[ExI] movie recommendations

Wed Dec 3 01:37:06 UTC 2025

From: extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org> On Behalf Of Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat
Subject: [ExI] movie recommendations

On 01/12/2025 22:46, John K Clark wrote:

Does anybody have a movie recommendation?

>…Absolutely nothing to do with futurism, AI, transhumanism, or anything else this list normally deals with, but my favourite film of all time is 'Amelie' (Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain, Jean-Pierre Jeunet et Guillaume Laurant), with Audrey Tatou.

Everything has to do with futurism Ben.  AI will view our movies as well as read our books.  With AI trained on how humans are, history and the arts wrap back around, like a snake devouring its tail.  Everything we do now is futurism.  Granted I do not like the notion that I just compared us to the snake’s tail, witnessing the snake’s head advancing hungrily.

>…Unless you have a heart of stone, I can't recommend it highly enough.

-- 
Ben

Ben you present here as a kind and gentle soul.  Your recommendation has persuaded me to view Amelie, in spite of my heart of stone.  Egregiously calcified lump of useless minerals it is, with few redeeming qualities, smaller than that of the Grinch before he met Cindy Lou Who, that’s who.

I am not familiar with French comedy, but my first exposure was John’s recommendation Death of Stalin, which is (one might opine) very dark comedy, darker than the inside of a cow.  I don’t know how else they could have presented that topic with any semblance of historical veracity without having hundreds of perfectly innocent commies get slain (ja, even I agree there are innocent commies.)

Casting Monte Python’s Michael Palin as Molotov was brilliant.

Historians have long debated what we will never know: the possibility that Stalin was murdered.  It seems plausible enough that I would buy that share for about 30 cents.  If he was murdered, it was probably by the polit bureau, and Beria is the leading suspect, perhaps 50% chance he dunnit.  In the movie, they have Beria poisoning the boss.  Before he did that, he slew all the doctors in Moscow, anyone who could treat a poison patient or diagnose the cause of death.  Upon “discovering” the ambiguously dead Stalin, he sent the rest of the polit bureau to fetch a doctor, but the best they could do is a psychiatrist.  The soviets used mental hospitals as makeshift prisons.  They put lab coats on a dozen psych patients (actual wackmeisters as opposed to the already-slain doctors (Beria could not risk having real medics survive)) and gave them temporary medical degrees.  Very dark hilarity ensued.  Those patient-doctors were all slain in a horrifying comedic scene.

History tells us that Beria is thought to be the Soviet contact for Klaus Fuchs, so I had already known something about him from Richard Rhodes’ excellent book The Making Of The Atomic Bomb.  Rhodes’ description of the ruthless Beria agrees with the French script writers: he was perhaps the smartest of the polit bureau, remorseless rapist, remorselessly disregarding the suffering of citizens, with the only socially redeeming quality being his murdering Stalin.

Ben, if you can develop the requisite heart of stone even temporarily, I do recommend Death of Stalin.

spike

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