What The Bleep?

STAWMAN WARNING:

No one in that forum suggested that the silly motion picture to which this disingenuous poster refers "is a cult." The contention was that it is a product of a cult.

Setanta,

Thank you. Exactly what you said. The movie is not a cult. How can a movie be a cult? In any event, yes: it was financed and produced by a cult. Anyone that does a google on the movie title & add the word "cult" to it can find hundreds of reliable references to back this up.

The problematic portion of this case is that the movie and its "actor/experts" mix some arguably real science with their fantasy. Stuff like saying: "The speed of light is 186,000 miles/second. Therefore, I can read your mind, channel people who have been dead for centuries, and fly." Not precisely this, but you get the idea.

People who don't know a lot about the scientific method and are gullible, ready to believe a fantastic beautiful lie, are victims of cults that put out movies like this.

I do not deny the movie has some cool special effects. Its kind of an attractive fantasy. But its just a fantasy. Its like asking someone to believe Star Wars is true, because after all, E=MC(squared).

A few reviews on the movie below, and believe it or not this is relatively tame compared to some of the stuff I've seen written about the movie. It appears that the part that bugged most people is the cult tried to hide that they were involved in making the movie, and raped science by having several poseur "experts" in the film.

http://media.orkut.com/articles/r0137.html

"Turns out there were more psychics than physicists producing and starring in the film delivering these insights. Specifically: members of a doomsday cult centered upon the blond lady, who actually turns out to be JZ Knight, a channeler who claims to be speaking in the voice of Ramtha, a 35,000-year-old warrior king. In "Bleep," JZ Knight's voice sounds increasingly like Tia Carrerre's in "Kull the Conqueror" as Ramtha grips her soul. The accent comes and goes, maybe depending on Ramtha signal strength. Supposedly Ramtha's not from Atlantis but from a neighboring island, which has often been overlooked. Think of it as the ancient sunken city-state version of New Jersey. "


http://www.phys.uregina.ca/pss/?q=node/7

"So after a little bit of digging I learned that yes, in fact, this movie was completely financed, filmed, produced, and directed by a cult. The cult being led by the person most interviewed in the movie, a woman named J. Z. Knight who believes she is channeling some long-dead Seer of Atlantis.
Yoiks.
So we all went and we were all frightened. Not only did the makers of this movie completely rape quantum physics, they used the idea of science and the scientists who appeared to justify the underlying theme of this movie...which was basically: Join our cult!
The movie did have some cool effects and some good ideas for how to live your life...but it doesn't excuse what they did."

Oh, and if you want to see the movie ripped to shreds further, by more pure science minds, you might post this question on the Science Forum.

I wandered into this movie at the two dollar theater one night with no idea at all what it was. I couldn't believe what I was watching. Moreover, I couldn't believe, looking around, how many people were there, and watching raptly. I laughed a couple of times and got dirty looks from the transparent, bug-eyed people at the end of the row.

Yeah - don't take much to entertain some folks.

I had a similar experience in Charleston, West Virginia in 1968, at a screening of The Graduate. All these college boys and girls showed up, boys in suits and ties, girls in prom-like formals. In a packed, old-fashioned movie house, there were exactly two people laughing. Me, and a middle-aged woman about a hundred yards away. The entire remainder of the audience sat in stunned silence. When i left the theater, people stepped quickly away from me, i suspect fearing contagion. I wandered around until i found a pool hall with beer. No one there took a second glance at me.

I'm confoozled. I thought the Graderut was funny. Damned funny. Ain't they got no census of yoomer in WV?

You've made me realize an error i made. That occured in Huntington, West Virginia, home of Marshall Univesity--and the majority of the student body were of rural origins. Even those who weren't very likely came from conservative backgrounds.

I could not begin to explain to you what the culture of the rural south and border states was more than 35 years ago. Yes, it was hilarious. But they were down for the count as soon as SEX reared its ugly head (all puns intended).

Ugly head, huh? Just look at the ceiling, then.

Many of them were by the end of the movie. In the scene in which Dustin reaches out and puts his hand on Anne Bancroft's breast, a shocked gasp litteraly drowned out the sound track. They were more disturbed by that then the brief full frontal nudity of Miss Bancroft (or her body double) earlier in the movie.

I hope you know that Doris Day was offered the part of Mrs Robinson and turned it down on the grounds that it was too naive.

So you better have another look at Doris Day movies if you want to be nearly up to date.

I have no previous knowledge of this movie. How bizzare!

Does anybody know how to upload photos to the posts?

PS Its a new release.

that's an easy one. first, click on post reply. then, click on IMG, and type in or cut & paste URL for the graphic file.

Tutorial - How to post an Image

cool thanks!!

PUG

Yer weccum. Anytime you want help with the bells and whistles here, just holler. The Help Forum is the best place to get answers; check over the topics to see if your concern has been answered, and if you don't see anything that helps, post a new topic there with your question ... that usually works pretty well.