Matt Welch | April 22, 2008
From an R.G. Bethany, subject line of "Peace":
The Movie "HAIR" is Psychological Anti-Warfare at its finest. Here's how it works. Two hours of very exciting music and dance. Nothing bad is said or implied. Everything is happy. You will notice alot of movement in every scene. Several things are always moving. You are being conditioned. Knowing this does not matter. Then the series of scenes at the end and...BAM. It hits you hard. Remember this is Psychological Anti-Warfare.
Me, I'm even more shocked that the movie came out in 1979. After, for example, the first season of Dallas....
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The fact that there is something moving in every scene is evidence of the fact that you are being conditioned? How? Conditioned for what? Are they trying to desensitize me to the horror of moving objects?
Just go to an off-Broadway one-man (or woman) play and you'll get conditioned. To hate theater forever.
These danged, newfangled moving pictures make my head hurt! They must use X-ray cameras because you can see through some of those poor actors clothes! Oh, the humanity!
Psychological Anti-Warfare? What the hell does that even mean... is it supposed to be the opposite of Psychological Warfare?
Crap play, crap movie, crap music. I give all version negative stars. They even managed to make naked women on stage boring, how the hell can you do that?
I've never seen 'Hair'. Anybody know what the BAM! is that he's talking about? what hits you so hard?
Apparently, Milos Forman added an entire plot for the movie version because the stage show has absolutely none.
CORRECT THE URKOBOLD IF HE IS MISTAKEN, BUT DIDN'T THE FILM
VERSION OF HAIR INCLUDE A YOUNG, NAKED, AND BOUNTIFUL
BEVERLY D'ANGELO?
BOUNCY, BOUNCY!
The fact that there is something moving in every scene is
evidence of the fact that you are being conditioned? How?
Conditioned for what? Are they trying to desensitize me to the
horror of moving objects?
Would not be conditioned to buy stuff, the continual fear of the
Left. No, must be beneficial conditioning so that you don't buy
stuff from da man.
"Me, I'm even more shocked that the movie came out in
1979."
Kind of like CAN'T STOP THE MUSIC; the big Disco movie coming out
in 1980, a good year and a half after everybody got sick of
Disco.
still, it provided the greatest product tie-in ever: a
Baskin-Robbins flavor called CAN'T STOP THE NUTS.(did they even
notice that it starred the Village People?)
Guy,
My many moons of work experience at the Biloxi Coliseum tells me
that they "condition" you to buy HAIR merchandise after the
show.
Crap play, crap movie, crap music. I give all version
negative stars. They even managed to make naked women on stage
boring, how the hell can you do that?
What happened, J sub D, you saw the play and hated it so much you
went to the movie and bought the soundtrack?
My many moons of work experience at the Biloxi Coliseum
tells me that they "condition" you to buy HAIR merchandise after
the show.
Ah, sort of like the ralleys at Freedom Park in DC where the
"anti-Capitalists" are all selling stuff? It is only beneficial
when it is their stuff?
The play was a middlebrow attempt to cash in on the '60s while
they happened. The movie was a self-conscious piece of '60s
nostalgia. Neither one is especially good, though it's hard not to
enjoy the camp awfulness of verses like
My hair like Jesus wore it
Hallelujah, I adore it
Hallelujah, Mary loved her son
Why don't my mother love me?
Say what you will about HAIR, but Age of Aquarius sticks in my head for days whenever I hear it.
ChicagoTom,
The Fifth Dimension, right? I kind of like that song, though it's
probably unpurged nostalgia.
Say what you will about HAIR, but Age of Aquarius sticks in
my head for days whenever I hear it.
Just as cannon fire does mine.
Guy,
Funny story. I went to the Blue Man Group on the tenth with a
friend of mine. Mike Roehm, the DJ, called an intermission and on
the screens the text "Buy Mike Roehm Merchandise" appeared. I
thought it was funny until my friend was one of the first in the
merchandise line to buy his cd. She listened to it on the way to my
house and I don't believe she has thought about it since. Marketing
works . . . just ask this Bethany person.
What happened, J sub D, you saw the play and hated it so
much you went to the movie and bought the soundtrack?
Actually, I saw the play(sucked) which implies I heard the
soundtrack (also sucks). I haven't seen the movie, so I am probably
being unfair (and accurate) to assert that it also sucks. Hippies
made some decent music, but this ain't it.
Say what you will about HAIR, but Age of Aquarius sticks in
my head for days whenever I hear it.
Other things that stick in your head:
Knives.
Maces.
Very small rocks.
Naga Sadow,
Kinda like that nutty lawyer chick from Peru who had been to a
Cheap Trick concert the day before our last date and just had to
borrow my "Cheap Trick Greatest Hits" CD? I gladly surrendered it
so she would get out of my Jeep and had no wish of seeing either
again.
No, her name was Rosa Maria, not Bethany :)
Other things that stick in your head:
Knives.
Maces.
Very small rocks.
Vomit.
Churches.
Lead.
"Unpurged nostalgia" is a terrific phrase.
would be a great name for a band.
Fixed that for you.
It's all so clear now: the closing sequence to The
40-Year-Old Virgin was the Anti-War Master Manipulators'
follow-up campaign, setting us up for defeat and humiliation in
Iraq just as the original HAIR cost us victory in
Vietnam.
Next: how Casablanca caused the sellout at Yalta.
"""Psychological Anti-Warfare? What the hell does that even
mean... is it supposed to be the opposite of Psychological
Warfare?"""
Probably. Pysch ops are consider a key element in warfare today,
not just on the enemy but on your own country. The lesson from
vietnam was preventing the loss of support for the war.
Check this article out.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/washington/20generals.html?em&ex=1208923200&en=a4ee1c89d3b31d22&ei=5087%0A
The Movie "HAIR" is Psychological Anti-Warfare at its finest. [...]You are being conditioned.
Bada-bing!
Now you've started a train of thought for me MattXIV! Who the HELL invented lawn darts? Why? Was he/she high? Did the inventor not realize I would be born someday with a sadistic older brother who just had to throw them at someone, anyone? Guess who that someone was?
Blood clots
Dude. That opened up a whole new world of punning for me. Thank
you.
Eh, the play has a kind of nutty musical energy if you have a
good cast. As social commentary it kind of flops, using a hammer to
get its points across.
The thing I find funny about hippies is their utter dependence on
the vast majority of people living a lifestyle they say is so evil.
If everyone became a hippy overnight, 90% of the population would
be dead in 6 months.
I liked Jesus Christ Superstar, with that Jesus hippie
dude.
I've told this story here before, but when I lived in Chicago in
the mid-90s, I heard a DJ say that the Broadway musical was on tour
and would be coming to Chicago that summer. With the original Jesus
and Judas he noted, apparently without intending it to sound the
way it did. Or maybe he knew something I didn't.
Found this on the googles for "R.G. Bethany":
R-49
The effectiveness of a pharmacist-led diabetes clinic in lowering
A1C and LDL-C levels
R.G. Bethany, S. M. Loughlin, J. D. Hayes, K. W. Garey, G. K.
Rice
Kelsey-Seybold Clinic and the University of Houston College of
Pharmacy, Houston, TX
March 31 - April 3, 2006 35
Background: Diabetes mellitus is a group of diseases characterized
by high levels of blood glucose resulting from defects
in insulin production, insulin action, or both; and is also
associated with serious microvascular and macrovascular
complications. The purpose of the study is to evaluate the
effectiveness of a pharmacist-led diabetes clinic in lowering
A1C
and LDL-cholesterol levels.
Objective: The primary objective of this study is to compare A1C
values of patients enrolled in a pharmacist-led diabetes
clinic with those patients not enrolled in the clinic. The
secondary objective is to compare LDL-C values of patients
enrolled in the clinic with those not enrolled.
Methods: All diabetic patients who were approached for entry into
the Diabetes mellitus Medication Therapy Management
Clinic (DM MTMC) between January 1, 2004 and December 31, 2004 were
eligible for study entry. Patients were identified
from a database maintained by the clinical pharmacists that
contains the names of all patients that were approached for
entry into clinic. Patients with less than two documented A1C and
LDL-C values within the following 6-9 months were
excluded. Changes in A1C and LDL-C values between patients enrolled
in the program will be compared to those who have
not enrolled using the Student's t-test or ANOVA. A p
ProLib -
I liked J.C. Superstar as well. With better music and a proven
plot, it beats Hair like a red-headed stepchild,
J sub D,
The best part was when that Judas character betrayed Jesus. Didn't
see that one coming!
I won't comment on HAIR, since I have been able to avoid seeing it in any incarnation, but I saw Jesus Christ Superstar in a traveling production featuring the "original" Jesus & Judas sometime within the last ten years. Maybe it was just one of them - I've yet to recover the memory. The album is not my cuppa tea, but it doesn't turn my stomach quite like the staged version did.
"...in the mid-90s, I heard a DJ say that the Broadway
musical was on tour and would be coming to Chicago that summer.
With the original Jesus and Judas..."
I don't doubt that you heard him say that, but I'm pretty sure he
was wrong. It was Jeff Fenholt who played Jesus in the original
Broadway production. In the mid-90's, he was doing Christian music
and Christmas records.
(I worked with him briefly on a metal project called "Bible Black"
in the mid-80's, with Duck MacDonald, Craig Gruber and Gary
Driscoll. It was rubbish.)
Billy Beck,
He meant the original Jesus and Judas from the movie--Ted Neely and
Carl Anderson.
The only thing I remember about Hair is that stupid Cowsills record...- Jim Walsh
Well, even an ill wind that blows some good. The Cowsills
were ripped off on TV as The Partridge Family, which meant
that I got to see Shirley Jones dressed like Zatanna the
magician.
Kevin
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