Ouch. How true.

I know, but "until the sun becomes a bloated red giant" doesn´t have the same ring to it.

Good thing I replaced my old vinyl records. They´d all get warped in the heat.

I don´t know. I´m talking about pure action here. He has the ability to create long action sequences where he builds up the action, creates a quiet moment, takes it up a notch, and so on and on - he does it with impeccable dramatic timing. He knows how to maintain suspense throughout, and also a sense of the geography (where every character is and what is going on). It sounds simple but few directors can actually do it.

Yes, these action sequences often require SFX, but it´s still good filmmaking. You would think there are more good action flicks out there but no... Of course, now that Cameron has become an "important director" with something to say, he might as well be retired as far as I´m concerned.

It all makes sense now.

It is fun. No, not *good* in any traditional sense of the word. But it´s Emmerich´s most likeable movie and it has no lame attempt at a message. Of course it is completely illogical and countless scenes are stolen from another movie - but it made me wish I was twelve again so I could not see the flaws. Today Emmerich is not just a hack but he´s a self-important, condescending hack.

The "rectal cancer" thing is an allusion to something Sean Penn recently said.

I think the reason why comments are so exasperated is because it is all so damn predictable.

Sorry you´re having commenting troubles; awkward to have a conversation that way.

All I can say is that I wonder if Hanks thinks it goes without saying because it is an amazing and salient fact. For a few years, the US could have annihilated every nation or regime it wanted (and the people of China or Eastern Europe might have greatly benefited from that). But there was no popular movement for revenge. We sent food and money (the people did, too, not just the government). The internment was a black mark, but one must keep things in perspective - it was an injustice and meant hardship, not annihilation. By all historical standards, no other nation would have behaved like we did. Of course you know this. But if Hanks takes it for granted it shows a certain historical unawareness.

Let me put it this way: Just 12 years after the end of WW2, Jerry Lewis would make a movie like Geisha Boy. Perhaps Americans are not built to hate.

"...a cause he's indicated over and over he thinks is just"

Yes, and maybe he still does. But many people are herd animals and opportunists - even those with "f**** you money" - and he wouldn´t be the first opportunist in the entertainment industry to make a politically correct adjustment.

"Does one have to jump on every little comment that's "out of line"?"

Only if one wants to :-)

Look, if he misspoke, is it not revealing that he erred in the usual modern-liberal direction? These people always do. The opposite never happens. Hanks would not for a second sound unabashedly jingoistic by mistake because that is not even remotely how these people think (and who would defend him if he did?) And that´s why these small remarks are significant.

We did not want their annihilation and we didn´t act like we did and Hanks is simply wrong there. I know the propaganda and the talk and some incidents in the front lines - nothing unusual about it - but even so we never became like them and we were pretty magnanimous victors.

It is undeniable and not surprising that there were elements of racism. Compared with the Germans, it was much easier to see the Japanese as completely alien and less than human (although the behavior shown by the Japanese didn´t help and the racism went both ways).

Still, I think Hanks went overboard. I cannot speculate as to what he meant; I have to take him at his word.

In these all too rare instances where Obama is keeping Bush´s policies (reluctantly) in place, it is simply for one reason: because Bush was right and his hyperventilating opponents were wrong. But there is no way they can ever admit that. Bush/Cheney actually thought about how to deal with detainees, fight terrorism and keep Iraq together while Democrats and liberal pundits were shooting off their mouths playing politics.