If you’re looking for propaganda, you’ll find an inexhaustible supply in American films. Hollywood is a place where even a history of the Mormon church can wind up as political propaganda — leftwing propaganda, at that. In “Brigham Young — Frontiersman” (Twentieth Century-Fox, 1940), Mormon prophet Joseph Smith, impersonated by Vincent Price(!), is asked what his religion is all about. Well, he says, with C.B. DeMillish music playing in the background, it’s about building a world that has “a brotherhood plan,” a plan that makes it “impossible for any one man to pile up a lotta goods or have power over his neighbors.” He likens his version of the New Jerusalem to “that anthill over there,” announcing that in the human anthill “everybody [will be] doing his share of the work and getting his part of the profits.” Thus summarized, Mormon theology comes much closer to Marx (“from each according to his ability, to each according to his need”) than anyone might have predicted. With respect to political ideas, Hollywood films have proven remarkably absorbent. But rather than multiplying examples of the “Brigham Young” kind, it may be interesting to identify the limits of absorbency, the boundaries of entertainment propaganda in America. How far has propaganda been able to go?
The boundaries are identified, I believe, by a pair of movies, “Gabriel Over the White House” (1933), the most overtly fascist film ever released by a major studio; and “Mission to Moscow” (1943), the most overtly communist film. This is not a scientific determination, but I think you’ll agree that it’s hard to imagine more extreme ideological statements ever issuing from Hollywood. Full Article
Stephen D. Cox 