Salon.com > Atlas Shrugged

We’re living in an Ayn Rand economy

Sat, 18 May 2013 12:00:00 +0000

Ayn Rand's novel "Atlas Shrugged" fantasizes a world in which anti-government citizens reject taxes and regulations, and "stop the motor" by withdrawing themselves from the system of production. In a perverse twist on the writer's theme the prediction is coming true. But instead of productive people rejecting taxes, rejected taxes are shutting down productive people.

Perhaps Ayn Rand never anticipated the impact of unregulated greed on a productive middle class. Perhaps she never understood the fairness of tax money for public research and infrastructure and security, all of which have contributed to the success of big business. She must have known about the inequality of the pre-Depression years. But she couldn't have foreseen the concurrent rise in technology and globalization that allowed inequality to surge again, more quickly, in a manner that threatens to put the greediest offenders out of our reach.

Ayn Rand film franchise “Atlas Shrugged” to get a second sequel

Wed, 27 Mar 2013 15:20:00 +0000

Libertarian icon Ayn Rand's 1957 novel "Atlas Shrugged" tells the story of a group of productive citizens going into hiding and refusing to support civilization any longer.

It's likely a story that rings truer than ever for the team behind the film adaptation, who have seen a seemingly huge prospective audience of Rand readers refuse to come out and see their two-part opus. ("Atlas Shrugged: Part I" made $4.6 million, on a budget of $20 million, in 2011; "Part II" made $3.4 million in 2012.)

But the team behind the films, producers John Aglialoro and Harmon Kaslow, have announced that they will be funding a third installment, scheduled for release in 2014. (Aglialoro is a CEO of the fitness-equipment company Cybex and a poker player; Kaslow is a producer of horror films including "Night Train," "Autopsy" and "Boo.")

Terrible reviews will not stop Atlas Shrugged 3

Wed, 13 Mar 2013 17:00:00 +0000

If you missed the first two big screen adaptations of Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" (which judging from their box office performances, you did), have no fear: You still have part three to look forward to in 2014.

John Aglialoro, the producer of the series, says he hopes to have the third installment ready for a release in the summer of 2014, Politico reports, adding that he is looking to make this version “something closer to the book." The second movie, Aglialoro says, was rushed so that it would be ready by October 2012, before Election Day.

"I wanted to get some things in that Ayn Rand said of her characters,” Aglialoro said. “I want to take the time so that the screenplay can say things, so that it’s a conversation.”

The first film, released in April, 2011, was pushed by Tea Party groups like Freedomworks, natural fans of Ayn Rand, whose original work mirrors Tea Party lines about individual responsibility, capitalism, and opposition to big government.

Bill would write Ayn Rand into curriculum

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 20:29:00 +0000

A Republican state senator in Idaho introduced a bill on Tuesday that would force students to read and pass a test on Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged" in order to graduate from high school, though he said he did it to make a point and doesn't intend to push forward with the legislation.

From the Idaho Spokesman-Review:

[Sen. John Goedde] said he doesn’t plan to press forward with the bill, but it was formally introduced in his committee Tuesday on a voice vote. He said he was sending a message to the State Board of Education, because he’s unhappy with its recent move to repeal a rule requiring two online courses to graduate from high school, and with its decision to back off on another planned rule regarding principal evaluations.

“It was a shot over their bow just to let them know that there’s another way to adopt high school graduation requirements,” Goedde said after the meeting. “I don’t intend to schedule a hearing on it.”

Goedde, who chairs the Idaho Senate’s Education Committee, explained that he chose that particular book because it "made my son a Republican," though he later added: “Well, he’s not a practicing Republican. But it certainly made him a conservative.”

Ayn Rand is for children

Sat, 19 Jan 2013 14:00:00 +0000

With this week's news that Glenn Beck and others are preparing to build libertarian communes and "Going Galt," I figure now is the time to finally refine my theory about those who claim to be Ayn Rand acolytes or who brag that their favorite book is “Fountainhead Shrugged” (they are the same book written twice in order to double Rand’s profit, so for brevity, let’s just use one name).

Since I first met Objectivists (read: libertarians) in college, my Unified Theory of Rand Groupies posited that they all probably fit into at least one of three groups: those who 1) never grew out of the usual "the world is persecuting me and doesn't see my true genius" phase that momentarily afflicts the typical high schooler 2) think saying "Ayn Rand" in any context makes them sound intelligent, even though they've never actually read her work or 3) have read Rand's work, don't genuinely believe in her ideology as evidenced by their lifestyle/politics, but still say they love her because it serves to make them feel good about their own avarice.

Biff from “Back to the Future” is in the “Atlas Shrugged” sequel

Fri, 21 Sep 2012 19:42:00 +0000

Considering that "Atlas Shrugged" was a 2011 box office flop (and boasts an 11% rating on Rotten Tomatoes), it's not clear how much of America will bother watching "Atlas Shrugged Part II," the second movie in the Rand-based trilogy. But one change, according to Slate's Dave Weigel, may increase its appeal: a new, slightly more obscure cast that rings true to the low-budget, independent spirit of the movies:

For all the mockery, for all the liberal gloating about box-office numbers, the first "Atlas" film accidentally cast too many successful actors. Taylor Schilling, the original Dagny Taggart, went on to co-star in "The Lucky One" and the upcoming Ben Affleck movie about the Iran hostage crisis. “She’s a bona fide movie star now,” says Aglialoro. So she’s been replaced by Samantha Mathis, a ’90s star who’s been mounting a kind of comeback. The rest of the cast is also new. It’s libertarian cinema by way of "Doctor Who."

Paul Ryan: Pop doofus

Wed, 12 Sep 2012 11:45:00 +0000

Paul Ryan, we have been told, is a heavyweight policy intellectual. A serious man, he draws on thinkers like Friedrich von Hayek and Milton Friedman to craft rigorous, complex budgetary proposals, and in so doing has become the ideological leader of the Republican Party. But somehow, when we reach for an apposite comparison, those sort of highbrow folks aren't whom Paul Ryan reminds us of. It's not great thinkers of the past like Woodrow Wilson or Benjamin Disraeli. And it's not contemporary figures with a reputation for policy acumen, like Paul Krugman or Newt Gingrich. Who is it that Paul Ryan reminds us of?

Sean Hannity to make cameo in “Atlas Shrugged” sequel

Thu, 06 Sep 2012 17:23:00 +0000

Apparently unfazed by the critical and box office failure of the first "Atlas Shrugged" movie, Sean Hannity announced that he is making a cameo in the sequel. Hannity posted on the blog for his radio show that he'll be appearing in "Atlas Shrugged Part Two," set to be released in October, and he "may be a character close to home."

The movies, intended to be a trilogy, are based on the Ayn Rand book by the same name. The first movie was critically panned but received heavy promotion from Tea Party groups. The equation added up to a $4.6 million domestic gross on a production budget of $20 million. That's the free market at work, folks. Maybe next time the producers should ask for an NEA grant.

Bad week for right-wing TV and movies

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 21:53:00 +0000

Did you, like most Americans, run out to your local Cato Institute gift shop and buy a DVD copy of "Atlas Shrugged: Part I" the second it was released? If you did, I'm afraid you've bought a defective product. Unfortunately, these DVDs all came from the factory loaded with a turgid, impenetrable, morally indefensible and wholly incoherent film about railroads and fancy steel. Also the copy on the back of the case is misleading.

The film's producers have released an apologetic press release explaining what went wrong:

The 1957 novel, Atlas Shrugged, is known in philosophical and political circles for presenting a cogent argument advocating a society driven by rational self-interest. On the back of the film's retail DVD and Blu-ray however, the movie's synopsis contradictorily states "AYN RAND's timeless novel of courage and self-sacrifice comes to life..."

Did you spot the error there? Rand's Objectivism is staunchly opposed to "courage and self-sacrifice," along every other essential component of basic human empathy, because it is a philosophy for angry teenage boys who imagine that they're intellectually superior to everyone around them.