Why would anyone boycott Anna Karenina or any of the Russian classics?
How can you even be "torn" about it? There's only one right answer.
How can you even be "torn" about it? There's only one right answer.
It's one tiny step removed from plain claiming some (Russian) authors should be canceled or not read because there's some folklore surrounding their importance for the construction of the national identity, and/or they defended some nationalistic ideals, and/or school children are taught silly nonsense about them.
Not many classic authors in any language would survive that filter.
Why, if we were to bar pieces of culture because school children are taught silliness about them, not much of the culture of the English-speaking world would survive!
I get that the current trend is to abhor anything Russian -- and also, that the current situation has not made it easy to sympathize with Russian-ness -- but really... this kind of articles is positively Orwellian.
Nothing good can come from ignoring/banning/canceling classic authors.
I remember watching the Chinese movie Hero (2002), sponsored by the state. The main premise of this beautiful movie is that dictatorship has its value that must be respected, and only people with deeper insight can understand it. Banning such works serves no purpose, but it's important for people to learn to spot manipulation and propaganda.
As far as I can see it has many people from Hong Kong in its cast -- including the awesome Maggie Cheung -- and the production company was from Hong Kong. Regardless, I don't consider "sponsored by the state" to be a naughty word, nor do I consider "fully privately sponsored" to be a badge of honor.
** Spoiler alert - don't read further but watch the movie instead! **
The whole movie is about the assassination attempt (OK, there is love and beauty and music, but the main plot is that). The main protagonist of the movie doesn't kill the emperor though as he understood what another character meant: that the emperor must not die, as the peace is possible only by uniting various ethnic groups by him.
On the surface, this kind of reasoning seems acceptable. In practice, though, forcing peace in this way just brings suffering and is a weak justification of imperialism. Look at the situation of Uighurs and Tibetans. A federation of states, in an integrated form like the USA or weaker like the EU seems to work much better in terms of benefits to their citizens than authoritarian empires in Chinese or Russian style.
> A federation of states, in an integrated form like the USA or weaker like the EU seems to work much better in terms of benefits to their citizens than authoritarian empires in Chinese or Russian style.
That's a lot of baggage to unload into a wuxia movie. It's a movie, a folklore fable more in the style of a Chinese Rashomon (to which it's been compared) than a way to introduce political discourse. I wouldn't overanalyze it, just like I don't watch samurai movies to criticize them because Japanese feudal society wasn't democratic.
I can guarantee you "Hero" is not communist propaganda. I thought we were past this level of paranoia with the Cold War over.
> Nevertheless, there were several film critics who felt the film had advocated autocracy and reacted with discomfort. J. Hoberman of The Village Voice deemed it to have a "cartoon ideology" and justification for ruthless leadership comparable to Triumph of the Will. Stephen Hunter of The Washington Post wrote an otherwise positive review but concluded: "The movie, spectacular as it is, in the end confronts what must be called the tyrant's creed, and declares itself in agreement with the tyrant."
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero_(2002_film)#Critical_resp...
Everybody make your own damn mind up.
But that also applies to this movie if the creators ideology hasn't leaked into it. Haven't watched so can't say.
The only reason he gets huge budgets and heads state filmmaking companies is because he’s an enormous Putin and war supporter.