The daily planet: Barbie battalions
It's either the achievement of a lifetime or the very sad waste of a life -- we can't decide. Either way, the life's work of a Dutch woman named Ietje Raebel, her collection of over 4000 Barbie dolls, went under the hammer in London yesterday for prices up to $2000. The collection spans from 1959 (when Babs was a demure brunette in a one-piece swimming costume) through to 2002 (when Ietje bought her final doll, the decidedly un-demure Quick Curl Miss America).
In between were thousands of Barbies which mirrored pretty much every social trend of the 20th century. Dolls in the sale include Barbie as Audrey Hepburn in
My Fair Lady, and Barbies inspired by artists, like Water Lily Barbie and Sunflower Barbie. No doubt Monet and Van Gogh would be proud.
Tuesday September 26, 2006
In the immortal words of Avril Lavigne, why does everything have to be so complic8ed? The flaw in all media coverage of world events these days is that we're never told who are the goodies and who are the baddies. This problem has been worrying Peter Bart, the editor of
Variety magazine, because Hollywood needs issues to be black and white in order to make colourful movies that audiences can relate to. Bart offers this summary of how a producer would be forced to pitch an action flick set in the Middle East of 2006: "This is a high concept movie. The bad guys are the Al Qaeda Sunnis, who are mad at the US because we've just given over Iraq to the Shiites, who are killing Sunnis. Of course, Al Qaeda's also getting close to Hezbollah, who are Shiites, but don't let that confuse you.
"You see, Hezbollah gets big time support from Syria, which is run by a Shiite who is distrusted by his Sunni majority. Syria also cosies up to Hamas, which is Sunni but also has links to the Muslim brotherhood.
"What ostensibly unites these factions, of course, is a fear of the Zionist conspiracy, which really means Israel. But behind this fear is an even bigger cloud – namely the plot to resurrect the Sassanians, a pre-Islamic Iranian dynasty that once ruled Iran and Iraq."
Not at all satisfactory, is it? You can certainly do better. Here's your assignment: write an outline, in less than 50 words (because that is the limit of the attention span of the average Hollywood producer) of a big-budget blockbuster about the Middle East, with recommendations on who might play George Bush, John Howard and Osama bin Laden. Be sure to make it clear who are the goodies. This column will pass on the best pitches to Hollywood, and take only 17 per cent of your ultimate box office.
Posted by Stay in touch
September 25, 2006 12:09 AM