Interesting.

Over the years, Miyazaki’s political stance about America’s involvement in global conflicts as well as the country’s contribution towards the globalisation of American culture has been unwavering. “Anti-jeans, Anti-bourbon, Anti-burgers, Anti-fried chicken, Anti-cola, Anti-American coffee, Anti-New York, Anti-West Coast,” Miyazaki once said while describing his beliefs.

According to excerpts from multiple interviews, Miyazaki’s dislike for all things American also extends to the realm of cinema.

“Americans shoot things and they blow up and the like, so as you’d expect, they make movies like that,” Miyazaki stated. “If someone is the enemy, it’s okay to kill endless numbers of them. Lord of the Rings is like that. If it’s the enemy, there’s killing without separation between civilians and soldiers. That falls within collateral damage.”

Miyazaki compared the visual politics of large-scale Hollywood productions such as the Lord of the Rings to the country’s international policies. Attacking America’s actions in Afghanistan, Miyazaki claimed that such projects are a dangerous addition to public discourse because they diminish the value of human life by weaponising the audience through cinematic violence.

  • CptKrkIsClmbngThMntn [any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Rolling Stone: You’re a congenial man, yet these books are incredibly violent. Does that ever feel at odds with these views about power and war?

    George R R Martin: The war that Tolkien wrote about was a war for the fate of civilization and the future of humanity, and that’s become the template. I’m not sure that it’s a good template, though. The Tolkien model led generations of fantasy writers to produce these endless series of dark lords and their evil minions who are all very ugly and wear black clothes. But the vast majority of wars throughout history are not like that. World War I is much more typical of the wars of history than World War II – the kind of war you look back afterward and say, “What the hell were we fighting for? Why did all these millions of people have to die? Was it really worth it to get rid of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, that we wiped out an entire generation, and tore up half the continent? Was the War of 1812 worth fighting? The Spanish-American War? What the hell were these people fighting for?”

    There’s only a few wars that are really worth what they cost.

    • PbSO4 [comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      That's what makes it a fantasy - we're asked to suspend our disbelief to imagine a war that matters against a defined, unquestionably evil foe. Yet even then, he still came to the narrative conclusion that war is hell and ruins the people who fight it. Problem comes when we believe reality is or should be like the faerie stories. George writes a bleak story of realpolitik then puts supernatural elements in, creating a different thing altogether. The problem is less that Tolkien's story is ethically unsophisticated, but more that people rip the images and elements from it without understanding that it's not the be all end all.

      • CptKrkIsClmbngThMntn [any]
        ·
        3 years ago

        I think I agree with you, and to make a left turn into a hot take, I think that's maybe what I disliked the most about the LotR movies. People laud their faithfulness but I really felt there was something they missed about the books, morphing them into big epic plot, action, and effects-driven adventure stories where the characters are stitched together with a few quips and heartfelt exchanges.