Even though he hadn't actually seen the movie, Leonard Peikoff decided to comment on the movie Titanic on his weekly radio show.
BEGINNING OF PEIKOFF'S REVIEW OF TITANIC
"What about this movie, Titanic? I haven't seen it. But I've got a very interesting review here, by a guy called Tim Page from The Washington Post. The same outfit that puts out Newsweek. And it's a terrific review, and it gives you a little clue of the American attitude toward wealth. This move, by the way, is the top grosser of all time. It's up for more Academy Awards than Gone With The Wind.
Now of course, part of it is, it's got this love story (if you can call it that), and Leonardo Dicaprio, that all these young girls just love, and it's got all kinds of fabulous special effects. But apparently the American public didn't mind what it also has, and that is pure Karl Marx from beginning to end. It's Communism! It's a Communist metaphysics presented in this movie, and believe it or not, The Washington Post ran a really intelligent comment on Titanic. And even though I haven't seen the movie, when I come back I want to give you a clue as to what that comment is; give you a little excerpt from it, because I agree with it completely, and ask you to call and tell me, is this your attitude toward wealth? Is this whole country Marxist? Or how do you explain the success of Titanic?
[Station Break]
"I'm just about to give you an excerpt from a review of Titanic by Tim Page of The Washington Post. I haven't seen the move, but from everything I've heard, this man is one hundred percent accurate. It's frightening to think that this kind of a movie, with this kind of content, has received such terrific box office from the American public. Let me quote from Tim Page:
"Titanic strikes me as gaseous, overblown, and in some ways downright pernicious. Imbued with a snide and debasing populism that could have come right out of a Depression-era morality fable. Rich people are bad, you see. Virtually all the passengers in the Titanic's First Class cabin are clipped, vitiated, mammon-worshipping monsters with blood colder than the fatal iceberg. Down in Steerage it's a different show, of course. Strong, hardy, lusty men and women who spit, leer, and party; embracing life and one another with equal gusto.""Another way of putting it is a Red Decade movie. The Rich are evil and the Poor are the vital livers of life, and we have to change our whole system to get rid of this rule by the Rich. Now Titanic doesn't give you a political moral, but I quote again from Tim Page:
"Titanic celebrates a dangerous distortion of democracy. The ideal it holds out is not a system that permits worthy people to learn and rise, regardless of modest origins, but rather a vast leveling where the lowest common denominator is exalted, and anything that smacks of manners or intelligence is suspect.""In other words, it's pure egalitarianism. No one is to be better than anybody else. Everyone is equal. Isn't it frightening that the American Public is flocking to this movie? Why do you think that is? What could be the explanation that this Land of the Free, and of the right to the pursuit of happiness, and of Capitalism, is causing, or at least in Bill Gate's mind is requiring him to pretend that he lives in Steerage because, God forbid, he should have money? And the movies about it tell us the same message. Are we against wealth? Are we New Delhi reincarnated? Is this now the ancient Orient again? What happened to the New World? Well, there's a clue in this article by Tim Page. He concludes by saying, "Only Hollywood could give us this film." His explanation? He quotes from Dicaprio. ""Don't think!" Dicaprio shouts as he tries to teach his girlfriend to whirl about in an informal dance. The makers of Titanic lived up to his advice."
"And I think that's the truest answer there is. They don't think either. They are completely mindless, making these movies. They just accept whatever bromides there are. But what about the American public? When are they going to wake up and start to think? Or have they lost the skill and ability to think, thanks to decades of Progressive Education, which is finally consolidated when everyone is lobotomized at college? Is there anybody left in this country who can stand up and say something other than the bromides of the moment? It looks bad right at this moment. What do you think?"
When a listener suggested to Peikoff that his comments on Titanic were inaccurate, Peikoff admitted that he had a "hobbled case" since he hadn't seen the movie. He then said:
"I'm going to go and see that blasted movie with an objective mind, and an Objectivist mind, and see whether it really is what I think from these type of comments, or whether there's something to what you say, and I will come back and report. That's a horrible sentence of three plus hours, watching people that I don't care about, drown, but I'm going to do it in the name of Objectivity; I hereby go on record."
END OF PEIKOFF'S REVIEW OF TITANIC
It's hard to know who's the bigger idiot: Leonard Peikoff or Tim Page. Page, for writing such an absurd review, or Peikoff, for believing it and using it as his source of information about the movie and the American public.
On the basis of Page's dopey review, Peikoff concludes that the makers of Titanic are "completely mindless," and that the movie is "pure Karl Marx from beginning to end," and is "Communism." Then he concludes that the country is in terrible shape because the American public is flocking to see this terrible movie.
I think Leonard Peikoff is a nut case.
And what did Peikoff think of Titanic after he'd actually seen it? Check out Leonard Peikoff Reviews "Titanic" - Part II.