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Pro-Liberty, Pro-Market Movies: Your Recommendations
On Tuesday, the Foundation for Economic Education posted a column about the Bollywood movie Guru. Interested by their claim that it was “The Best Pro-Market Film You’ve Never Seen,” I decided to give it a viewing. I was very pleased. Guru has some hurdles to clear, but its story is right out of a Rand novel.
After viewing the movie, I started to compile in my head a list of other pro-market, pro-liberty movies. I’m interested in what yours are as well. Maybe the list we compile can be used as a “Ricochet Recommended Viewing” list.
Here are the movies on my list (so far):
- The Atlas Shrugged Trilogy: Pt1, Pt2, Pt3
- Chuck Norris vs. Communism
- 1776
- The Lost City
- To Live
- Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress
- Harry Potter: Pt5, Pt6, P7.1, P7.2
- Guru
- Comes a Bright Day
So, what are yours?
Published in Entertainment
You should also go for the 1949 “The Fountainhead”, 1950’s “Destination Moon”, and a couple of Europeans: “A Report on the Party and Its Guests”, “King Size”, and maybe “Okhraina”.
Yes, “The Fountainhead” should be on the list. I have not seen the others. I will track them down.
Here’s the whole movie, direct from Heinlein to you!
“Fiddler on the Roof”
“The Pursuit of Happyness”
“The Patriot”
These are only tangentially applicable. It occurs to me that this is a tough challenge. Movie makers have been tearing down my cultural values for a century.
The Humphrey Bogart, Audrey Hepburn, William Holden version of Sabrina. (No, I am not kidding. Have you watched it lately?)
Following on Arahant’s suggestion, the same director’s 1961 “One, Two, Three” is one of the breeziest satires of Communism–and Coca-Cola–ever made.
Just watched a youtube clip of this – Cagney meeting with the Russian delegation. I really like when old comedy is still funny by today’s standards.
More will come to me, but this one is a hidden gem:
Follow that Dream 1962. Elvis in his glory as an inadvertent entrepreneur and meddlesome government officials.
Hellfighters – The Duke in business, nuff said.
Fantastic movie. A favorite around here.
Yeah – It still stands up pretty well today.
Chef
“forged in the fires of revolution!”
“i don’t care who your jeweler is”
Speaking of films with meddlesome government officials getting in the way of entrepreneurs, there is also Ghostbusters. This has a somewhat anti-academic theme as well.
Kidco.
Does Red Dawn count?
Original or remake?
Risky Business. Capitalism at it’s finest, if a bit morally ambiguous (like Capitalism, sometimes). And not because Cruise dances in his skivvies, but maybe a little bit because of Rebecca De Mornay.
Other People’s Money: The creative destruction that is capitalism.
Someone beat me to Ghostbusters, so I’ll add The Untouchables that earned Sean Connery his Oscar.
Silk Stockings, Cole Porter’s musical remake of Ninotchka.
Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse backed up by a trio of Russian “diplomats” played by Jules Munshin, Joseph Buloff and Peter Lorre.
Vassili Markovitch, Commisar of Art: I want to look somebody up. Does this office have a copy of Who’s Still Who?
“Alien,” because Weyland-Yutani shows how private enterprise can exploit far-distant resources. Granted, there’s the whole thing about the “expendable” crew, but they weren’t winners; I prefer my ship captains NOT to have his sternum punctured with a retractable mandible.
When I lived in the PRC (People’s Republic of Connecticut), I would drive on Rt. 8 past the factory in Seymour which was used for that movie.
Enemy at the Gates and Other People’s Lives (?) – it’s about the E. German Stasi eavesdropping on people – two pretty good anti-communist movies.
Original, of course. Haven’t seen the remake, nor do I intend to.
bleh. not one of the films mentioned streams on netflix.
…which might tell you something about Netflix!
I confess to having done a little Googling to help me with my answer: “A Bug’s Life”. Flik is an entrepreneur. The ants are the industrious members of society. The grasshoppers are the oppressive state, coming to take the fruits of others’ labor.
As I wrote this, another Pixar movie came to mind: “The Incredibles”, which wades into “Harrison Bergeron” territory when it deals with the tragic suppression of God-given talents and abilities.
We the Living.
I heard The Pursuit of Happyness would belong on this list.
Comes A Bright Day was recently streaming on Netflix, but now it is not. Bummer.
Guru is can be seen on YouTube. Check the FEE article for the link, but also read my comment on the article for some of the films hurdles that you will have to look past.
Oh, crap! Serenity!
How could I have forgotten about Serenity?
(Thanks for the avatar, Owen Findy!)