libertarian Hollywood?

From Carl Horowitz at TownHall.com...

Horowitz opens with a quote from Clint Eastwood, one of the more famous libertarians: “I like the libertarian view, which is to leave everyone alone.”

Culture War polemicists who imagine themselves to be carrying the torch of liberty frequently proclaim that today’s film producers and directors “mock” and “ridicule” our nation’s cherished values....Actually, the “agenda” of today’s American filmmakers, aside from making money, is storytelling....If the politics of certain longtime filmmakers (Mike Nichols and Spike Lee come to mind) veer leftward, that’s not propaganda. It’s called a point of view. And everyone has one.

Now for the main point: Hollywood does have a reigning political sensibility. It’s called libertarianism, or more accurately, individualist libertarianism. Now before your jaw drops further, I’m not saying that audiences regularly exit local multiplexes ready to storm the barricades for Ron Paul. That’s not the way film, even political film, works....But it is an underappreciated fact that the fight for liberty is a common theme in recent movies, and not just those directed by Clint Eastwood or starring (Cato Institute supporter) Kurt Russell....

If you want hard evidence, the best place to look would be the celluloid heirs to George Orwell’s 1984. Recent feature films such as Enemy of the State, Minority Report and Eagle Eye each revolve around a latter-day Winston Smith, forced on the run from a centralized force armed to the teeth with hyper-sophisticated surveillance technology...resistance to Big Brother-run technocratic dystopia animates Demolition Man, The Sixth Day, Blade Runner, Dark City, The Matrix trilogy, Escape from New York, and its sequel, Escape from L.A.

There is also a low-key variation on this theme of an individual rebelling against his controlled existence: naïve Everyman awakened. Outstanding examples include Groundhog Day, Stranger than Fiction, Pleasantville, Gattaca and The Truman Show. Each film is, at bottom, a libertarian critique of how modern video culture blurs actual and simulated reality to the detriment of the individual....

A conservative strain within the theme of libertarian resistance to the centralized perfection of mankind also finds expression in movies based on the science fiction of Michael Crichton....

Recent westerns, such as Unforgiven, Open Range and Appaloosa, contain a strong undercurrent of libertarian moral realism; in the Wild West, where even lawmen can be lawless, an honest man has to defend himself with whatever it takes....

Many full-length animated productions, especially Disney/Pixar’s The Incredibles, palpably celebrate liberty....

In the face of all this, why, then, do self-styled culture warriors insist that Hollywood is a vast anti-American Leftist monolith? Aside from sheer intellectual laziness, the most plausible explanation lies with their need to rouse the rabble....