The political issue in "Trumbo," however much played down, and in the reviews including the linked one seems to be a call for freedom of speech - and overtly or not, it is freedom of speech for everyone. In line with this, the movie chose to do Trumbo, one of the least communist of the Hollywood Ten. The approach is abstract, specifically, abstracted from class comparison. Frankly, if a city government denies a demonstration permit to the Ku Klux Klan, progressives should not support a permit for the Klan, contrary to Leon Trotsky's shameful testimony in 1938 to the Dies Committee, parent of HUAC: "The working class in the capitalist countries must stand in defense of freedom for all political tendencies including their own irreconcilable enemies." https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1939/03/dies.htm
Parallel with the politics, it seems that "Trumbo" and most reviews do not go into why the U.S. ruling class after World War Two launched a drive under the banner of anti-communism to tame the trade unions, smear anti-imperialist activists for their peace movement, and turn popular culture as much as possible away from social issues. Toward that analysis, if I may quote myself: "Once industrial unions became a reality shortly before World War Two, many capitalists came to appreciate that they could help tamp down conflict in the workplace. A labor contract typically enlisted union officers to prevent and stop wildcat strikes. Still, capital was not happy about the militancy and seemingly endless vision of a better life that workers acquired in the course of stormy union campaigns. Soon after World War Two ended, it was time to discipline labor with a good dose of repression." --The Hollow Colossus, p. 154f. http://www.hollowcolossus.com _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
