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This Divided State (2005)
Missed the point, but not bad
I thought the film was alright; I didn't see the extreme pro-Moore, anti-religion bias that some of the commenters have found. There was certainly more sympathy for the Moore supporters, and Kay Anderson is obviously made into a convenient villain, and it's obvious who the filmmaker thinks are the good guys and the bad guys here, but the bias wasn't completely over the top (or completely unwarranted).
To the bigger point, I think if the goal of the event, as the UVSC President said, was to generate "civil dialogue" it failed, and was doomed to fail from the start. Moore and Hannity are, by nature, antithetical to civil dialogue. If the Student Government wanted to inspire civil dialogue they should have brought in lecturers who actually are, you know, civil. Who specialize in discourse rather than demagoguery. And if they had, there wouldn't have been nearly the backlash from the community.
I don't think that the citizenry of Orem and Provo and the rest of Utah (where I lived for many years) is opposed to liberalism per se (despite Kay Anderson's repeated assertions that "this is a very conservative community"); what it resists is incivility. And the sneering, condescending tone of these self-promoting idealogues is, at heart, a promotion of contention, a call to division.
In the end, I think Greenstreet shot himself in the foot a little by his obvious sympathy for Moore (but perhaps that was forced upon him by his collaboration with the Center for American Progress). You catch glimpses of the (IMO) more significant theme of civility being able to bridge the gaps of ideology, particularly in the relationship between Jim Bassi and Joe Vogel, and I think perhaps it was initially the point of the whole movie, but I don't think it was brought home nearly forcefully enough.
And as a small point, why were all the stock "campus" shots of BYU rather than UVSC? Maybe it was an economic issue and shots of BYU campus were already in the can or something, but every time there was a montage of students walking around, it was at BYU, which irked me a bit.
Where Eagles Dare (1968)
Thoroughly Enjoyed It
I found this to be exciting and enjoyable throughout. I didn't know any of the plot going in, and with a modicum of disbelief suspension (when are those Nazi's going to learn how to shoot straight?) I found it to be very engaging.
Negatives: it definitely got a little long (158 minutes in all), and I felt much of the "escape" action was somewhat gratuitous and drawn out. I also thought the supporting cast, with the exception of Darren Nesbitt as von Hapen, were pretty pedestrian.
Positives: good roles for both Burton and Eastwood. I found the taciturn interplay between the two characters very enjoyable. For all its run time, the dialog is quite sparse, which I thought added to both the intensity and the suspense.
Overall, I thought it was an excellent movie.
Sleuth (1972)
Slow start, not that great
Meh..
(Some slight spoilers may follow)
Negatives: The first two "reversals" were obvious. And they chewed up most of the movie (about 80 minutes). Furthermore, even when things got going the pacing was uneven.
Positives: Michael Caine's performance during the final hour. Also, the dialog was very good, although I personally could have done without quite so much innuendo.
For my money, the film is significantly overrated. The intelligence of the dialog is overshadowed by its weak buildup. I'd much rather watch Rope with its hackneyed moralizing but real tension and suspense any day.