MovieChat Forums > They Live (1988) Discussion > Keith David's comments about They Live

Keith David's comments about They Live


He said in a recent interview that when the movie opened it was number one for two weeks in a row, and then it was gone from theaters. You couldn't see it if you wanted to. When he asked Carpenter or someone (i forget who) about it, the reply he got was "I think we pissed somebody off". Interesting...

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It wouldn't surprise me. This was during the Reagan years and this sort of thing was blasphemy. Some nameless suit didn't like the message and made sure it went away.



"I have epic retardation" - Mrs. 7blue

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That's too bad. What a great film.

Come with me if you want to live.

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What an absurd allegation. Reagan was the head the Screen Actors Guild. He was full-on pro-movie. You know nothing. That era was not one of fascist clamp downs. It was free and full of people being as dumb as they wanted. We soared as a nation in most every way.

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You do not have a clue do you. Watch Reagan (2011) Yes he was head of the SAG and a liberal democrat but he sold out and crushed unions after that. He even snitched on other in Hollywood to congress. He was all about big business and he is the reason why so many republicans are so damn stupid. Reagan BELIEVED in the power of movies and that is why he would hated a movie like this.

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That's just pure speculation. If it was most likely to be anyone it would have been Bush. It also likely would have happened regardless of the administration. The oligarchical establishment pretty much controls the US regardless of which party is in power.

America is an oligarchy, not a democracy or republic, university study finds

America is no longer a democracy — never mind the democratic republic envisioned by Founding Fathers.

Rather, it has taken a turn down elitist lane and become a country led by a small dominant class comprised of powerful members who exert total control over the general population — an oligarchy, said a new study jointly conducted by Princeton and Northwestern universities.

One finding in the study: The U.S. government now represents the rich and powerful, not the average citizen

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/apr/21/americas-oligarchy-not-democracy-or-republic-unive/





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"All great truths begin as blasphemies."

- George Bernard Shaw

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You clearly don't know much about Reagan. When he was governor of California he used lies and fabricated evidence to get professors at Berkeley fired, as they were defending student's rights to protest for free speech and peace (two things Reagan could not tolerate, apparently). He even had UC president Clark Kerr removed from position and greatly slashed the budget for education, as he thought education was just a breeding ground for 'commies'.

..or maybe not lol http://www.SunbeltRyders.com

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He even had UC president Clark Kerr removed from position and greatly slashed the budget for education


Every time someone says 'education' I wince.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMqJvhmD5Yg

"You don't have choice. You have owners".

Also, watch The War on Kids.

Education.....

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All kinds of words get co-opted and trivialized. We stop trusting them as soon as they become degraded by advertising, pop culture, and institutions, but that doesn't mean that they don't have true meaning. In my book there is no real education without genuine independent, critical thinking. The problem is that it has become something considered outside the mainstream, when it's something that should be a given, an integral part of a holistic approach to learning.

It also, unfortunately, tends to be conflated with vacuous cynicism. Nothing should be lock-step, nothing should be merely reflexive. Someone who defaults to the cynical rejection of anything mainstream is as bad as someone that defaults to mainstream conformity itself. Everything should be taken on its own terms and considered for the real subtext, regardless of whether the source is "mainstream" or "alternative", square or hip. The truth is the truth, regardless of cliques, fashions, or trends.

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You clearly know alot about nothing.Another obama bot

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Just because someone speaks poorly of Reagan does not make him an Obama supporter, or "Obama bot" (political name-calling is fun).

They're both agents of a higher power that's hidden from us yet is pretty much all around us in everyway, Television, internet, ads, architecture, etc. I dislike both. Although when I was 18 and naive I did vote for Obama and was a democrat. But unlike Reagan, who was a democrat, I'm not an opportunist who would sell my soul to the establishment. They wouldn't want it anyway.


Only people with money say that money doesn't matter.

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I checked on box office mojo. It indeed opened at #1 but then it dropped to #4 then #11 and #16. So it had a four week run and it dropped quickly. To say it was pulled over some type of political agenda is nonsense. The masses were not interested but the film has a great cult status and has done better long term than many other films.

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reagan was a failure an america is a rotting cesspool im ashamed to be an american

ur about to become maggot food

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[deleted]

"and" not "an" lol! So leave! Are you in jr high??

suzycreamcheese RIP Heath Ledger 1979-2008

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lol after reading... only about 2% of your posts... you post about 2 things: A) comments on british films/actors while using the word "mate" in every other sentence, and B) weird posts about how much man on man sex turns you on... seriously, I couldn't make this stuff up:

"nothings hotter than lesbians going at it well accept for man on man sex"
( http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0717157/board/thread/64483377?p=3&d=238248349#238248349 )

Not to mention you never miss a chance to misuse the word "accept" for "except", then/than, you're/your, etc, etc, etc... Listen dude, I don't know if you're a troll or just simpleminded but you're clearly not American so don't drag a foreign country in to your *beep* up, misguided, pointless rants on the internet... since you're clearly not even qualified to criticize something as simple as a 4-year-old's spelling exam

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What an absurd allegation. Reagan was the head the Screen Actors Guild. He was full-on pro-movie. You know nothing. That era was not one of fascist clamp downs. It was free and full of people being as dumb as they wanted. We soared as a nation in most every way.


Reagan was involved with the SAG back in the 1940s. By the 1960s he was governor of California and in fact was heading fascist clamp downs, such as trying to have Berkley professors put out work for spreading liberal ideas on campus, and passing heavy gun control in California to disarm the Black Panthers. Reagan's White House also was heavily influencing Hollywood to push more right wing agenda, providing assistance (such as military aircraft) for the movies like Top Gun in exchange for script approval and using it as an Air Force recruitment ad.

Given Reagan's connections in the entertainment industry it wouldn't be all that surprising that he may have called in a favor from one of his exec buddies to squash a movie with a blatant anti-Reaganomics message (in addition to the fact that John Carpenter was publicly stating it was an anti-Reagan movie during promotions).

And meanwhile on Mushroom Hill this happened https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IlnOiJWUdo

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Reagan was the worst president of the 20th century. This movie criticized his idiotic economic policies and general attitude of the '80s and was punished for it.



Never trust a black man named "Chip."

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Nah, Franklin Roosevelt was way worse than Reagan. He put over 100,000 innocent Americans of Japanese descent into concentration camps and sacrificed 3,000 sailors at Pearl Harbor to galvanize support for America's entry into WW2.

Reagan did nothing compared to that.

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and sacrificed 3,000 sailors at Pearl Harbor to galvanize support for America's entry into WW2.


Bullsh!t.

He put over 100,000 innocent Americans of Japanese descent into concentration camps


Internment camps, not concentration camps. They weren't being killed. And it was a mistake.

FDR was still a great president, even with that mistake. Everything Reagan did was wrong and hurt the country. Reagan's legacy led directly to GWB and Trump, further cementing him as the worst president of the 20th century.



Never trust a black man named "Chip."

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Bullsh!t.


Bullsh!t yourself. All the evidence points to Washington foreknowledge of an attack at Pearl Harbor. Multiple warnings from foreign intelligence services. The three fleet carriers conveniently out at sea when the attack came. No torpedo nets to protect the ships anchored at Pearl. The McCollum memo.

Internment camps, not concentration camps.


Same thing.

Internment camp = Concentration camp = Internment camp

A rose by any other name...

They weren't being killed.


No, they were just being rounded up at gunpoint, deprived of their freedom and property, and held against their will for many years. All without a trial.

I guess that makes it OK.

And it was a mistake.


Roosevelt didn't seem to think so.

FDR was still a great president, even with that mistake.


LOL, he was a scummy, communist sympathizing piece of Wall Street sh!t.

Everything Reagan did was wrong and hurt the country.


At least he didn't round up innocent Americans by the train load and march them into concentration camps like FDR, though.

Reagan's legacy led directly to GWB and Trump, further cementing him as the worst president of the 20th century.


Let me know when any of those three lie the U.S. into a bloody, pointless world war and then incarcerate innocent Americans by the thousands in concentration camps like FDR did.

Maybe then you will have something resembling a point.

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From Pipers IMDb page:

Quote:

[on being cast in They Live!] You know, when we did it, it was about Reaganomics, but it was also a political statement [about] where our society is headed. Right now, what they're trying to do in society is get rid of all cash money so you just have a chip and everything is on your chip. Well, that's full control. If you go on an airplane right now, they won't take cash anymore. They actually say, "We're a cashless airplane." Wait a second? You won't take cash? That's "OBEY. This is your God." I think this movie is a statement of "keep our freedom," and I believe everybody gets that from it no matter what generation.


...the guy in the $600 banana suit - COME ON!

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[deleted]

You're insane.Obama-bot.

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That's a compliment, Obama is a great man.

Cardboard Box is the Future.

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Obama is a great man??? You need a pair of those special glasses you poor deluded fool.

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Yet all of Obama's detractors in this thread can say nothing more intelligent than 3rd grade utterances such as "Obama-bot" and "you poor deluded fool." If you hate Obama so much how about a detailed, intelligent discussion about his policies and why you disagree with them, other than this simple name calling and Idiocracy-level dialogue?

If you go into a debate armed with nothing more than a bunch of name calling you've already lost, and at the very least it makes for very boring conversation.

And meanwhile on Mushroom Hill this happened https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IlnOiJWUdo

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Or perhaps it was a low budget film, it made some money, died a natural screen death and quickly was licensed to HBO, Which was the thing in those days..

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Wow, that's really an interesting piece of information. Thank you. There could be more truth in that movie than people think. Truth is stranger than fiction.

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[deleted]

Liberals control Hollywood. If this were a true allegory about Reagan's administration, you'd think the studios would have really pushed it, and that critics would have talked about how relevant it was.

But put the Michael Savage-George Noory conspiracy theorizing aside and just consider that maybe it fizzled after a couple of weeks, and it went to video distribution.


"The bigger the government, the smaller the citizen."

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Another moron with the liberals control hollywood line. Go figure

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Well, when you have Katie Perry, Jamie Foxx, Kanye West, George Clooney, Jennifer Hudson, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, etc etc etc etc etc, and numerous other Hollywood figures constantly tweeting for obama, (and NBC now making a TV show about Hillary Clinton) then 'liberals controlling Hollywood' is the common deduction people make.

Not too hard to figure out.

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[deleted]

Sure, based on your comments you obviously know a lot about what's going on the world............

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Parties dont exist, its globalist vs freedom lovers
Exactly. Astonishing that anyone posting in this forum doesn't get that, given that this is EXACTLY a major message of this very movie.

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You just named people that Hollywood hires, none of them own a major film studio. Who 'runs' Hollywood you likely wouldn't recognize by name and certainly not by face.

..or maybe not lol http://www.SunbeltRyders.com

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[deleted]

"They Live" is a subversive, anti-capitalist, anti-corporate movie disguised as a commercial B-movie-actioner.

I can totally see how some executives or shareholders of studios didn't like the message of the movie they produced by accident...

I would like to see the original B.O. numbers of "They Live":
Was the theatrical life of the movie really cut short ?

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You know, I don't buy this whole argument. Looking at the B.O. numbers for They Live, according to boxofficemojo.com, the movie's take seems to follow a fairly normal curve for a moderately unsuccessful film. In its first four weekends, it makes 4.8m, 2.7m, 1.3m, 0.6m. The theater count remained unchanged for the first two weekends, then it lost a third of the screens for the third weekend (hardly unusual), then half for the weekend after.

You can't blame the drop in box office on the number of screens either, as the screen average goes from $3300/screen on the first weekend to $1900/screen on the second, then $1100/screen or so on the third and fourth. People weren't exactly flocking to see the movie where it was available. The movie just ran out of gas and while we can come up with some crazy theories to blame anyone but the quality of the movie itself or the studio, I think it's clear it just did not resonate with audiences.

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[deleted]

Wrong dude. It's very much an anti-communist movie. Not sure where you got the idea it's anti-capitalist. It's way more pro-individualism and way more right wing than you are thinking.

*beep* off, you goddamn *beep* *beep*

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Wrong dude. It's very much an anti-communist movie. Not sure where you got the idea it's anti-capitalist. It's way more pro-individualism and way more right wing than you are thinking.


Wtf? This is a John Carpenter movie. John Carpenter's pretty notoriously a hardcore liberal. He's said himself that this movie is a critique of Reaganomics; if you're looking for support for Right Wing ideology this is the LAST movie you should be watching. Watch pretty much any interview with John Carpenter where he talks about this movie. Such as this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWu9JOB-TmY

Where he says:

"Basically, our spin on the story was that all the 'aliens' are members of the upper class, the rich, and they're slowly exploiting the middle class and everybody's becoming poorer, and everything we think about buying cars and having pools and condos, all the things that everybody strives for in America, are basically created by this RACE of inhuman creatures who completely just want to exploit us like the Third World, and is told from the point-of-view of the homeless. So, it has a theme and a message to it but basically it's an action film."


Or the various interviews with Roddy Piper, who was a conservative and talks about John Carpenter trying to get him to vibe with the left wing message of the movie or discussing his dislike of Reagan's policies.

And meanwhile on Mushroom Hill this happened https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IlnOiJWUdo

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Well, when you have Katie Perry, Jamie Foxx, Kanye West, George Clooney, Jennifer Hudson, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, etc etc etc etc etc, and numerous other Hollywood figures constantly tweeting for obama, (and NBC now making a TV show about Hillary Clinton) then 'liberals controlling Hollywood' is the common deduction people make.


Those are performers. The people who "control" Hollywood are the executives - rich old white men. Guess which way rich old white men tend to skew politically?

And meanwhile on Mushroom Hill this happened https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IlnOiJWUdo

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If you want to point out their race and gender, then why not also point out that a great majority of them happen to be Jewish as well? I mean why leave out that bit of personal info if your so intent on providing an accurate description of the people who run the industry?

And Carpenter stated that he was a Capitalist in an interview he once gave. What, did you believe him to be some kind of Communist supporter or sympathizer? It IS possible for an individual to be both a liberal and a Capitalist you do realize. Everything and everyone in life is not always strictly black and white.

"Life IS pain highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something".

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If you want to point out their race and gender, then why not also point out that a great majority of them happen to be Jewish as well? I mean why leave out that bit of personal info if your so intent on providing an accurate description of the people who run the industry?


"Jewish" denotes religion and/or culture, not race or gender. I wasn't talking about the religions of those who run Hollywood.

And Carpenter stated that he was a Capitalist in an interview he once gave. What, did you believe him to be some kind of Communist supporter or sympathizer? It IS possible for an individual to be both a liberal and a Capitalist you do realize. Everything and everyone in life is not always strictly black and white.


Okay?! When did I say otherwise? I never even mentioned capitalists or communists. Or are you just talking to the voices in your nutty little head?

And meanwhile on Mushroom Hill this happened https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IlnOiJWUdo

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My original point, in regards to my first response to your previous post, is that a disproportionate amount of Jewish men do, and in fact always have, held much of the power within The Hollywood system from all the way back to the industry's heyday. So in this regard it is NOT a completely irrelevant fact to point out here. And many times within this society of ours, issues of religion, race and gender are very often related to each other whenever it comes to specific discussion(s) of the various forms of discrimination which have always been prevalent throughout society in The U.S. and abroad. So again, my drawing attention to the fact that quite a large number of Jews run and control the industry is not an insignificant factor.

And as far as my other response to your post is concerned, I merely felt the fact that this particular film has always been so entrenched in the issue(s) of the negative effects and impact that Capitalism has on society, and The U.S in particular, that it was very much worth pointing out the fact that Carpenter himself is not a complete anti-Capitalist as many might assume due to the film's subject matter and message. So taking this into account I obviously presumed that you yourself were also making a statement about how extremely anti-Capitalist the maker of this film was/is when he's actually not. So I apparently misread and/or misinterpreted what you were saying in your original post I must admit. However I still don't believe that such a misinterpretation necessarily equates to having "voices in your nutty little head" as you put it to me.

"Life IS pain highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something".

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It's the golden rule. He who has the gold makes the rule.

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This doesn't surprise me at all. Shame, as it's a truly awesome movie. Tongue in cheek, with a serious message.

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Interesting.

They Live has always been a favorite of mine and I kinda wondered why it was never more popular. Here's the box office info:

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?page=weekly&id=theylive.htm

So yeah, what he said actually seems accurate. Between the 2nd and 3rd week it was taken out of 400 theaters, then the next week another 400-500.

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Not accurate at all. First of all, the movie wasn't #1 for two weeks. It opened at #1 and then slid down to #4 its second week, which was a 44 percent drop. By week #3 when it was STILL in over 1000 theaters, the movie made a measly 1.8 million and was #13 by that point. It, like many other movies, opened strong but proved to have no real staying power.

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Well, it was critical of a lot of things, including modern media, which is Hollywood controlled, which is liberal controlled, so yeah, maybe Carpenter didn't toe the Hollywood line the way he was supposed to.

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I think this was removed on purpose by Universal. Universal at the time was headed by Lew Wasserman who engaged in a long of strong arm tactics to have Universal be top dog in Hollywood. Lew Wasserman
used to be an agent whose client was Ronald Reagan(surprise!) & was good friends with Jack Valenti(former head of the MPAA &
who was known to have a lot of political muscle)

I recommend a documentary on Lew Wasserman called The Last Mogul. It is on Netflix


Going blind from CGI

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I love all the name calling between liberals and conservatives, you're all working harder for less while the 1% laughs at our stupidity.

HELP AGGRAVATE THE STATUS QUO, VOTE AGAINST EVERY INCUMBENT YOU SEE ON A BALLOT.

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[deleted]

Yes, of course, everyone who protests the government are thugs, looters, and rapists. That's why it's okay to spray them with mace while they're handcuffed. I hope you never have kids, someone as dumb as you having children should be considered child abuse.

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They were idiots for thinking that protests will defeat the greedy 1% !
Generalizing and calling them "rapists" shows the limit of your logic.





-----
"It's Got Electrolytes!" -Idiocracy

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Wall Street greediness destroyed the economy and you think there's no 1% and OWS were the bad guys... You're a *beep* idiot. One of the people this movie was talking about




If I don't reply, you're most likely on my ignore list

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Yes, exactly. Red team, blue team, but they are both part of the Statist Party and are controlled from the top - not the bottom.

As for the Wall St. joke, the "fix" proposed by them was always the FedGov needs to do this or do that. The Government isn't the solution, it is the problem.
Captured from above.

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John Carpenter : "I'll spell it out. Starting with Reagan and your Iron Lady, they tried telling us that government is the problem..... Good government is never a problem. Bad goverment is the problem."

Glasgow's FOREMOST authority Italics = irony. Infer the opposite please.

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The John Carpenter NAME helped the first couple of weeks at the boxoffice. But the public just wasn't interested in a political vehicle for entertainment. They can go see that on their nightly news. The Right Stuff (1983) which was a GREAT film, suffered the same fate since people got the impression it was a somewhar a political movie being used to boost the Presidential candidacy of Sen. John Glenn D-Ohio. 😨

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Reagan actually started our Deficit....he cut taxes then secretly borrowed Billions from 'The Fed' leaving the American taxpayer to foot the bill-in the future

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