Angelina Jolie is really trying to get her film permit back so she can continue shooting her first movie as a director. The government of Bosnia had originally given Angelina permission to shoot her movie in the country but yanked it when they learned the movie was about a Bosnian woman who falls in love with her Serb rapist.
The thing is, Angelina's statement does not really correct the impression everyone has. She says that she wants people to hold off judgment until they see the movie. To me that means that the rumors are probably true but that she thinks the way she is bringing it to life will be different. I don't know. One of the producers on the movie said, that the rumor the victim falls in love with the rapist is insane. The way he said it though was that he was referring to the rumor and not the plot premise.
Neither the producer or any of the actors can talk about the movie because of confidentiality agreements they signed for Angelina. Continuing with her statement, Angelina said she would be happy to meet with rape victims and talk to them and that "The choice to make a film about this area and set in this time in history was also to remind people of what happened not so long ago and to give attention to the survivors of the war."
I know that Angelina has a lot of fans and they will immediately come to her defense but Enty I totally agree with you. How dare Angelina say "don't judge until YOU'VE SEEN THE MOVIE".
ReplyDeleteIf they are just rumors and are untrue then just say it.
Based on her statement I believe that Angelina is lying.
Oh, who cares. Good grief, the movie is not even out yet. Let's judge and attack when we actually have seen it.
ReplyDeleteIt's all about publicity for her. Blech. Her movies usually tank anyway. She's just too self-righteous for me.
ReplyDeleteOf course she could just let the Bosnian Govt. in on her precious little secret plot so they can approve it.
ReplyDeleteSeems like that might be a better idea than having the production shut down.
This isn't some tabloid gossiping about her relationship or kids, so it won't be so easy for her to dismiss this.
ReplyDeleteThis a womens group of rape survivors, calling out one of the most visible and famous human rights activist in the world.
She'd do well to meet with them, and for her an her reputation's sake - I hope this film isn't what they think it is.
Well .. um .. it seems right there in her statement that she told us what the plot is .. that it is about a woman falling in love with her rapist. So .. yes .. she is lying.
ReplyDeleteAs for the insanity of the plot device .. I just recall the section of Eve Ensler's {SP?] "Vagina Monologues" about the Bosnian War and the idea of this film disgusts me as a rape survivor. The horrors those women faced .. no. Can't .. won't see it .. think Angelina is proving to be the faux intellectual idiot I have felt she was for years. The more I think about this .. the angrier I get.
Am I missing something? What is the problem with her shooting a film in which the rape victim falls in love with her rapist? Is this based on a true story? Is this a taboo subject to discuss in Bosnia?
ReplyDeleteI can only guess here this is some kind of Stockholm Syndrome for the plot (I hope).
ReplyDeleteBut it is not secret of what happend to women during that civil war.
i think it has to do more with Bosnian/Serb conflicts than her silly movie.
ReplyDeleteMy guess would be that the plot involves these 2 people meeting years after the rape, not recognizing each other, & falling in love, only to have the past catch up with them...at least, that's about the only marginally tolerable way I could see dealing w/the subject. (As for Stockholm Syndrome, wasn't The Night Porter enough?) Angie, you really need to take the bull by the horns, so to speak, and meet with the various groups, because no matter how good your intentions might be, you do NOT want to be seen as insensitive to rape survivors...trust me on this.
ReplyDeleteWell I would hope in the story the woman gets to go on a free-for-all rampage and slays the fuck outta every GD rapist who ever raped anyone ever in their fucking lives. Rips their dicks off and crams them down their GD throats. Tortures them to pieces slowly and horribly. Now THAT would be a good ending for this kind of story.
ReplyDeleteI would hope the same for the poor, poor women in Darfur and every other GD country with NO rights and massive, rampant, uncontrolled, God-forsaken abuse of women and children.
But that's just me. Any other ending to the story will not fly for me, personally, so I will not see it.
And Wil, I am truly sorry for your ordeal. I hope you are OK!
I have the same questions that Lady J asked.
ReplyDeleteI know, I know...I'm not like most normal women. I want to see the Statham-style ending to that kind of awfulness. Love story??? Please.
ReplyDeleteHell yes, I want to see revenge. Hell yes, I want to see blood for blood on these types of crimes. Jesus' words be damned. I do not believe in that "turn the other cheek and forgive them" shit anyway. I believe in fighting back. Not that it will ever happen. Not that girls' noses and arms and genitals won't continue to be hacked off worldwide.
Makes me fucking SICK. And crazy. I need to go sit down...
Angie Jo better have a VERY good story and better kiss the asses of every survivor's groups over there or else her cred is going straight down the tubes IMO.
It pisses me off enough when soaps have victims fall in love with their rapists, and soaps are completely nuts already. This is obscene, and I can't believe they're making this movie. It will just help perpetuate the myth that women are really "asking for it." I can't wait until I see it to judge it, because there is no way in HELL I will be watching it.
ReplyDeleteLady J, when they revoked the permits, the Bosnians said that there are 0 cases of a rape victim falling in love with her rapist.
ReplyDeleteRobin, your storyline seems plausible, but as Selena said, even then the only possible resolution I could get behind would be if she then tortured and killed him.
selenakyle, look for a french move from 2000 called Rape Me (Baise Moi). Very violent and extremely uncomfortable to watch, but worth it. Quite the controversy when it came out...
ReplyDeletemove = movie
ReplyDeleteIf this movie was about rape and revenge or justice I could understand her reasoning for making it but Angelina only said that it was LOVE STORY. If she'd said it's a love story with a twist then I could also understand her take on the film but she's only said GO SEE IT BEFORE YOU JUDGE IT.
ReplyDeleteWitch Please!
Oh and she'd better not be one of those people who believes in the "it's not rape, rape" theory.
ReplyDeletenot on my dollar said...
ReplyDeleteI know that Angelina has a lot of fans and they will immediately come to her defense
It goes the other way around, too. She's such a polarizing person that the many people who loathe her are going to jump all over it no matter what she has or hasn't said, thrilled to have another reason for bashing her. I have no idea what this movie is about, which is why I'd rather wait for more information before I jump to conclusions. And no I don't mean wait to see the movie, I mean more information, period. So far there's been so little of it all anyone can do is jump to conclusions. I'll wait for more information and THEN make a judgment.
I really like your idea, selena. Too bad there isn't a way to make it happen in real life, damn it...
ReplyDeletethanks Mooshki that makes sense.
ReplyDeleteI'm reading various other sources, many of which say the reason the permits were revoked had nothing to do with the subject matter, rather there was something wrong with the paperwork. And Enty, you yourself state that this is based on "the impression everyone has.", not on actual fact. And the producer very well COULD have been referring to the plot, not the rumours.
ReplyDeleteBasically what I'm saying is, because this is SUCH a sensitive subject, I need more info before making judgment. I have no idea if the permits were revoked because of subject matter or administrative matters, which is my point, we don't know, no one knows with 100% certainty. If this IS a movie about a rape survivor falling in love with a rapist, that would be something I'd have ZERO interest in seeing and would not, and I would be hugely disappointed in Jolie. But I'm going to wait to vilify her until I know for sure.
selenakyle, I totally agree! Excellent posts!
ReplyDelete@jen,
ReplyDeleteI too would love to have access to additional information before making judgment but Angelina has already said "go see the film" which means she has no intention of giving enough information to make the decision.
How does this NOT look like a ploy by her to fill seats in the theater?
But I am pretty much an Angie fan, don't get me wrong.
ReplyDeleteSorry, the subject matter got me all het up thar fer a minnit!
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ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThe rapes and rape camps in that war were part of the genocide -- a new and different idea of rape in war. Keep in mind we were dealing with extreme nationalism on all sides and not just that but differences in religion, too. The Serbians used the rapes camps to systematically impregnate Bosnian Muslims so that they'd give birth to ... supposedly not Bosnians, not Muslims but ... Serbian paramilitary babies. The nationalism was so high and heated that all sides believed it, it was the reason for the rape camps, the idea of this being a part of the genocide had to do with the women not giving birth to their own kind but to the enemy (and the men were indeed murdered in the more conventional form of genocide and masses of them floated down the rivers like logs). Anyway.
ReplyDeleteAngelina Jolie is making a love story about a Bosnian Muslim falling in love with a Serbian paramilitary officer. The feminists protesting are not dumbasses; Sarejevo was not a backwater before the Bosnian war but an international center of culture. Angelina thinks she's Ms. Political but she's just f*cking clueless on this one.
Angie Jo and her confidentiality agreements. Sigh. I agree with not on my dollar - this smacks of grabbing publicity. I would be shocked if this had to do with love in a rape camp, especially by Angelina since she has worked with the UN.
ReplyDeleteI remember reading in a magazine many years ago about the atrocities there. It didn't mention anything about Serbian paramilitary babies. It did have interviews with women who experienced those camps, some of them grandmothers, who described they all had all their teeth knocked out so when the soldiers came in to ram their heads on their penises, the women couldn't bite them. There was also an account of how the women banded together to prevent a 6 year-old girl from killing herself because she couldn't stand to be raped anymore. That article really marked me.
If Angelina is indeed making a love story about a Muslim woman falling in love with a Serb paramilitary officer, how would that be possible unless they were in love before the war started? Wouldn't the officer have an instilled hatred of Muslims? Wouldn't he have warned her and her family to leave before the war started? I just find it implausible.
Rapists are disgusting, violent people, so I don't see how this can play out in any way that would make me want to see it--even if it was years after the fact and the two didn't remember each other. Because even in that case, he's still a fucking pig who raped a woman. Unless maybe it was someone who was forced with a gun to his head to rape someone and was still dealing with the guilt years later and was suicidal over the fact that he raped someone rather than face death.
ReplyDeleteBut no thanks AJ, I won't wait to see it. I'll wait to hear about it, because I am positive that the details will leak long before the movie comes out.
Amen, Jen! You said what I wanted to say, but way more articulate. :)
ReplyDeleteShe has her permits back:
ReplyDeleteSARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina — Angelina Jolie has been given back a permit to film in Bosnia that was briefly withdrawn because of rumors that her movie featured a rape victim who falls in love with her assailant, her producer said Monday.
Jolie was given back the permit for her first project as a director after the country's culture minster was given the script in an attempt to assure him the rumors were false, said Edin Sarkic, Jolie's Bosnian producer. The minister did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/top/all/7251976.html
They received the script - ie THEY SAW THE SCRIPT - and gave the go-ahead. So I think that's a pretty definite sign that it was all indeed a rumour, or at least a misunderstanding. Which is bad enough, but ESPECIALLY when it's about something as serious as rape. I hope this is the end of this. And I REALLY hope you address this, Enty. I know you don't like Angelina, but I hope for ONCE you'll have her back here - not for HER sake, but because being accused of being a rape apologist is extremely serious.
Oh,a nd SHE DID say something else in addition to "go see the film" :
ReplyDelete"It's very simple," she said during a break in shooting Friday. "There was a nasty rumor that it was about a relationship that started with a rape and torture — and it's not."