appeal is geographic (Trump won Pennsylvania), which doesn’t seem to matter much to Democratic primary voters. [Corrected. – LP.]
  • Former First Lady, New York Senator and losing 2016 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton: Probably not. She wasn’t even healthy enough to run effectively in 2016, how is she going to take the grind in 2020? So I don’t give much credence to reports she’ll run. Her absence has not made Democratic voting hearts grow fonder. If I had to guess, she’s secretly hoping that Democrats end up with a brokered convention and she emerges as the consensus compromise nominee without having to campaign.
  • New York Governor Andrew Cuomo: Probably not. Says he’s not running. We know Cuomo lies, but his declaration, and the fact that so many Democratic-friendly media outlets that have previously given him a pass for his sleaze would attack him to boost other (likely non-male and non-white) contenders will probably keep him out.
  • New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio: All but out. Hasn’t announced he’s not running, but he barely even bothers to show up for his current job. Widely loathed with no national base and no notable fundraising prowess. Other than that he’s in good shape…
  • New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: Probably not. Young by warhorse standards, but she’s been a senator since 2009. Says she’s not running, and I don’t see voters crying out to vote for another female senator from New York…
  • Former Vice President Al Gore: No signs of a run, despite certain Democratic insiders openly pining for him.
  • Outgoing Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper: Probably in. Might be able to run as the “Pro Pot Candidate.” Unless that will be…
  • Washington Governor Jay Inslee: In. He’s running as the “all in on global warming” president, which I suspect has all the activist cachet of a Presbyterian sermon in a Democratic Party dominated by illegal alien activism and victimhood identity politics.
  • Virginia Senator and Hillary Clinton’s 2016 Vice Presidential running mate Tim Kaine: Probably not. Veep picks used to be considered contenders, but Kaine didn’t exactly set the world on fire. Said he wasn’t running right after Trump’s surprise victory, and hasn’t said anything to change minds since.
  • Former Obama Secretary of State and Massachusetts Senator John Kerry: Considering running. I don’t see him getting much traction, but he’s rich enough (from marrying well) to self-fund. He and Biden would be the only candidates with notable foreign policy experience (disasterous though it was), but when has that mattered in a recent Democratic Presidential primary?
  • Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar: Considering a run. A strong contender to snag some Clinton feminist cadres, having not made the many missteps Elizabeth Warren has, but it’s hard to see her gain much fundraising traction.
  • Former Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe: leaning toward it. Personally I expect the public appetite for a figure so closely linked to the Clintons to be extremely limited in 2020, and I don’t see any running room for him if any of the higher profile Old White Guys run.
  • Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley: Considering a run. In the Senate since 2009. Can you be an old warhorse if no one knows who you are?
  • Former First Lady Michelle Obama: Out. Both she and her husband say she’s not running. For once we should probably take them at their word…
  • Former Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick: Out. Says he’s not running, and there’s already enough real and potential Massachusetts candidates in the race.
  • Vermont Socialist Senator Bernie Sanders: Probably running. Getting screwed by Hillary and talk of a “socialist wave” in 2018 (deluded though it was) must be steeling his resolve, even though he’s a year older than Joe Biden.
  • Talk show host Oprah Winfrey: Probably not running. She says she’s not: “In that political structure — all the non-truths, the bullsh*t, the crap, the nastiness, the backhanded backroom stuff that goes on — I feel like I could not exist. I would not be able to do it. It’s not a clean business. It would kill me.” Translation: I’m just too pure for your rough and tumble politics.
  • Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren: In. She’s announced she’s running. After years of self-inflicted wounds, I expect her to lose badly.

    • Am I missing anyone here?

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    Posted in Democrats, Elections | 7 Comments »