Comments on: You wanna understand America, don't come here — go to the movies

You wanna understand America, don't come here — go to the movies

Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 19:37:14 -0800

Rich Hall's How The West Was Lost (What started with Red River mostly ended with Blazing Saddles; from 20th C. cultural behemoth to object of satire; the Western genre and the archetype of the cowboy.)

There's a tradition of Brits coming to the US to explain this young country and expose the folks back home to America. From Charles William Janson and Thomas Ashe on through Stephen Fry and Jeremy Clarkson, foreigners with funny accents and strange vocabulary have set foot on American soil in an effort to explore the place and its people. But for the Brits to truly understand America, two things might be necessary: an American expat and (more importantly) MOVIES! Because an insider's take on Hollywood's misportrayal, mythmaking, stereotypes, historical ignorance, misunderstanding, bullshit, and skewed lens through which we see (and are shown) ourselves as Americans can get pretty interesting as well as informative.

Stuff like:

Rich Hall's Inventing The Indian (Before there was an America to wonder at, there was an inconvenient bunch of extant civilizations that had to be dealt with first. Cinematically, the Indians had to be killed off before they could be reinvented on screen starring non-Indians. With Dallas Goldtooth.) Rich Hall's California Stars (Fraud, vice, technology, fantasy, corruption, sex, sunshine, drugs, freedom, violence, money, madness, fame, and the dreams at the root of them all. The past is prologue in the Golden State.) Rich Hall's You Can Go To Hell, I'm Going To Texas (Cowboys; oil; truly EPIC expanses of open space; ~~handegg~~ football; graceless, cigar-chompling, neauveau riche good-ole-boy petro-barons; and an anti-littering campaign as statement of identity. Plus, you don't pay for the 72oz/2.04kg steak if you finish it in under an hour. Rich Hall's The Dirty South (Heat, whiskey, violence, the Civil War, sex, racism, ignorance, hospitality, family dysfunction, nature, religion, music, "rednecksploitation"... and Burt Reynolds.) Rich Hall's Continental Drifters ("As a rule, road movies end badly; the main characters either die, or go home." Ennui, disaffection, rebellion, the Dust Bowl, hobos, wanderers, freedom, possibility, and the hypnotic embrace of forward motion on the Interstate Highway System.)

By: octothorpe

octothorpe — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 19:47:03 -0800

Huh, that's apparently the same Rich Hall who was in Not Necessarily the News. I wondered what ever became of him.

By: nadawi

nadawi — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 19:52:50 -0800

i love rich hall so much. you know it'll be a great episode of whatever panel show it is when he's introduced.

By: not_on_display

not_on_display — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 19:55:21 -0800

He was also on SNL Season 10, and did a terrific Doug Henning, and felt like a kinder, gentler Norm McDonald. I also submitted Sniglets on occasion; none made the cut. When I found out he was huge in Britain, I thought, "Really! Well, good on him and the UK."

By: oneswellfoop

oneswellfoop — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 20:03:43 -0800

Yes, regular viewers of Fry's QI panel show know Rich Hall as (my description) "the token Ugly American". I still have a copy of his Sniglets book somewhere, although I can't remember when I last used one of his "words that don't appear in the dictionary, but should", for which I feel regrethalfful. I do wish he'd return to the USofA to cause more trouble here. But when Whose Line was imported, I was hoping for more Mike McShane and less Ryan Stiles, so you don't always get what you want - at least I don't.

By: His thoughts were red thoughts

His thoughts were red thoughts — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 20:06:02 -0800

Huh, that's apparently the same Rich Hall who was in Not Necessarily the News. I wondered what ever became of him. He is much loved on the comedy festival circuit.

By: jonathanhughes

jonathanhughes — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 20:09:25 -0800

I have the sniglet book, and my sister and i use one of them regularly: Yinkel, N.: A person who combs his hair over his bald spot, hoping no one will notice.

By: Harvey Kilobit

Harvey Kilobit — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 20:23:26 -0800

"Americans are very happy people. What are the reasons? They own guns! And it's very important to keep Americans happy BECAUSE THEY OWN GUNS."

By: chambers

chambers — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 20:28:40 -0800

IIRC, he's not entirely an expat. He has a farm in Montana or one of the Dakotas he lives on a few months out of the year, but the vast majority of his work is in the UK.

By: Ber

Ber — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 20:33:06 -0800

I was in a western tourist town (Medora ND) with a family from Sweden. A local cowboy who dresses up for the tourists rode by on his horse, in full Old West regalia. He stopped and talked to us for a while. The little Swedish boy with us dissolved into tears at the sight of a real cowboy on a horse. Damn, that imagery is really hard-wired into foreigners. Hell, it's hard-wired into Americans.

By: Catblack

Catblack — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 22:01:10 -0800

I'm reminded a bit of Doug Stanhope's bits on Newswipe and Screenwipe, which are a distillation of his particular American views for a british audience. (I'll let you look them up, they are probably a bit more biting and biter than Rich Hall.)

By: Paul Slade

Paul Slade — Mon, 17 Nov 2014 01:07:01 -0800

Hall's an excellent stand-up, but his skills don't end there. I've seen all of his movie documentaries listed above, and they're all full of well-researched expertise, insight and wit. Well worth seeing.

By: zardoz

zardoz — Mon, 17 Nov 2014 04:39:18 -0800

This American seconds not knowing what happened to him after Not Necessarily the News. Sniglets was awesome, kind of an Urban Dictionary before Urban Dictionary or the Internet itself.

By: IndigoJones

IndigoJones — Mon, 17 Nov 2014 08:52:49 -0800

A nod to Alistair Cooke, explainer in chief to more than one generation of BBC listeners.

By: Atom Eyes

Atom Eyes — Mon, 17 Nov 2014 08:59:16 -0800

I used to own one of the Sniglets books when I was a child. I remember two: nop - verb - the move you make while holding an open newspaper where you bump your nose into the center crease of the paper in order to turn the page/fold it up Eastro turf - noun - the fake cellophane grass you put in Easter baskets

By: So You're Saying These Are Pants?

So You're Saying These Are Pants? — Mon, 17 Nov 2014 11:13:43 -0800

wow, the first link was a fantastic overview of the myth of the west in cinema. thank you for that! His point at the end is fascinating -- you literally can't make a western that isn't away of Westerns as a genre anymore. Got me thinking about what other styles of movies might evolve in a similar way. Superheroes? maybe. I'm tempted to think that no one genre can be as important to an entire culture as westerns were again, and therefore no genre can really ever arrive at the strange place that westerns hold in culture today. Either way, great documentary! I'm off to explore another one.

By: Flexagon

Flexagon — Mon, 17 Nov 2014 12:04:57 -0800

If there's one thing that stands out from watching "Stephen Fry in America," it's that he's steeped in American culture and movies.

By: ob1quixote

ob1quixote — Mon, 17 Nov 2014 20:07:06 -0800

Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey: Rich Hall's The Dirty South

Oh, wow. I'd seen How The West Was Lost and a few of the others, but this one slipped below my radar. Thanks, PBZM!

By: dhartung

dhartung — Tue, 18 Nov 2014 00:03:46 -0800

The little Swedish boy with us dissolved into tears at the sight of a real cowboy on a horse. Damn, that imagery is really hard-wired into foreigners. When we visited Sweden, we drove quite a bit, and somewhere in the middle we turned down a narrow road and came across a cartoonish place named something like "Björn's Dude Ranch". Seriously, it was on the level of Disney's Frontierland. Really underlined the point for me that American culture is all over the world.

By: hippybear

hippybear — Wed, 19 Nov 2014 00:23:38 -0800

I basically binge-watched this entire series. It's a very fascinating insider-as-outsider viewpoint on exactly in the media what creates the American Mythos and how it should not be applied to Reality. With a lot of snark, some of which contains some actual insight that left me nodding my head in agreement with the points made even while I was shaking it against the method of presentation. Quite good stuff, all around. Probably pretty valuable viewing for anyone who is looking at US culture, although I think the people who might need it the most (those from the US who have never once thought about how the US is perceived abroad or at home, let alone thought about how Hollywood might have shaped those perceptions) will probably never see it. Good on the BBC for hosting this (apparently) expanding series of looks at US culture and depictions in film. I hope it continues to grow over time. Thanks so much for posting this!