"America isn't a country -- it's a business." The quote comes from Andrew Dominik and Brad Pitt's new crime film "Killing Them Softly," which premiered in Cannes for the public on Tuesday and is already being dubbed an anti-capitalist screed. The L.A. Times' Steven Zeitchik even wrote of the film, "It is arguably the first post-Occupy film -- or, perhaps, what the documentary "Inside Job" might look like if it was a fictional feature."
At a Cannes Film Festival press conference, Dominik said that America is largely about making money, and that that went double for Hollywood, according to Zeitchik, who argues, "Dominik's larger notion is that U.S. capitalism is deeply flawed, and that government, whether Democrat or Republican, has let down its people."
“We were certainly at the apex of the mortgage loan debacle,” Pitt said today in Cannes. “I felt that I was reading a gangster film and it wasn’t until the very end that it coalesced for me as far what the direction of the film is pointing to overall — that this microcosm is actually saying something about the macro world.”
Pitt even said that it was "criminal that there still haven't been any criminal repercussions" for those who caused the financial crisis.
“I always feel that crime films are about capitalism,” said Dominik. ‘’It’s the only genre where it’s perfectly accepted for all the characters to be motivated by a desire for money only.”
And as I argued yesterday, Dominik's film isn't the only one in Cannes infused with concerns that should resonate with the 99%.
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1 Comment
Ben | September 22, 2012 2:48 PM
Hey! Antony ! I see not only heroes of the lowsy film but its creators and You are motivated by money!
All of you-capitalist haters are the same for me as the big crosses draggers.