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Disgusting.
A collection of Film producers and executives are pushing once again to make it a crime for kids to download movies and songs.
They want the police to protect their massive profits and allow their lawyers to threaten ordinary people so they can tighten the cartel that holds us to paying $30 for a CD that the original artists only make $1 profit on.
The police won’t investigate US film production companies ripping off local canadian artists, but a 15 year old downloading a movie his minimum wage mom can’t afford to rent should get sued they assert.
The police in canada would have to lock up or arrest 50% of Canadian businesses, that’s how many are using some cracked version of a business software.
Yet those same producers can take some Canadian artists ideas and make a couple of million, and the legal system here just laughs at local artists while taking kickbacks and paid for joyrides.
Have a good laugh when someone speaks about justice in Canada.
It’s only just if you’re rich.
I’m reading an excellent book called “The Film Director as Superstar”
Inside it’s cheesy 70’s cover is a collection of interviews with famous directors
most of whom began with self funded independent films
Reading it has reaffirmed much of what I’ve seen here
in “hollywood north”, the same kind of ripoffs and control
it’s amazing.
I’ve actually liked unions for most of my life.
If it wasn’t for unions, we’d all be serfs, not just the majority of us.
Unions grew out of gangs, and gangs are basically unions of poor people
sticking together to oppose the oppression, domination, and thievery of the rich.
Most unions started out from businesses built by gangs that originated from racial discrimination.
So the Italian, Irish, Black, Hispanic, etc. immigrants who encountered hatred and discrimination when they came to north america, banded together to make work for each other and protect their people from ending up in sweatshops.
The book is facinating.
The starting stories of these directors are really similiar to what I’ve encountered here in this city.
Kubrick, De Palma, Lucas, Polanski, and others all seem to tell a similar story, with some excellent quotes I might add later to this.
Their first couple films had to be made with their own money.
No one wanted them to tell THEIR story.
All the money people, the “hollywood” bullshit, tried to keep them from making their first films
tried to shut them out, shut them up
Because they didn’t want anyone else to control their vision
They didn’t want to make a film by comittee
they had a vision, and they were willing to work with a small crew of independents to make it happen.
Now they are all superstar award winners.
But in the beginning, their first films almost didn’t get made
because of the hierarchical control system of the tinseltown monopolists
and active harassment by film unions.
The film unions pressured each of these directors, even threatening them.
But none of these now famous men could afford to make their first films that way
Hiring union people requires lots of money and a much larger crew
and as soon as someone else pays the money
then the message gets altered
edited
to please the investors
These are men who are now seen as giants in film
innovators, risk takers, visionaries
It wasn’t until they had some success with their own work, funded with life’s savings, that they could get funding without their work being subject to alteration by a goldmonger.
the groundbreaking eraserheads and dark stars,
would never be made in the hierarchical studio system.
The professional closure that unions create is good for the workers that are represented by a union
but terrible for art itself.
A union doesn’t care that it’s churning out 20 movies a year that sell guns and death to children
It’s people are making money
It doesn’t care that someone has a greater artistic vision
If they don’t want to submit to the control of the money people
the union itself will help to rip them off.
Robert Cooper is in a union.
So when he shook my hand and agreed to 15-20% of what he made for me on the ideas he used from our consultation, and then subsequently broke that deal, the union stands behind him.
IATSE calls me up and asks me to join.
I wonder why I would?
Most of the movies made in Vancouver are shit films made by committee
2 of my films have now been stolen by people who are union members
hundreds of union people in vancouver know the whole story about him ripping me off and cineworks ripping me of before that.
Ironically, if I had my proper earned credit on both works,
I would be able to apply for the writer’s union.
The little girl in the park suddenly points her finger at me like a gun
“I’m killing you” she says
that’s what we make for her here….
So we’ve recreated the great depression
10% + unemployment rates
rrsp rip offs
life savings destroyed
unscrupulous business owners paying unliveable wages
using “the economy” as an excuse
union workers who once spit on the poor, laughing
now stand in food bank lines
provinces finding every little reason to disqualify people for the most basic of benefits
basic food and shelter
minimum wages that don’t pay enough for basic rent
The Feds have to realize
that at some point there is a bottom
that we can’t drive people below.
The provinces are squeezing people trying to cut everyone off of basic welfare
people with disabilities
getting harassed constantly
if you harass them enough maybe they’ll give up and leave
whole communities displaced
There should be no way that someone can be cut off from the basics.
The most basic.
People who are 60+ shouldn’t be forced to work or look for work.
and we give handouts to the fatcats
who’ve been bleeding everyone for years.
Get ready for the big party, the Olympics is here
clean up the mess, shovel these people into graves,
or better yet cremate them
so we have room for more of the rich from other countries
fuck the poor from here…
