in re re[3-True Lies Guy writes : "I heartily agree with you. Movies are foremost entertainment. Any effort to educate or extract a response beyond enjoyment is secondary." Only in Hollywood is entertainment foremost. Ever since the beginning of film making, politics has had a political undertone. Look at Soviet Montage (e.g. Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin) and socialist realism in the soviet cinema endorsed by Lenin and Stalin (who saw the importance of movies as mass communication). There was also the French poetic realism (e.g. Jean Renoir). Look at the war-time propaganda films of WWII and at Italiam Neorealism (e.g. Rossellini). There is also the French New Wave (e.g. Rasnais). Even today there is the Third World cinema. There are many other periods and countries and auteurs I haven't mentioned because I don't want to overkill my point. I just wanted to say that it's a mistake to neglect the history of polictics in cinema (especially politics as a root of cinema) or the oppurtunity for cinema to present political messages to a wide audience. Cinema is not and has never been just for entertainment; at least not outside of Hollywood, where it matters more to make a statement than to make a buck. Entertainment is what sells here in the states, and may not be secondary to most people, but I feel the reverse is true in other places. I'm not saying that films can't be fun or have to hit you over the head with a political hammer but that shouldn't be the primary reason to make a film. Am I off the mark or what do other people think? Brian L. Tanner [log in to unmask]