<![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both! - Idolator Comments]]> http://cache.gawker.com/assets/base/img/thumbs140x140/idolator.com.png <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both! - Idolator Comments]]> http://idolator.com Thu, 08 Nov 2007 21:33:53 EST Thu, 08 Nov 2007 21:33:53 EST http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2919230 @Paula:

Easy to see why the mix-up happened. While Scorsese in 1983 never would have touched that mess, "Scarface" is exactly the sort of overheated dreck ol' Marty would probably direct now.

DaeSu

]]> 33:320408:c2919230 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 21:33:53 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2918904 @DaeSu: Good point. Probably should of looked that up before I got all high-and-mighty. Honestly thought it was a Scorcese movie for some reason, which seems dumb now that you've corrected me.

I stand by my statement about the difference between "American Gangster" and "Scarface" though.

Paula

]]> 33:320408:c2918904 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 20:45:33 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2917875 @WhosWho:

Actually, Brian DePalma directed "Scarface."

DaeSu

]]> 33:320408:c2917875 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 18:59:23 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2916212 @Aquemini: And I really don't think it does. Which is, I guess, something we're just going to disagree on. If anyone is to blame for the glamorization of gangster behavior, it's marketers who pander to it, not so much the films themselves. The whole Scarface phenomena is probably a better example than "American Gangster" because there has been an entire marketing campaign around emulating Al Pacino's scenery-chewing bad-assedness. Why this is, who the hell knows, because the movie is totally absurd. Personally, I think it's because Scorcese spent so much time pandering to the "isn't blowing shit up on screen cool" part of the story, and not as much to the "would you really want to be Al Pacino" part.

Honestly, I really don't think "American Gangster" does that at all. Its anti-drug bent is pretty evident from the get-go, and the gangsters certainly don't triumph. What it failed to do, I think - or could have done a lot better, anyway - was stress the racism that allowed Frank Lucas (in a twisted way) to get as far as he did, and how this in itself was another prime example of white apathy towards problems in Harlem.

The fault I find with American Gangster isn't that it's reinforcing the idea that selling drugs is cool. People who do bad things in the movie get the comeuppance they deserve. Rather, I think that it creates too much of a Rebel versus Empire dynamic, which - and you're right here - could possibly encourage some sort of idolization of Frank Lucas the same way it's created an entire sub-culture of Che devotees. But I don't think the movie deliberately pandered to that demographic at all; it's more of a side-effect of trying to make a racial tensions sub-plot fit in to a screen play about the rise and fall of a drug lord.

Sorry, for the length. It's hard to be brief on the subject.

Paula

]]> 33:320408:c2916212 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 16:57:00 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2915692 @Aquemini: Uh, I went to one "buddy", so howabout we not make snap judgments about crap we don't understand.

Paula

]]> 33:320408:c2915692 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 16:33:03 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2914834 @WhosWho: Plus, I didn't say it would up the crime rate, i am just saying it legitimizes the already abhorrent ideals that kids i dealt with everyday carry: namely, that killing people and running drugs is okay, and even glamorous.

Bazooka Tooth

]]> 33:320408:c2914834 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 15:54:27 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2914807 @DaeSu: exactly.

Bazooka Tooth

]]> 33:320408:c2914807 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 15:53:12 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2914800 @WhosWho: go spend a year in an inner city public school and then we;ll talk, buddy.

Bazooka Tooth

]]> 33:320408:c2914800 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 15:52:57 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2914781 @Aquemini:

I hear ya, Aquemini. "American Gangster" is meant for the same knuckleheads strutting around in "Scarface" jackets emblazoned with the words "Power, Money, Respect" on the sleeve. (Which I saw some young idiot wearing downtown last week. Depressing.)

DaeSu

]]> 33:320408:c2914781 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 15:52:00 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2912154 @Aquemini: Hey, "American Gangster" may be channeling movies like "The Godfather" and "Once Upon a Time In America" but to say that it's going to go out inspire "dumb hood kids" to use your oh-so-eloquent turn of phrase is an absurd conclusion to draw. First of all, the movie does a pretty good job depicting how awful heroin is, and how much it - and Frank Lucas' wide-scale distribution - helped contribute to the continued economic distress of 1970s Harlem. Besides, I'm not sure that any sane person would walk out of that movie saying, "Oh, I wanna be Frank Lucas." And as for T.I.'s character...well, let's just say he doesn't come out of it either.

Romanticism in gangster movies has always been a problem - particularly in the campy mess that was "Scarface" - and "American Gangster" sinks in to that on occasion. If anything, though, "American Gangster" and Ridley Scott do a much better job painting the mafia as the criminals they are, then Scorcese and dare-I-say-it, Coppola ever did. That doesn't mean Coppola and Scorcese didn't make great movies - they did - but it's ridiculous to imply that "American Gangster" is going to up the crime rate.

Paula

]]> 33:320408:c2912154 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 13:55:22 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2911240 And that Jay-Z album fucking sucks.

Bazooka Tooth

]]> 33:320408:c2911240 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 13:09:29 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2911228 American Gangster, to me, is all about selling itself to young, dumb, hood kids who think that Scarface is not a tale of a downfall due to being a sociopath, but a cool-ass movie because the guy makes money and kills people. The fact that Ridley, Crowe, and Denzel even signed on to this bullshit movie has made me lose major respect for them.

Just what we need: more legitimization and glorifying of drug-dealing killers.

Bazooka Tooth

]]> 33:320408:c2911228 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 13:09:01 EST <![CDATA[Attn. Musicians: The Best Way To Promote Yourselves Is Now Public Embarassment. Or Getting Arrested. Or Both!]]> http://idolator.com/tunes/crackpot-theories/attn-musicians-the-best-way-to-promote-yourselves-is-now-public-embarassment-or-getting-arrested-or-both-320408.php#c2909331 I wouldn't be so quick to write off the criminal angle. After all- you don't see american Gangster flaunting Fab Five Freddy's role in the flick.

Hallux Valgus

]]> 33:320408:c2909331 Thu, 08 Nov 2007 11:27:22 EST