"This may be a shock to you, but Hollywood celebrities are an elite!" –
Thomas Frank

Thomas Frank has written one of the most successful books about the history of the Democratic Party and he talks about the polemics between Hollywood and middle/rural America with Meat Bone Express Podcast.

Frank was once a regular guest on CNN, but in the current age that doesn't have time to wade through nuance, Frank's refusal to become a partisan-hack has made him an outsider for increasingly polemic and crumbling American cable news networks. But he has started to circle the wagons as a regular on Australian, Italian and Canadian TV and guest on popular YouTube channels such as TYT and Jimmy Dore. 

His book Listen, Liberal is a continued international success. Released before the 2016 election, Listen, Liberal was and is as prophetic as the Adam Curtis magnum opus documentary HYPERNORMALISATION and works as a fine companion. 

In a Guardian article, Frank talks about the agitprop filmmaking of Steve Bannon, the Trump campaign manager who has now left the White House and started making films again:

"[Generation Zero's] most far-fetched proposition is also its most revealing. Generation Zero asserts that history unfolds in a cyclical pattern, endlessly repeating itself. Historical crises (such as the Depression and Second World War) are said to give rise to triumphant and ambitious generations (think Levittown circa 1952), who make the mistake of spoiling their children, who then tear society apart through their decadence and narcissism, triggering the cycle over again. Or as the movie’s trailer puts it: “In history, there are four turnings. The crisis. The high. The awakening. The unravelling. History repeats itself. The untold story about the financial meltdown.”

Thomas Frank spoke with Meat Bone Express at the Adelaide Writers festival.

Mike Retter, publisher of the Podcast "Meat Bone Express"

Full podcast interview:

 


Mike Retter is a film director, of the indie feature Youth On The March, creator of the zine "Cinema Now", and the Podcast "Meat Bone Express", and part of the Port Film Co-op.