Free Republic

Premiers April 1st.

HBO is one of the most liberal entertainment outlets ever conceived, but at the very least you had to respect them for not trying to hide that agenda. So why go all spineless now? Part of HBO’s absurd, intelligence-insulting denial is simply disingenuous. The network’s “agenda” took a pretty big hit when Governor Palin chose not to run in 2012, but the timing of this docu-drama, which is based on a political book written my John Heilamann and Mark Halperin, was always obvious: Drop this bomb in the heat of the GOP primary.

For decades, parents have worried about dangerous substances being put into what their children receive while Trick or Treating. On Friday evening, HBO's Bill Maher actually called for people to "put drugs in the Halloween candy"

Although it has not quite recaptured the magic of "The Sopranos," there is no denying that HBO is once again in full stride. With Emmy-winning movies, a panoply of well-done documentaries, successful comedies and dramatic hits both popular — "True Blood" — and critical — "Boardwalk Empire," "Treme" — the premium network bursts with so much justified confidence that it took on the perilous realm of fantasy with the well-received "Game of Thrones." So maybe it's time to tone down the tits. I write the word knowing it is going to render my editors and readers apoplectic — why not...

Based on a true story - In April, 2004, casualties mount in Iraq. At Quantico, choices focus on increasing troop strength or only replacing casualties. Lt. Col. Mike Strobl crunches numbers. Stung by his superior's rejection of his recommendation because he lacks recent combat experience, Strobl volunteers for escort duty, accompanying the remains Pfc. Chance Phelps, killed at 19. From Dover to Philadelphia by hearse, from there to Minneapolis and on to Billings by plane, and then by car to Phelps' Wyoming home - person after person pays respects. Kind words, small gifts, and gratitude are given Strobl to deliver...

Just finisjed watching HBO's Too Big To Fail. Its movie about the 2008 financial crisis and I have a question for those who've seen it and who has a better working knowledge of the events that led up to the 2008 crisis. How accurate are the facts portrayed in this HBO film? Knowing HBO's left leaning views and they clearly tried to make the repubs out to be villainous but all that aside, how did they do factually? Reason I ask is, if they did their homework and presented the business facts and events that led up to the 2008...

I’ve written several articles skewering HBO for producing political projects destined to air immediately prior to the 2012 election, where the vast majority of the cast and crew are passionate Barack Obama supporters, and where the content is aimed at the Democrat’s two favorite Republican villains… Sarah Palin and Dick Cheney. So, when I sat down to watch HBO’s Too Big to Fail, I prepared myself for the worst. What I didn’t expect was the big surprise awaiting me. Too Big to Fail, which premieres on HBO on May 23, 2011, features a star studded cast recounting the events that...

First Look: Julianne Moore as Governor Sarah Palin, Actress Cast as Bristol by John Nolte I wrote at length about the timing of HBO’s adaptation of “Game Change,” — an obvious hit job that even the New York Times, Atlantic and Poynter Institute criticized for a lack of sourcing. But the Left is not about truth, they are only about tactics: We’ll see how closely the film sticks to the book, but Governor Palin disputed how “Game Change” portrayed her and being as that it was one of the very few books I had time to read last year, it...

Get a sneak peek at Julianne Moore as Sarah Palin HBO‘s latest anti-Republican flick. The former Boogie Nights star Julianne Moore, 50, will play a 43 year old Sarah Palin during the 2008 Presidential election based on the 2010 book, Game Change, by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin.

Like it did with Boardwalk Empire in September, HBO just renewed Game of Thrones moments after the ratings for the premiere episode were in. For Game of Thrones, those ratings were solid, not great. But, also like with Boardwalk Empire, HBO invested in elaborate sets and designs in re-creating the world from George R.R. Martin's books, so a second season was considered a sure thing. And while HBO brass pay attention to ratings, the numbers have never been the deciding factor in the network's renewal decisions as proven by the pickups of shows like Treme, Bored to Death and In...

Well, I gave Oscar-winning documentarist Barbara Kopple the benefit of the doubt. After watching Gunfight on HBO, I can state without equivocation that it was a heavily tilted, barely disguised polemic presenting the argument for gun control. In fact, you could call it the Colin [Goddard] and Paul [Helmke] Show . . . Goddard, the high-cheekboned gun control advocate who survived the Virginia Tech massacre, was clearly the “star” of the doc. His experience opened the film and closed it. And ran all the way through it. The President of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence played best supporting...

Bill Maher should be fired. It's not acceptable that in this country in 2011 a mother of five children should be called such a disgusting name on television. When Imus only chuckled at someone else's comment of "nappy-headed ho's" he was immediately dismissed. Why? Because blacks threatened to boycott CBS. And guess what? Boycotts work. Where is the boycott of Time-Warner after Maher's insane remarks? Anyone with a pencil or a computer should contact Time Warner and tell them we're going to boycott all Time Warner television shows, films and products until Maher is ousted for his foul comment last...

I apologize in advance if my writing the words that were said on HBO offends anyone, but this has to be said. NOW Communications Director, Lisa Bennet scolds Bill Maher because of his latest comment about Sarah Palin, calling her a "dumb twat." "Listen, supposedly progressive men (ok, and women, too): Cut the crap! Stop degrading women with whom you disagree and/or don't like by using female body terms or other gender-associated slurs. OK? Can you do that, please?" Yes. C'mon fellas, now I asked you to stop, don't make me count to three. Way to Say it sister!! Of...

HBO just can’t help themselves. Less than two weeks after the pay television giant announced Julianne Moore, 50, will play a 43 year old Sarah Palin during the 2008 Presidential election, the network announced its intentions to make another anti-GOP movie based on the 2008 Barton Gellman book, "Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency" as well as "The Dark Side," a 2006 documentary which aired on "Frontline," a PBS public affairs series.

In 2003, Charles Krauthammer coined the term, Bush Derangement Syndrome, defined as “the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency — nay — the very existence of George W. Bush.” By 2008, the syndrome progressed into Palin Derangement Syndrome. And in 2011, HBO caught the bug...

DHD: “Julianne Moore is set to star in HBO Films’ Game Change. Directed by Jay Roach, the movie is based on Mark Halperin and John Heilemann’s 2010 book about the 2008 Presidential elections and follows John McCain’s presidential campaign, from his selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate to their ultimate defeat in the general election.” We’ll see how closely the film sticks to the book, but Governor Palin disputed how “Game Change” portrayed her and being as that it was one of the very few books

Sarah Palin is getting the movie treatment with HBO Films' Game Change. Oscar-nominated actress Julianne Moore will portray the former Alaska governor in the project, which will chronicle Palin's burst into the national scene as a surprise vice presidential candidate in 2008. Directing Game Change is Jay Roach, director of the Meet the Parents movies as well as the HBO film Recount, which examined the aftermath of the 2000 presidential election with a focus on the Florida recount. Game Change is based on Mark Halperin and John Heilemann’s book about the 2008 presidential elections and follows John McCain’s campaign from...

Julianne Moore is set to star in HBO Films' Game Change. Directed by Jay Roach, the movie is based on Mark Halperin and John Heilemann’s 2010 book about the 2008 Presidential elections and follows John McCain’s presidential campaign, from his selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate to their ultimate defeat in the general election. Danny Strong, who previously wrote the Roach-directed HBO movie Recount, about the aftermath of the 2000 Presidential elections, penned the script for Game Change. Roach is executive producing, with Strong co-executive producing. So far, Palin has been most famously portrayed on TV...

The show was not only a liberal hit piece, they had some of the dumbest liberals in America as "specialist". This idiot economist from MIT, Simon Johnson, actually blamed Ronald Reagan for the current deficits and said that the economy got much worse under Reagan. One wonders how these people get this stupid so early in life. I suppose one of his grants was cut in the 80s and he figured life must have been hard for everyone. Anyway, don't waste your time. The hit pieces are sometimes ok, I get a little bias and can live with it. This...

The time to vomit is now. Aaron Sorkin's Cable News Drama Is A Go At HBO With Pilot Order, Scott Rudin Producing EXCLUSIVE: Aaron Sorkin's long-gestating drama set behind the scenes of a nightly cable news show is becoming a reality. HBO has closed a deal for a pilot order to the project, which reunites The Social Network writer with the movie's producer Scott Rudin. Both are executive producing the pilot, which will be filmed later this year. UPDATE: Word is the project's working title is More As the Story Develops. In his research for the show, Sorkin spent time...

Watch two videos, one is Bill Maher joking about a botched attempt to take VICE PRESIDENT Dick Cheney's life. The watch a video of Bill Maher saying Republicans want to kill people or use such language, not Liberals.

HBO’s Atlantic City gangster drama ends its first season tonight—Allen Barra argues that its excellence is unrivaled in TV history, and has only seldom been achieved in film. In the first episode of Boardwalk Empire, directed by Martin Scorsese, Atlantic City political boss “Nucky” Thompson, played by Steve Buscemi, pensively gazes into a fortuneteller’s parlor. A short time later, we see the reverse shot—Nucky staring through the door’s oval window as seen from the inside. The shot replicates the double burn insert popular in newspapers in the 1910s and 1920s where a photo of a famous person was set in...

What's playing at 1pm ET? Why, it's By the People: The Election of Barack Obama. Cell phones and premium cable - liberal necessities. Useful Info Nation

What is it called when someone has paranoid delusions that someone with paranoid delusions is out to get him? Whatever it is, Bill Maher has it in spades. This guy is seriously paranoid about paranoid Christians – or as he calls them, “nativist bedwetters” who wave signs on Tax Day and offer burnt sacrifices, I gather, to the most “Evil Dingbat,” Sarah Palin. On Monday’s Tonight Show, Maher snarked about the dreaded Sunday School teachers, organists, moms in jumpers, and little girls in patent leather shoes who “control the national dialogue” and “perpetuate mass delusion” – through electromagnetic microwaves, I...

Responding to the upcoming HBO pro-abortion documentary 12th and Delaware — due for release August 3 — and the immoral tactics used by filmmakers Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady, Human Life International released the following statement back in February (edited): Father Thomas J. Euteneuer, president of Human Life International, commented on the premier of 12th and Delaware, an HBO documentary that focuses its attention on a corner in Fort Pierce, Florida, where the battle for the defense of the unborn rages daily. Father Euteneuer, who appears in the film, stated, 'Despite the efforts of the directors and the editors of...

Pretty good Gregalogue.

The new HBO movie "The Special Relationship" -- about the friendship between Bill Clinton and Britain's Tony Blair -- is missing something: a scene about Monica Lewinsky. The scene that showed Bill telling Hillary for the first time about his affair with Monica Lewinsky was shot but cut from the film at the last moment, according to actress Hope Davis, who plays the former First Lady in the movie. "It felt very strange trying to shoot it," Davis told the celebrity-news Web site becksmithhollywood.com. "It was a very uncomfortable feeling."

HBO Movie on Assisted Suicide Advocate Jack Kevorkian Premiers Saturday Washington, DC -- The new HBO movie glorifying the life of assisted suicide advocate Jack Kevorkian starring Al Pacino premiers on Saturday. You Don't Know Jack, the biopic on the man who was eventually imprisoned for killing a disabled patient on national television, is already drawing criticism. http://LifeNews.com/bio3085.html

Catching up with an HBO sports documentary which ran several times in March: ‘Magic & Bird: A Courtship of Rivals,’ painted Boston Celtics basketball star Larry Bird as the victim of a racist national milieu exacerbated by President Ronald Reagan...

'Price was twelve, bruh.' 'Say bruh. Them twelve hundred was for eight pieces.' A deal's going down, yeah. But not the sort we're used to witnessing between black men on a television show set in an American city. Certainly not a David Simon drama on HBO. Yet before even a word of dialogue is uttered come clues. A saxophonist licks, then adjusts his reed. Valve oil gets applied to a trombone. Soldiers and cops stand guard. Two little kids dance to a faint parade rhythm, which is soon supplanted by the bass booming from an SUV. An unseen trumpet sounds...

In 2002, ABC decided not to renew Bill Maher's contract apparently due to some disgraceful comments he made on his program "Politically Incorrect" following the 9/11 attacks. After what transpired on "Real Time" Friday, the heads of HBO should be equally outraged, if not more. As the discussion moved to the attempted assassination of Vice President Cheney last week, Maher asked his panel why it was necessary for the Huffington Post to remove comments by readers concerning their disappointment that the attempt failed. As the conversation ensued, Maher said one of the most disgraceful and irresponsible things uttered on a...

The way Bill Maher sees it, resistance to ObamaCare is all God's fault. Why? Because so many people believe in this "schmuck" who lives in the clouds...and this belief, in turn, intensifies opposition to ObamaCare. This leftist social critic, anti-Christian crusader, and HBO comedy show host warned God at the end of last week to back off, to allow smart people like himself and Barack Obama and the New York Times editorial board to push the God-fearing "ignoramuses" aside this week and take control of the nation's health care.

"Good Night Chesty! Where ever you are!"

"When we see crazy, senseless deaths like this, we can only ask why, why, why couldn't it have been Glenn Beck?" So joked Bill Maher Friday evening on HBO's "Real Time." During his opening monologue, Maher addressed John Bedell, the man that was shot and killed Thursday when he attacked the Pentagon. For some reason, the comedian used the incident as a vehicle to go after the Fox News host (video embedded below the fold with transcript, h/t Ed Morrissey, file photo):

To prepare for the filming of HBO's epic, $200-million World War II miniseries "The Pacific," screenwriter Bruce C. McKenna accompanied a locations crew to a tiny coral island near Guam known as Peleliu. A ridge there is laced with hundreds of caves -- undisturbed for more than half a century -- where Japanese troops hid out from U.S. Marines during one of the war's deadliest conflicts. "There are still skeletons in the caves, and we saw them," McKenna remembers with amazement. "At the first cave we found, we walked in and there was the rib cage of a dead Japanese...

There’s the cliched phrase: “It’s like watching a train wreck.” In “Terror in Mumbai,” which airs tonight 8 pm ET/PT on HBO, you get to see what no documentary has shown before: a “360 degree view” of a multi-pronged terrorist act, seen partly and genuinely from the terrorists point view. The reason: “Terror in Mumbai” uses actual cell phone instructional conversations during the attack given to the terrorists in the field by a shadowy control “boss” in Pakistan. Not recreated -- the real thing…and it will make your blood both boil, and freeze. So, yes, even terrorists have “directors” who...

TERROR IN MUMBAI features exclusive audio tapes of the intercepted phone calls between the young gunmen and their controllers in Pakistan, and testimony from the sole surviving gunman. The Mumbai attackers' targets included the city's main railway station, a popular cafe, two major hotels and a Jewish center. Leaving the city's iconic Taj Mahal Hotel in flames, and Mumbai's woefully unprepared police and security forces paralyzed with fear, the attacks sent an ominous message to governments around the world. "Much as the 9/11 attacks in the U.S. did in 2001, the events that unfolded last November in Mumbai served as...

During the 10AM ET hour of America’s Newsroom on Fox News Channel, fill-in co-host Martha Maccallum told viewers what President Obama watched on election night while Democrats suffered big losses in New Jersey and Virginia: “Robert Gibbs said, well, he was actually watching, you know, the HBO special about his year-long campaign and how it all went.” On Tuesday night the White House had worked to downplay the Democratic gubernatorial defeats by claiming the President did not watch the election returns. Apparently Gibbs thought it would look better if the commander in chief was watching a self-indulgent fawning documentary about...

Harvard students will be able to watch the “The Wire” for class credit next year. At a panel last night, stars of the HBO hit series joined Harvard professors in discussing the applications of the show—which depicts the struggles of urban life in Baltimore—in understanding and combating real urban social issues. “‘The Wire’ has done more to enhance our understanding of the systemic urban inequality that constrains the lives of the poor than any published study” Sociology Professor William J. Wilson said. African American studies chair Professor Evelyn B. Higginbotham said that there would be a new course in which...

NEW YORK (AP) - Pivotal presidential campaigns are frequently defined in retrospect by documentaries. "The War Room" chronicled Bill Clinton's political operation in 1992, adding a phrase to the political lexicon in the process. Alexandra Pelosi's "Journeys With George" captured the oddities of a national campaign on board George W. Bush's airplane in 2000. The makers of "By the People: The Election of Barack Obama," which premieres Tuesday—Election Night—on HBO, wouldn't mind the same status. "That was our hope—that we would create something for history," said filmmaker Alicia Sams, who made the documentary with colleague Amy Rice and a key...

Good Morning America co-host Diane Sawyer on Tuesday helped promote an upcoming HBO documentary on Barack Obama and allowed producer Ed Norton to gush over the "zen" presidential campaign of the Democratic candidate. Sawyer breathlessly teased the program as "the Obamas behind closed doors. The grandmother who raised him and the man you’ve never seen." Sawyer played several clips of the By the People: The Election of Barack Obama, a film that followed Obama and his family during the 2008 campaign. The segment, which ran six and a half minutes, will be supplemented by more promotion on Tuesday’s Nightline. When...

Would Larry David Urinate on the Koran? by Jamie Glazov In a recent Curb Your Enthusiasm episode, Larry David accidentally urinates on a picture of Jesus while he is a guest in someone else’s home. This, in turn, leads to a misunderstanding in which the homeowners think they have a miraculously weeping Jesus.Some Christians are understandably upset.Just some thoughts on what this episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm has revealed:Are producers of this show, or Larry David, or anyone else connected to it fearing for their lives right now? Are there Christian groups calling for the death of anyone in connection...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 29 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — A prominent national Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization today called on HBO to apologize for an episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” in which the main character splattered urine on a painting of Jesus. snip “It is beyond tasteless to insult the religious sensibilities of billions of people in America and around the world with such a cheap and vulgar publicity stunt. Jesus, peace be upon him, is loved and revered by both Christians and Muslims. Muslims view him as one of God’s greatest messengers to mankind. snip “We understand the drive for ratings, but...

Last Sunday, in "Curb Your Enthusiasm", Larry David's new pill has increased his flow so much it is causing him to splatter, which leads to a misunderstanding about a miraculously weeping Jesus in Maureen and her mothers bathroom. Immediately after the air time Catholic groups came out with disapproving statements...

Comedian Larry David is under attack from critics who say he pushed the mocking of religion and Christian belief in miracles over the edge in the latest episode of his HBO series "Curb Your Enthusiasm," which the cable network defended as "playful."

Larry David New York City, N.Y., Oct 28, 2009 / 10:55 pm (CNA).-   Catholic critics have reacted to an HBO show that had a scene showing a painting of Jesus being urinated on and which also mocked Catholic devotion to Jesus. They have questioned an apparent double standard in the treatment of religions and have called for an apology from the show’s producers.Larry David, creator of the successful sitcom “Seinfeld,” now stars in the Sunday night show “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” a fictional comedy about his life.In the most recent episode, the elderly David goes to the bathroom in...

"Outrage," a documentary that claims to expose closeted homosexuality among elected officials who have taken stances against gay rights issues - including, it says, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist - will make its cable television debut tonight. The film was in theaters last May. HBO is scheduled to begin showing it at 9 tonight. Director Kirby Dick said the message remains as important as ever. He said gays and lesbians are locked in the largest civil rights struggle in the United States today and his film examines hypocrisy among lawmakers that has set back the movement. "This is one of the...

Trailer for "The Pacific", the HBO series on the war in the Pacific during WWII

If smugness were a crime, they would put HBO "Real Time" host Bill Maher under the jail. On NBC's Aug. 24 "Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien," Maher expressed his frustration with President Barack Obama's inability to get health care/health insurance reformed and passed into law. "I think right now for example, this health care debate looks like it's - we could lose it because I don't think [Obama] he has been tough enough," Maher said. "You know, he used to say in the campaign, ‘It's your time.' This is his time. He should get mad, stop [expletive] around." ...more (w/video)...

HBO’s Potential New Star ‘Licked Doorknobs’ to Make Republicans Sick Posted By John Nolte On August 25, 2009 @ 5:03 am In Entertainment, Featured Story, News, Politics The first reaction to a story like this is get wrapped ’round the axle of HBO’s hypocrisy, so let’s get that out of the way: Of course no Republican who had behaved in the same manner as ”sex columnist” Dan Savage would get a shot at an HBO show. But there’s really no hypocrisy when you realize that Bill Maher’s network is waging ideological war. Through that prism of clarity, the network’s desire...