MovieChat Forums > The General (1927) Discussion > Rooting for the bad guys?

Rooting for the bad guys?

posted 11 years ago by johnnymonsarrat
21 replies | jump to latest

I don't see the angle of shows like The Sopranos where viewers are expected to root for the bad guys. Same thing with Das Boot, which portrays German submariners during World War II.This film, too, wants us to root for a Confederate soldier whose actions lead to a lot of Union deaths and presumably the pushback of the war to free the slaves.

I'm surprised that none of the reviews or comments I read here mention this. It's a well made film but I could not give it a top score.

[–] genplant29 11 years ago

I totally get the validity of your point. Keaton, however, felt (and I entirely agree) that "The General's" (the train of that name) valiant true-life take-back story worked best, for a feel-good entertainment movie, if told from a sympathetic vantage point of the Confederate side, as he wanted to personally portray the hero of the story, and otherwise he'd have been portraying, ultimately, a villain, which that wouldn't really have worked well for a semi-comedy with a hero who the viewer is supposed to be rooting for. As it's a true-life story, and the Confederates really did get "The General" back, it works appropriately for the Confederate side to get to be the heroes of this particular movie. They lost the overall war, but did win that particular historic victory.

[–] daddie0 10 years ago

As it's a true-life story, and the Confederates really did get "The General" back, it works appropriately for the Confederate side to get to be the heroes of this particular movie.

^This.

[–] franzkabuki 11 years ago

There`re no "bad guys" in Das Boot, merely soldiers doing their job - even if they happened to be on the "wrong side".

"facts are stupid things" - Ronald Reagan

[–] bootblack987 11 years ago

There`re no "bad guys" in Das Boot, merely soldiers doing their job - even if they happened to be on the "wrong side".

I will steal Buffy Sainte-Marie's words:

He's five feet two and he's six feet four
He fights with missiles and with spears
He's all of 31 and he's only 17
He's been a soldier for a thousand years

He's a Catholic, a Hindu, an athiest, a Jain,
a Buddhist and a Baptist and a Jew
and he knows he shouldn't kill
and he knows he always will
kill you for me my friend and me for you

And he's fighting for Canada,
he's fighting for France,
he's fighting for the USA,
and he's fighting for the Russians
and he's fighting for Japan,
and he thinks we'll put an end to war this way

And he's fighting for Democracy
and fighting for the Reds
He says it's for the peace of all
He's the one who must decide
who's to live and who's to die
and he never sees the writing on the walls

But without him how would Hitler have
condemned him at Dachau
Without him Caesar would have stood alone
He's the one who gives his body
as a weapon to a war
and without him all this killing can't go on

He's the universal soldier and he
really is to blame
His orders come from far away no more
They come from him, and you, and me
and brothers can't you see
this is not the way we put an end to war.

[–] franzkabuki 11 years ago

Dreamy-eyed idealism is a nice thing; however, it`s got little to do with the reality of how things are.

"facts are stupid things" - Ronald Reagan

[–] bootblack987 11 years ago

Would you say the protests of the Vietnam war were dreamy-eyed idealism?

[–] franzkabuki 11 years ago

I`m afraid that`s quite irrelevant here.

"facts are stupid things" - Ronald Reagan

[–] Royalcourtier 9 years ago

Yes, they were. But they were also doing the work of the Communist enemy.

The USA should not have allowed itself to lose the Vietnam War. The people of Vietnam are still suffering from an oppressive tyranny because the USA was defeated.

[–] dyahrmarkt (5) 7 years ago

I think you've drifted quite far from "The General" here, royalcounter.

[–] spookyrat1 10 years ago

This film, too, wants us to root for a Confederate soldier whose actions lead to a lot of Union deaths and presumably the pushback of the war to free the slaves.

Keaton has transformed an historical event into what is primarily intended as a comedy, whilst sticking as closely as possible to the historical thread with the confederates getting their train back. Difficult to do that from a union perspective.

I'm not American but I'd be wary of just automatically adopting the ideological position that the Union were the "goodies", the Confederacy, the "baddies" and the war was just about freeing slaves.

[–] daddie0 10 years ago

This film, too, wants us to root for a Confederate soldier whose actions lead to a lot of Union deaths and presumably the pushback of the war to free the slaves.

It's funny--and I know nothing of Keaton's personal politics--but it seemed like at times rather than having the audience "root for a side" in the war, Keaton had them rooting for a character...and his story of justice and love. To get hung up on such details seems to miss the point. I thought scenes such as when Keaton was getting shot at only to realize he had crossed "a line" was was now wearing the "wrong" color, were poignant commentary on the silliness of it all. It is clear in the beginning of the film that he is not jumping off the couch to go die in a war...he's interested in the girl, and the girl wants a hero.

To simply this film to such a basic form does a great disservice to the film-maker's creativity. I would suggest you may be bringing far more of your own bias to the film than it actually presents (and I may be as well).

[–] belaglik 9 years ago

So if you have problems with films that take the side of the "bad" guys, I would imagine it would severely limit your entertainment choices. You must have hated Oceans Eleven and cheered when Jack died in Titanic considering what a scoundrel he was what with being an identity thief and stealing another fellow's girl.

If it's any consolation to you, the South lost the war anyway. And if you seriously think there was a "good side" and a "bad side" in the "Civil" War, you are depending solely on the limited information you were taught in school and in popular media and have not thoroughly studied your history. Begin with Lincoln, then Lee, and go from there. If you have an open mind, you'll find that you will question everything you've been told.

[–] johnnymonsarrat 9 years ago

haha oh yea man too bad I listened to sources like school and media!

I should be pissing on those because you're the reputable source of truth.

"screw education" is what you're trying to sell? I ain't buyin'!

*beep* slaveholders and the confederacy.

Johnny Monsarrat Consulting. All content by Jon Monsarrat!

[–] Royalcourtier 9 years ago

The Confederates were the good guys. Just because they lost the war didn't make them bad. It was bad of the Yankees to start the war in the first place, and then invade the South. Lincoln provoked war, but should have allowed the confederacy independence. The Civil War was after all a war of independence, and the good guys lost.

[–] johnnymonsarrat 9 years ago

You're right. Losing the war didn't make them bad. It was the slavery.

I think we can all agree that liberating millions of slaves was a pretty good reason to start a war. As for independence, the South is not the economic powerhouse of the United States. More federal money goes to the South than gets paid in. I think staying in the union turned out to be a pretty good deal for them, which is why Puerto Rico would like to become a full state.

Johnny Monsarrat Consulting. All content by Jon Monsarrat!

[–] brad_filippone 9 years ago

The vast majority of Southerners did not own slaves. They were defending their homeland and their property. Win or lose, that makes them heroes. At the time the war was not considered a war to end slavery. Even the Union soldiers were fighting to keep the nation together.

[–] redbrioche 8 years ago

Lincoln considered the war necessary to hold the Union together. Abolition of slavery was used as a tool by the Emancipation Proclamation because it applied only to slaves in the Union-occupied territories. Lincoln wasn't even averse to sending freed slaves to Liberia.

[–] Prismark10 8 years ago

As far as I am concerned Hollywood has a history of portraying Confederates as almost heroic and certainly honourable soldiers and it is the Unionists that tends to be looked on as despicable.

It's that man again!!

[–] marktayloruk (2378) 2 years ago

They're the romantic lovers- like Cavaliers, Jacobites, French Royalists, White Russians, Rhodesians..

[–] marktayloruk (2378) a year ago

Sorry - lovers.