Hey Woody, Irony rhymes with Soon-Yi (and other thoughts on L’affaire Polanski)

I won’t try to improve upon the excellent commentaries being made all around the papers and blogs regarding L’affaire Polanski. My take on the matter is rather simple: don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time. Polanski did the crime and admitted as much. End of story.

Anyone (then or now) who has deluded themselves into thinking he actually fled the U.S.A. (and stayed gone) because he was afraid of a vindictive judge, as opposed to the more primal fear of going to jail (as he would — and should — have done), needs a swift knife to the nose, a la Jake Gittes.

In any event, how nice to see that the insular Hollywood country club has circled the wagons to support their fugitive friend. A petition to release Polanski? Don’t you sign petitions for, you know, innocent people being oppressed by malevolent governments? Only imbeciles from L.A. could confuse Polanski’s (self-imposed) plight with a situation that actually warrants mass protest. Like, say, health care reform.

That Woody Allen went anywhere near this particular issue reveals him to be both beneath contempt and incapable of understanding irony (hint: it rhymes with Soon-Yi). It’s shameless. The only thing more embarrassing than his signature on that petition is the sum of his career the last two decades. How about Whoopi Goldberg’s quote? Wow. It’s almost impossible to resist making offensive rebuttals to her illogical (and yes, offensive) peregrinations regarding the concept of ”rape-rape”, so I’ll simply suggest it would be nice to offer her the “rape test” the same way Liz Cheney should get the “torture test” to see if reality easily squares with their blithe declarations about other peoples’ pain.

It has been embarrassing to hear the orchestra of elite idiots displaying how insulated and utterly out of touch they are. The list of signatures on the aforementioned petition from the Hollywood fraternity is nauseating. If Scorsese stings — and it does — seeing the great Milan Kundera is downright depressing, although it does put his undeniable misogynistic streak in better perspective).

This is neither tough nor complicated. Any of these well-paid and morally myopic big-wigs rallying around their weasel are just as odious as the politicians (ironically, the types most of these artists correctly skewer) who admonish us to look forward and not ruffle feathers by investigating war crimes committed in all of our names. (That some of them are invoking Polanski’s history as a Holocaust survivor is disingenuous as it is cynical. And sickening.)

The fact that Polanski is a brilliant director (indeed, I’m on record endorsing Chinatown as the most perfect American movie ever made) really has nothing to do with justice. If you believe in that not-so-complicated concept, this is a no brainer. The problem is, we’re seeing the lack of brain power and the darkended hearts that work together to keep the cash registers ringing in Hollywood.