In the Turfgrrl ranking of screenwriters, David Mamet holds a special spot for Glengarry Glenn Ross, House of Games, The Spanish Prisoner, Spartan and my favorite car chase movie Ronin. Each of these movies contributes exquisite dialog, and in the case of Ronin , an exquisite plot involving southern France and Audis. The Village Voice features an essay by Mamet that is really worth a read because he rails against the brain dead liberal. Which was a perfect read for me today following last night’s common council meeting.
Favorite grafs:
And in doing so, I recognized that I held those two views of America (politics, government, corporations, the military). One was of a state where everything was magically wrong and must be immediately corrected at any cost; and the other—the world in which I actually functioned day to day—was made up of people, most of whom were reasonably trying to maximize their comfort by getting along with each other (in the workplace, the marketplace, the jury room, on the freeway, even at the school-board meeting).
And I realized that the time had come for me to avow my participation in that America in which I chose to live, and that that country was not a schoolroom teaching values, but a marketplace.
Yep, my America has pretty much always been a marketplace. Now if we could enlighten the more brain dead who walk amongst us that negotiating, bartering, give and take is what makes a marketplace work.
But read the whole thing, Mamet is always a good read.
source: Village Voice, David Mamet: Why I Am No Longer a ‘Brain-Dead Liberal’, by David Mamet, March 11, 2008
