Talk:Exodus (1960 film)

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IMHO, this movie is a Classic. It is surprising that with such a fine cast that it only won an Oscar for best music. Then again, Hollywood seemed less than comfortable with the movie. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.71.55.235 (talk) 22:09, 3 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I added this section as it is relevant to understanding the movie within an appropriate media context, i.e. historical and contemporary.

The historical aspect is self evident from the two brief paragraphs posted. Re. the contemporary relevant aspect, let me briefly quote from an article (entitled "Arabs will hate 'Munich'", published by Ynet <http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3191326,00.html>) by Ron Ben-Yishai:

"Arabs losing the war of words

Spielberg’s film isn’t the first film to project an Israeli tragedy on the Western World. Israelis and Jews have eloquently told their story dozens of times or more in compelling narrative that captures the hearts and minds of audiences around the world -- every subject from the Holocaust to hijackings, the killing of Israelis and Jews to the creation of Israel.

One of the most popular is the Hollywood movie "Exodus." The movie Exodus is fiction, yet it probably has defined for most Americans the fundamentals of the Arab-Israeli conflict. The film is based on the fiction novel by prize-winning author Leon Uris. Uris was commissioned by a publicist hired by supporters of the state of Israel." —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hadan (talk • contribs) 07:30, 12 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think this section is totally irrelevant and not necessary to the article or understanding of the film. In-fact, I would go so far to say that it is Revisionist History and thus qualifies as Original Research.Jason Schwartz (talk) 02:42, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You are blanking cited material. If it was irrelevant and unnecessary, you wouldn't be so excited about it. It honors the citations and is thus not OR. Please do restore it.

I watched the preview for the film, after reading about it in about a half dozen sources, prior to editing the page. It was phenomenal... The voiceover actually declares it "

the birth of a nation"! I think you should take a deep breath and review the sources before editing either of these pages again (at which point I trust you will graciously restore my version). DBaba (talk) 19:57, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply

]

I find it hard to believe that the Goldstone Report in 2009 uncovered that Exodus was actually paid for Edward Gottlieb as a ploy to improve the image of Israel. Otherwise, I would argue that this is not well sourced and a reaction to novel on the hollywood portrayal of Arabs. If it is true that Uris was paid by Gottlieb to produce the novel, than it might belong on the article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exodus_(novel), but it does not exist there, in fact they claim that the movie rights financed the novel. If you believe that there is information missing that is essential to this article, then you should include it. But the prominence, the lack of (real?) supporting evidence and the contradiction from the Exodus_(novel) article leads me to believe that the original author might not have acted with sincerity when making their contribution. Jason Schwartz (talk) 23:31, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, there may be some insincere editors out there, but we must avoid the fate of dogs. I read somewhere that dogs who read Wikipedia are certain that everything reflecting poorly on dogs' self-conception is written by cats. Moreover, for some people, because of the way they make their identities, certain facts, although in a sense known to be true, are inadmissible. Those facts which are out of compliance with their self-conception "bounce off their consciousness". A known fact may be so unbearable that it is habitually pushed aside and not allowed to enter into logical processes, or on the other hand it may enter into every calculation and yet never be admitted as a fact, even in one's own mind. In the context of nationalist myth-making, then, "sincerity" would seem to be a measure of distance from the nationalist center of gravitation; sincerity, as disinvolvement of self-conception. Perhaps the original author was struggling from these effects, and lacked the capacity to recognize or overcome them, without having any known oblique intent.

But that's neither here nor there. It looks like your argument about Gottlieb, which is uncited, would be a compelling argument for adding attribution, but may not justify blanking the entirety of that section. More importantly, is there anything else in that section you blanked that might be significant to the article, Gottlieb aside, in your mind? DBaba (talk) 17:17, 9 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to believe that this has little bearing on my personal beliefs. I am a Physicist and I would like to believe that I can look at things objectively. My claim is that the references are not relavant to the topic. Reel Bad Arabs is motivated by an agenda (Would you quote "loose change" when writing a factual article about 9/11?) and should not be seen as an accurate depiction of history. As for sourcing the Goldstone Report, I have doubts that there is even references to this film in that report. I believe this section should remain removed and a new one should be written, regarding the commissioning of the film.

Note that there is a simular discussion about this section, which I should refer you to here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Exodus_(novel) in the section "Obfuscation, Negation & Willful Falsification". The result of this was a better sourced section that reads like: "Most sources tell us that Uris, motivated by an intense interest in Israel, financed his own research for the novel by selling the film rights in advance to MGM and writing articles about the Sinai campaign.[1][2][3] It is said that the book involved two years of research, and involved thousands of interviews". 14:56, 10 July 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jason.Schwartz (talk • contribs)

I'm not concerned with your personal beliefs, or if Physicist is the first thing you'd list in describing yourself biographically. My concern is that you may not have read the section that you blanked very carefully, because you have not accounted for all the material you have deleted. For this reason, I will modify the text you have deleted and restore it, for you to read over again.

It's disturbing that you associate a text about institutionalized anti-Arab racism with a notorious conspiracy theory. But I think we will reach a balanced conclusion, despite your passion for Physics and my aversion to particularized sciences. DBaba (talk) 22:47, 10 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You are free to write whatever you want, as long as it is true. I deleted the original text because I felt that it was factually inaccurate and the sources did little to convince me otherwise. If you believe there is truth to it, I welcome you to modify it and place it here. But as far as I am concerned it was all rubbish... Jason Schwartz (talk) 01:08, 11 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Until someone can point to a source that shows Preminger or Trumbo actually wanted the film to be more sexually explicit, I'm removing this line about censorship as irrelevant, OR, and POV. ("Due to early 1960s censorship, the film also eliminated several sex scenes found in the novel.") Krychek (talk) 15:53, 4 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A very interesting account of the deep Israeli involvement in both the book and the film, based on private and government archives, just appeared in Giora Goodman (2014): “Operation Exodus”: Israeli government involvement in the production of Otto Preminger's Film Exodus (1960), Journal of Israeli History: Politics, Society, Culture, [1]. I can provide a copy to anyone who wants to mine it. Zero^talk 11:21, 21 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

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