Independent Sources wasn’t going to write about this topic (Stone being picked to direct the first movie on the events of 9/11) since it was being covered ad nauseum in other places, but when we read the interview Stone just gave to quell the controversy, his comments were so bizarre that we felt it was our civic duty to comment. (Let’s call it the Tom Cruise Syndrome: Problem on Oprah, go make a goof of yourself with Matt Lauer to get them to forget about Oprah). Presumably Paramount thinks that if Stone says enough dumb things now, people will forget what he said four years ago. Interesting strategy.

First some quick back story. Oliver Stone made an ass of himself on a panel held barely a month after the 9/11 terrorist attacks by relaying his theory that the attacks were a revolt against the six companies who control the world… (i.e., media companies). It gets worse. . He had this exchange:

 They control culture, they control ideas. And I think the revolt of September 11th was about ‘Fuck you! Fuck your order—’ 

 ”Excuse me,” a fellow-panelist, Christopher Hitchens, said. ” ‘Revolt’?”

Whatever you want to call it.

“It was state-supported mass murder, using civilians as missiles,” said Hitchens, a columnist for Vanity Fair and The Nation.

The studios bought television stations. Why? Why did the telecommunications bill get passed at midnight, a hidden bill at midnight? The Arabs have a point!

It’s interesting. In everything that I’ve read about the Jihad, the terrorists, etc. and their hatred for all things that are not radical Islamic, I don’t remember seeing al Qaeda harping on the Telecommunications Act.

Now let’s go to present day and the interview  designed to quell controversy about the director selection. In the interview Stone took the opportunity to admire the response of the British to the London attacks (by Islamic terrorists) by saying:

“They (the British) didn’t run around and call for huge pieces of legislation costing billions of dollars to defend our homeland and create a huge war in a foreign country.”

Not to fisk Mr. Stone’s words (as goofy as they are), but the British are already fighting in Iraq so I’m not sure of the point he’s trying to make. Second, it would appear that he is proposing that spending money on homeland security is a bad thing. If so, he’s pretty much alone in that assessment. In fact, listening to his words, Stone sounds an awful lot like the two flag-burning teen anarchists caught in Florida last month (“Dude,  free trade sucks!”)

Stone went on to say that the Palestinians who danced at the news of the attack were reacting just as people had responded after the revolutions in France and Russia.

Yeah, exactly the same thing. No difference.

Brad Grey, what in the world are you thinking? Since you are head of a studio that in Oliver’s world is one of the companies that controls the world, why couldn’t you control this one?

Update: Greg Gutfeld of Maxim Magazine weighs with his suggestion for a more appropriate director…Theo Van Gogh. (ed. note: Brilliant.)

Update: Michelle Malkin reports that filming has begun in NYC.

Ward Churchill

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 14th, 2005 at 12:37 am by Insider and is filed under Media, Nemesises ... Nemesi?, War. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.