… Daniel M. Lovery imagines what the reviews might look like.
Here is one of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.
An industrious young woman neglects to charge for her housekeeping services and is rightly exploited for her naïveté. She dies without ever having sought her own happiness as the highest moral aim. I did not finish watching this movie, finding it impossible to sympathize with the main character. —No stars.
And here is one of Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory.
An excellent movie. The obviously unfit individuals are winnowed out through a series of entrepreneurial tests and, in the end, an enterprising young boy receives a factory. I believe more movies should be made about enterprising young boys who are given factories. —Three and a half stars. (Half a star off for the grandparents, who are sponging off the labor of Charlie and his mother. If Grandpa Joe can dance, Grandpa Joe can work.)
Maybe I shouldn’t be, but I’m surprised by “Up.” The man is standing in the way of Progress by refusing to sell his house because of sentiment and geriatric stubbornness.
When Adam Lee, on his old blog, was doing his reading and reviewing of Atlas Shrugged (so that we don’t have to read it), poster TBranin kicked off a hilarious thread “If Ayn Rand Wrote Shakespeare”.
It had descrptions for a lot of the plays, like this:
King Lear: An aging yet handsome blond, steely eyed King gives his kingdom to his two selfish daughters Goneril and Regan while giving nothing to his selfless and loving daughter Cordelia. This turns out to be a good decision.
Claudius (Formerly Hamlet): Tall, square jawed, blue eyed Claudius kills his brother to claim the the throne of Denmark, then gives the former king’s moocher son the boot. The End.
I love these sorts of Rand parodies, the list of things to parody, and the ensuing hilariousness, are unparalled!
Lion King: Very good. Simba worked hard to inherit the throne from his father. It loses points for the giraffes and antelopes, who never do any work.
Lion King 2: Bad. The protagonist offers to help her mortal enemy climb up from the ledge at the climax, despite being in no position to make a return on her investment.
Lion King 1 1/2: Even worse, it spends all its time focusing on the lazy moochers.
I do get the conceit, but putting words in dead people’s mouths according to one’s whimsy is a bit feeble, in my opinion.
I seriously doubt she’d have written any of that.
For example, I’ve had people try to parody me, and it’s mostly indicative of their personal biases, not of me.
(Still, it has the virtue the dead can’t gainsay you, unlike the living)
Ayn Rand reviewed John Morales’ comment
>>Oh, what a loser. He wrote that comment for free!
🙂