The Hunt: Universal Pictures cancels film release due to mass shootings

[USALiberal]

Universal Pictures has pulled the release of The Hunt following a series of mass shootings and criticism from US President Donald Trump.

The Hunt, a satirical film in which liberals hunt Trump supporters and kill them for sport, was due to be released on 27 September.

Marketing of the film had already been put on hold following the El Paso and Dayton shootings.

Universal said the decision was made after "thoughtful consideration."

The Hunt's storyline is intended to reflect the divided nature of US politics.

One trailer for the film was pulled by ESPN. It was said to open with the sound resembling an emergency broadcast signal.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, the liberal characters refer to their prey as "deplorables", a term used by Hillary Clinton to describe some of Mr Trump's fans in the run up too the 2016 elections.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-49310259

[CTyankee]

1. Um, what were they thinking?

As Beto said, "What the fuck?"

[USALiberal]

2. I agree, weird idea for a movie. nt

[Hortensis]

8. Weird that "liberals" are murderous instead of RW extremists,

or even LW extremists. Wonder who funded this "timely" project.

Good place to point out that feds reported that of all violent domestic terrorism attacks,

94% were non-Muslim RW extremists.
4% were Muslim extremists. (Me: presumably all or almost all RW)
2% were LW extremists.

Left-wing terrorists committed TWO PERCENT of all violent terrorist incidents on record.

And LW radicals and extremists quickly become far less liberal in traits, beliefs and behavior the more extreme they become.

That said, I kind of wish I had a chance to check out this fantasy.

[Bluepinky]

10. I agree, liberals are not the gun-nut crazies.

It would be interesting to see who funded this “timely” movie. Why do I think it might be the NRA, maybe funneling money from Russia into this project? It would certainly stir up some more anger toward liberals.

[Hortensis]

16. I lost an investigative article from last year that listed TV shows

of TV shows and movies, backed by RW money, meant to be propaganda Kool-Aid delivered as regular entertainment. Sure wish I could find it and check this out further.

One series my husband liked may not have been deliberate propaganda, but I raised so much fuss when I saw it that he stopped watching. It featured a billionaire who hired a pair of male and female vigilantes to go after dangerous national threats because, you know, government law enforcement either was too corrupt/morally bankrupt to or was so incompetent as to be totally worthless. These completely "beyond-what-law?" criminal characters, who always ended up killing without consequence, and their sociopathic employer were the good guys.

[Joe941]

13. They will re edit the film and take current politics out of it....

Then release it in a year.

[Hortensis]

17. In the last months before the election. It'll work for

everyone then that it'd work for now.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

19. It's a Blumhouse film (Jason Blum)

Written by Damon Lindelof (Lost). Starting Ike Barenholtz, Emma Roberts, and Hillary Swank.

Everyone involved is a liberal. The movie is satirical, and looked to be really good.

[Hortensis]

25. I admit I'm in the mood to enjoy if good, but let's not fool

ourselves -- the underlying theme is prime RW fodder. During Obama's admin, there were many sightings of the trains that were carrying Republicans west to death camps.

Reminds me. Our son actually briefly dated a young woman who told me the TV show the X-Files was how anti-government resistances groups secretly got their messages out to the people. They had to do it that way to avoid being murdered by our evil government, which apparently never caught on. (In his defense she was very pretty, sparkly and charming.)

Last I heard she'd retreated with her winger parents (she'd bred true) to the virtually-all-white "redoubt" of either WV or eastern KY to await and survive the inevitable national collapse. By now she will have reproduced some kids old enough to watch this with their parents and grandparents when it comes out.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

27. It's not, though.

The film is similar to The Most Dangerous Game, with the allegory about how divisive American politics have come.

Did you ever see Kevin Smith’s Red State? Similar vein.

[Hortensis]

28. :) I get it. If you spend more time with the people

I'm talking about, you'll get their "get," though. Maybe just wander over to the kind of forum where imbibers know Bill dragged bodies in black plastic bags around the White House grounds in the dark (presumably while the SS guarded him). This'll probably revive at least a few of the old arguments about how just many (dozens) the Clintons have murdered personally.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

30. I live in Trumpistan, Florida. I see and hear these people every day.

They are stupid and/or crazy.

I still want to see the film.

[Hortensis]

31. Lol. Me too, both. In fact,

one of our vacation mobile homes is surrounded by gorgeous marsh and protected wilderness smack in the middle of Trumpistan. In his old fishing clothes and favorite ancient cap, my elderly husband doesn't look at all like a despised snowbird, or a Jew, but is taken for a local, and he often gets an earful. Good thing he's good natured and prefers to laugh. Sometimes a bit too much, but he's finally had to admit that these people really could get control, and then Katie bar the door, or whatever the Yiddish version is.

[drmeow]

42. If the political roles were reversed

it would be a documentary rather than satire

[democratisphere]

3. Why would they make a movie like THAT?!

Hollywood executives are nuts!

[JHB]

11. Think about it. What was the premise of Rambo: First Blood Part 2?

Gutless government bureaucrats really did leave hundreds of POWs in Vietnam to be tortured in squalid prison camps.

Red Dawn: Soviets, Cubans, and Nicaraguans invade the US. Released at a time when conservative were saying "peaceniks" and "freezniks" wanted "unilateral disarmament".

Dirty Harry, and a bunch of other vigilante movies: Politicians are always feckless, letting evildoers run free. A tough guy just has to do "what needs to be done".

Practically every frikkin Chuck Norris movie or TV show.

More recently, there was An American Carol, a "satire" where a Michael Moore stand-in learns his lessons like Scrooge did. (Ok, maybe that one doesn't count because it bombed so hard it should have served as an object lesson.)

And I know I'm leaving out a bunch of more recent movies, because I see fewer movies these days and didn't shell out to see them.



Also think of all the dumbass movies that have ever been put out which had you wondering who was more nuts: The guy who thought it was a grand idea for a movie, or the guy who gave it the green light?


Conservatives love to complain about "Liberal Hollywood", but that's because when they do get pandered to they don't even notice, because that's their rightful due.

[customerserviceguy]

12. Don't forget

"Inglourious Basterds", where US GI's commit war crimes, only when the crimes are committed against Nazis, the audience cheers loudly.

Violence sells.

[JHB]

22. Yes, but this isn't just about violence...

...so much as it's about movies reinforcing, legitimizing, and painting in a heroic light conservative conspiracy theories and axe-grindings.

[Agschmid]

20. It's similar to the "Purge" series which had made hundreds of millions of dollars.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

23. Entertainment. The film looked really good.

A shame Universal caved on this.

[dweller]

4. aw jeez

✌🏼

[secondwind]

5. I can't believe they thought this was a good idea. WTF

[Buckeye_Democrat]

6. Good grief.

Were they hoping to make Trump supporters even MORE paranoid?!

The Hunt/Film synopsis

Twelve strangers wake up in a clearing. They don’t know where they are, or how they got there. They don't know they've been chosen… for a very specific purpose … The Hunt. In the shadow of a dark internet conspiracy theory, a group of globalist elites gathers for the very first time at a remote Manor House to hunt humans for sport. But the elites’ master plan is about to be derailed because one of the hunted, Crystal (Betty Gilpin, GLOW), knows The Hunters’ game better than they do. She turns the tables on the killers, picking them off, one by one, as she makes her way toward the mysterious woman (two-time Oscar® winner Hilary Swank) at the center of it all.

[dawg day]

39. "Global elitists?"

Only Trumpers could define that as "liberal". The Walton family, the Kochs, the Sacklers come quicker to mind than Rev. William Barber and Elizabeth Warren.

[tblue37]

47. The Mercers, too.nt

[Bluepinky]

7. They got the plot wrong. A much more likely scenario

is Trump supporters hunting down and killing liberals. The crazed gun nuts are mostly right wing.

Stupid and dangerous idea for a movie, aimed at directing fear and hatred of liberals. The NRA probably wrote the script. I don’t know too many liberals with a gun. They use paper and pen to make their points, not guns.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

21. Damon Lindeloff (a writer on Lost and Fringe) wrote it.

He’s a Democrat. As is everyone else involved in the film.

Also, many liberals own guns.

[Bluepinky]

32. Okay, but as another poster wrote, the great majority of mass shootings are done by those on the far

right.

And my sister is always telling me that Mark Zuckerburg is a Democrat, so how can Facebook be a conduit for Russia or Republicans to sow discord amongst Democrats? And Ivanka and Kushner claimed to be Democrats and look how well that turned out.

I would like to see who funded this movie.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

34. Yes, you are correct about mass shootings.

This film is not a documentary, however. It’s a horror-comedy/satire. Kind of a political riff on The Most Dangerous Game. It’s meant to be entertainment.

Both the writer and the production company owner (Jason Blum, Blumhouse Films) are liberals (Blum is very outspoken against Trump). Blumhouse Films and White Rabbit Films (Lindeloff) are the financiers for the film

It should be noted that Trumpers are complaining about this film (including Trump himself), which is why Universal (the distributor) is pulling the film.

[dawg day]

40. One stupid thing many liberals "creatively" do is try to show how "open-minded" they are -

by "non-stereotyping" or, rather "reverse-stereotyping." So, you know, "This serial murderer is FEMALE!" I guess the idea is to say, "All sides do it," even if demonstrably only one side does it, or does the vast majority of it.

So "I'm a liberal, and I'm going to show that hunting people as prey is bad by showing that liberals might do it too!"
I guess maybe they hope that they'll get right-wingers to be empathetic. "Oh! Being hunted and caged like those kids at the border would feel really BAD!"

But the right-wingers don't interpret it that way... they instead take it as further confirmation that they are the abused ones.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

46. You are reading WAY too fucking deep into

a satirical horror film.

There is no “liberals might do it, too”.

It’s a film. Entertainment.

[dixiegrrrrl]

43. Just to add..Universal is owned by Comcast. n/t

[Dr Hobbitstein]

45. Blumhouse is owned by Jason Blum.

Universal is the distributor, not the producer.

[PSPS]

9. I thought contemporary movies were universally bad, but this one really takes the cake.

How could anyone actually make a pitch for this story line and have it accepted as a "good idea for a movie?"

[customerserviceguy]

14. Many more

bad ideas than good ones come out of Hollywood.

[RainCaster]

15. I had no idea Hollywood is this bad

Wow.

[JHB]

24. It's been that bad since "Birth of a Nation"

[Dr Hobbitstein]

18. Ugh. I was looking forward to this film. nt

[BeyondGeography]

26. JFC, just what this country needed

Anything for a buck.

[Throck]

29. Hollywood

It's all about the bucks.

[Coventina]

33. This movie was already made and called "Bloodlust"

[Dr Hobbitstein]

36. The Most Dangerous Game, is more apt. nt

[Tennessee Hillbilly]

35. The Hunt, a satirical film

The problem is that conservatives can't recognize satire and will completely mis-interpret the purpose of the film.

[Dr Hobbitstein]

37. The same can be said of DU.

Lots of reactionaries in this thread.

[MontanaMama]

38. Don't these geniuses have the

hunters and the prey swapped? Deplorable are hunting liberals and immigrants daily. Maybe they should just make a documentary about what is really happening now for Christ’s sake instead of a fantasy that would never happen.

[Fla_Democrat]

41. The Last Supper, 1995

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0113613/

"A group of idealistic, but frustrated, liberals succumb to the temptation of murdering rightwing pundits for their political beliefs."

I guess it's more offensive in this film using guns, rather than poison....