Mel Gibson's New Police Brutality Movie Is a Vile, Racist Right-Wing Fantasy

[Demovictory9]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/mel-gibsons-new-police-brutality-movie-is-a-vile-racist-right-wing-fantasy

VENICE, Italy — Two years ago, the Venice Film Festival hosted the world premiere of Hacksaw Ridge, a World War II drama directed by Mel Gibson. The film marked Gibson’s first turn behind the camera in a decade, since he’d drunkenly slurred “the Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world,” pleaded guilty to battering his then-partner Oksana Grigorieva, and was caught on audio saying she was “asking” to be “raped by a pack of n*ggers.” Despite never demonstrating much in the way of genuine contrition, he was treated to a prolonged standing ovation on the Lido—the opening salvo of a “comeback tour” replete with rave reviews, a $175 million box office gross, and six Academy Award nominations. This fuck you attitude, coupled with a rich history of racism, misogyny and homophobia, has elevated Gibson to folk-hero status among the far-right. He is their Oprah.

And they’re going to be very happy with his new film.


Making its world premiere in Venice, Dragged Across Concrete’s premise is as follows: a pair of detectives, Brett Ridgeman (Mel Gibson) and Anthony Lurasetti (Vince Vaughn) are caught on tape applying excessive force to a Hispanic prisoner in handcuffs, in the form of Ridgeman grinding his boot into the man’s neck until it emits a cracking sound. (During the bust, Ridgeman and Lurasetti also mock a scared, naked Latina suspect, claiming they can’t understand what she’s saying due to her accent. Both scenes are played for laughs.) With the tape destined to go viral, Ridgeman and Lurasetti are suspended for six weeks without pay, though the chief of police (Don Johnson) is sympathetic to their plight, delivering a rambling sermon about how being branded a “racist” today is akin to getting labeled a “communist” in the 1950s—or, to quote the president, this is a WITCH HUNT! and these two violent cops are the real victims.

Though a six-week suspension seems like a mild punishment, especially considering this is the third time Ridgeman’s been busted for using excessive force, he is in desperate need of cash. You see, his wife Melanie (Laurie Holden) has MS and his daughter is bullied by black kids on her four-block trek to school. Worried that those same black kids will rape their daughter once she matures, they vow to move to a better neighborhood (presumably one with less black people). “I never thought I was a racist until living in this area,” Melanie says, her husband nodding in agreement. So Ridgeman cooks up a plan to rob an out-of-town crook, and ropes in Lurasetti with a Forgotten Man spiel: “I don’t politick and I don’t change with the times,” he explains, lamenting how that matters more in today’s world than “good, honest work.”

Things don’t go as planned, of course.

Dragged Across Concrete is written and directed by S. Craig Zahler, whose previous film, Brawl in Cell Block 99, also bowed in Venice. Unlike Brawl, a slick work of poetic brutality about a hard-on-his-luck pugilist (Vaughn) who’s forced to smash in skulls to save his pregnant wife, Zahler’s latest is a cold-blooded saga that revels in the violence it inflicts on women and minorities, in particular. Its two most sadistic scenes consist of a newly-minted mom whose fingers and face are shredded off with a machine gun, and a black man (Michael Jai White’s Biscuit) who is graphically disemboweled in order to retrieve a swallowed key. After removing his heart and intestines, a white henchman warns another not to puncture his liver because “it stinks… black guys especially.”

[fierywoman]

1. ... and you expected it to be ...?

[Demovictory9]

2. that maybe he learned something from the experience of having his racism broadcast to the world?

I guess not.

and Vince Vaughn's career has taken a downturn...guess he doesn't care where the next paycheck comes from.

[roamer65]

3. Vince Vaughn is a washed up B grade POS.

[RockRaven]

4. One cannot be surprised a film starring Gibson, Vaugh, Johnson, directed by Zahler is TRASH

The original article references "Brawl in Cell Block 99" and I'd like to point out a factoid for those who don't want to click through, or those who do in case the Daily Beast doesn't mention this (cuz I didn't click through I'm not aware): "Brawl in Cell Block 99" grossed $7,144 according to Wikipedia. No, that's not a typo. Seven thousand one hundred forty-four dollars. Total. Gross. Released to theaters Oct 6, 2017. Released to streaming and video Oct 13, 2017. $7K in revenue. Welp.

Now take the cast of this movie (including the same female lead, btw), add Mel Gibson and some *additional* racism, and maybe you've got a deplorable blockbuster. Except no, you won't. Because deplorables won't really put up when the chips are down (Unite the Right DC march anybody?). They will pirate this video before they pay $15 or whatever. They will watch it in their basement before they brave the public forum of a multiplex. They will praise this film and Gibson and Vaughn before they've even seen it.

I hope Vince Vaughn saved up his doofus college-boy stoner movie money, because I think his middle-aged white-guy right-wing hackey-propaganda movie money is going to dry up in time... There's too much competition -- Baldwin and Sorbo and Selleck, oh my!

[SunSeeker]

5. OMG. Who in their right mind would be in this piece of racist, sexist trash?

Seems like a career killer to me..

[mitch96]

13. Hold on to your hat's... A film on KellyAnne Conjob..

Dianne Kruger is gonna be the blond POS.... uggh..
m

[ProudLib72]

6. WTF is wrong with these people?

Don't they understand they will not get to cash in on this administration's racism and hatred? They have wasted their time because there are a very, very few people who will pay to see it.

[BlueTsunami2018]

7. And right wingers will now see it in droves out of defiance.

If this gets any play on social media as being what the headline claims, the deplorables will go see it out of spite. Whether or not theaters give it the release it needs to make box office is another story. If enough people make a stink about it, it might not get any play.

We’ll see.

[VOX]

8. This cinematic POS was meant to be a foul-mouthed, over-the-top, Tarantino knock-off.

And, for all his faults (and they are many) Tarantino has, on occasion, cranked out some interesting stuff.

But this crap by Zahler? It's trying so hard to be Tarantino-esque, but it misses by a country mile to the point that it's toxic. It'll be on cable by Thanksgiving, where I will studiously avoid it, as well.

The sad thing is that Mel Gibson (talk about someone with faults!) has it in him to direct a serious film and pull it off well. His "Apocalypto" is one such startling achievement.

[a la izquierda]

9. Apocalypto was a violence porn fest...

Monstrously historically inaccurate and with a smack-you-in-the-head with symbolism ending.
The Mayas were little more than blood-thirst maniacs swindled by false gods, in Gibson’s take. I mean, at least he hired indigenous actors and they did use Yucatec dialogue. (I use one scene in the movie, to be honest, to show my students how white stucco for temples was made; I have a PhD in Mexican history and am a specialist in indigenous history).

Nothing is off limits or sacred for Gibson.

[underpants]

10. Gibson and Vaughn enduring Meryl Streep's 2017 Golden Globe speech

[SkyDancer]

11. Mel Gibson is a weirdo

And nothing less.

[Ilsa]

12. Thanks for posting.

I didn't know about vince Vaughan. I saw him in a kids' Christmas movie which was innocent enough, almost, but didn't know he was this bad. I haven't seen his movies directed towards an older audience.