"Blood Diamond" (2006 action movie with Leonardo DiCaprio)

For me as a conservative, these lines of dialogue raise the movie above most other Hollywood movies:

Archer (DiCaprio): So you think because your intentions are good they'll spare you, eh?

Benjamin Margai: My heart always told me that people are inherently good. My experience suggests otherwise. But what about you, Mr. Archer? In your long career as a journalist, would you say that people are mostly good?

Archer: No, I'd say they are just people.
-------------------------------------

I would've preferred the scene end there. But Margai has one last line, which isn't too bad:

The one annoyance is that the secondary villain (and the buffoon of the novel), Eugene Irving, is a Republican (emphasis mine):

His appointment as director had been partially due to his performance at the FBI, where behind his back his colleagues had called him the Charmer, as in snake, and partially because his cousin was a Republican congressman from Kentucky with plenty of pull on the National Intelli­gence Committee.

[page 114]

Irving's face was as stern and demanding as he could muster, but in­side, he was beaming. The speech had been a bit melodramatic in places, but overall it showed great political promise. I can work a crowd, he thought. He imagined himself standing at the pulpit of the Republican National Convention, his arms outstretched, his fingers giving the V for victory, the deafening roar of the crowd below him, and tens of thousands of balloons and confetti raining down around him. He would have to give some thought to a running mate.

[page 116]

Sidenote:

Conservatives rightly see bums lounging around public areas as a lose-lose situation – the bums are a blight on public areas, and they also don’t get the help they need.

But when conservatives express the desire to take bums (called “homeless” by the liberals) off the street, liberals view them (the conservatives) as similar to fascist James Bondian villains who are trying to recruit the unwilling into a “new world order.”

The antagonist of “Invasive Procedures,” George Galen, is in fact a fascist James Bondian villain trying to recruit the unwilling into a new world order, and in the following excerpts boasts of his grand plan to one of the novel’s heroes, Dr. Monica Owen.

But the sad truth is that this is what liberals actually think of conservatives.  As you read the following, keep in mind that the authors probably think of Galen as conservative and Dr. Monica Owen as liberal. As Dennis Prager says, conservatives think liberals are wrong; and liberals think conservatives are bad:

[George Galen] paused for a moment to study Monica's face. "You think I'm cruel, don't you?" he said.

Monica said nothing.

"We've rescued him, Doctor. Think of that. We took a young man who was dead to the world and we gave him a second chance at life. I know you may think our methods are a little unorthodox, but consider what we're accomplishing here. The world has turned its back on these people. We're giving them a life they never thought possible."

He smiled.

"Of course, they don't see that yet. They don't comprehend what we're doing for them. And frankly, I suspect neither do you. But again, I don't fault you for it. It's too new. It's too different from the world of medicine you know. But believe me, Dr. Owens. When all is said and done, I feel confident you'll agree that we were in the right all along."

He opened the door and led them inside.

[page 78]

This was the real George Galen, Monica thought: not the one who talked fancy about gene sequencers, but the one who kidnapped and used people and acted as if he were doing them the biggest of favors. He was the most dangerous of men, because in his actions, he saw only good. He saw himself as a hero.

[page 79]

Sidenote #2:

The following is my politically incorrect rewriting of a passage from the YA science fiction novel "Web of Fire" by Steve Voake.

I don’t want you to think the novel is political; it is not.

But for fun, I took out the made-up names of the society of villains and substituted the words Democrat and socialist; and I took out the made-up names of the society of heroes and substituted the words Republican, Christian, and conservative.

The result shows what the modern liberal is up against. She believes in the liberal fantasy. For the scales to fall from her eyes requires a big paradigm shift:

Alya spent the next few days searching through classified files stored on the computer system. Although she knew it was strictly forbidden, her encounter with the Republican boy at the airbase had merely added to her growing suspicion that the Democrat Party was very selective about what it allowed the people to know. Her history lessons at school had portrayed liberals and atheists as brave heroes who would ensure the fulfillment of ancient prophesies. Conservatives and Christians, on the other hand, were monstrous, evil creatures who would destroy the world unless they were eliminated.

But although Alya's quicksilver mind had led her to discover the keys to their ultimate destruction, it now made her question the morality of it. She wanted to be sure that it was necessary as she had always been led to believe. So, using the high-level clearance that her newly found success had given her, she had started to comb through the powerful computer database, entering keywords like Republican, Conservative, and Christian in an attempt to discover the truth.

And what she discovered was nothing short of a revelation to her.

Initially, she as reassured by the fact that there was plenty of evidence to back up the lessons that she had been taught. Time and again she found examples of pollution, violence, suffering, and countless wars waged by Republicans. But gradually her careful research began to reveal that many of them were apparently peace-loving, responsible stewards of the Earth. And to her mounting horror and shame, she discovered that some of the most terrible, unspeakable acts of brutality had been done by liberals and socialists. For the first time, Alya saw with her own eyes the carefully catalogued records of methodical cruelty, meted out by atheists and socialists.

And as she sat alone at the computer watching images of ordinary Republicans going about their daily business, Alya realized two things; firstly, that it had not been conservatives who had killed her family, and secondly, that she had been lied to all her life.

Conservatives and Christians were not monsters; they were people, just like her.

The monsters, it seemed, were much closer to home.

Unless you are a liberal or a female. If you are, you may very well disagree with my assessment. And if you’re a both a liberal and a female then it’s likely you will disagree with me.

Three story events that ruin the movie for me:

Early on the two protagonists, Noah and Allie, are about to engage in an act that may result in her pregnancy when they are rudely interrupted by her outraged parents. That’s fine. What is bad is that this interruption is shown as a bad thing – akin to coming between Romeo and Juliette. Sorry, filmmakers, but I see stopping pre-marital sex between teens as a good thing.

Seven years later, Allie is about to marry Lon when she discovers Noah again and they fall into each other’s arms and have wild sex at his place. Noah goes out to get breakfast. Allie hears what she thinks is Noah returning but it’s actually her scandalized mother at the door. So far so good. But then Mrs. Hamilton reveals to her daughter that she too had a summer fling with a boy “from the wrong side of the tracks” when she was Allie’s age. Okay, so I think that this may not be bad; it may be the filmmakers making Allie’s mother into a more well-rounded character, even if it will send her daughter mixed messages about Noah. But it’s worse than that. Mrs. Hamilton actually implies that she regrets not following through with that long ago love affair. Then she gives Allie all the love letters from Noah that she had intercepted at the mailbox seven years ago. Well, that’s not even a mixed message; rather it’s a full-on message in favor of Noah, a reversal which goes against everything Mrs. Hamilton has done up to this point in the story. Sometimes character reversals are good; not this time.

Allie: “I made a promise to a man! He gave me a ring and I gave him my word!”

Noah: “This is not about keeping your promise! And it’s not about following your heart! It’s about security… Money! He’s got a lot of money!”

Noah (and the filmmakers) clearly think that “following your heart” is a good thing. Not I.