When Science Fiction Took Over the Movies

Anthony Lane on 1982 at the multiplex. Plus: Antonia Hitchens reports from the R.N.C.; Bernie Sanders on Biden; and are Hollywood’s Jewish founders worth defending? View in browser | Update your preferences Wednesday, July 17, 2024 In today’s edition, exclusively for newsletter readers, Antonia Hitchens reports on last night’s speeches pledging fealty to Donald Trump at the Republican National Convention. Plus: • Bernie Sanders on why he wants Biden to stay in the race • An assassination attempt in the Internet’s brain-rot era • Are Hollywood’s Jewish founders worth defending? Antonia Hitchens Reporting from Milwaukee Nikki Haley speaks to the delegates. Photograph by Sinna Nasseri for The New Yorker On the second day of the Republican National Convention, the theme was Make America Safe Once Again. Inside the Fiserv Forum, delegates waved signs that said “Stop Biden’s Border Bloodbath,” and speakers identified as “everyday Americans” spoke of urban areas in crisis from crime and drugs. Anne Fundner, a mother who lost her son to fentanyl poisoning, spoke through tears. “We need President Trump back to save the lives of our kids,” she said. The program was designed to convey an America defined by lawlessness and chaos, but the mood toggled between these ideas and an emphasis on party unity and positivity. “They always bend the knee,” Donald Trump once said, of the G.O.P. skeptics who have gone on to endorse him. Last night, Trump came to see his former opponents praise him. He joined the R.N.C.’s evening session, where he sat watching from an imperial red box. Two conventions ago, in 2016, Senator Ted Cruz refused to endorse Trump and told delegates to “vote your conscience.” Now the Party belongs to Trump, and last night, Cruz (of whom Trump reportedly said, earlier this year, “Ted—he shouldn’t even exist”) was the first former critic to take the stage to thank God for Trump. Then came Nikki Haley. “President Trump asked me to speak to this convention in the name of unity,” Haley said, to a standing ovation. Trump has mocked Haley’s birth name, told crowds that her wardrobe is hideous, and reportedly said that, because of a “complexion problem” with her skin, he could never appoint her Secretary of State. “We shouldn’t have followed him,” Haley said of Trump after January 6th. “You don’t have to agree with Trump a hundred per cent of the time to vote for him,” she said last night. Trump smiled. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, whom Trump has called Meatball, DeSoros, and DeSanctimonious, was next. Earlier this year, DeSantis made fun of Republicans who “kiss the ring” for Trump, but he was there to do just that. Echoing the Party’s big-tent message this week, DeSantis was notably more moderate in his speech to delegates than he was in his own Presidential bid; when he said Americans deserve the “right to life,” he segued straight to add “liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” instead of highlighting his staunch anti-abortion stance. Rupert Murdoch, who had fallen out with Trump after 2020, and whom Trump called a “MAGA-hating globalist,” watched the spectacle of reconciliation from the Fox suite. Later that night, at a party, Ted Cruz offered to give interviews, but many opted to stick to their drinks and baskets of cheese curds. Haley and DeSantis seemed like last-minute invitees, not fully welcomed into the inner circle—the Party wants their voters, not their friendship. From the News Desk Q. & A. Bernie Sanders Wants Joe Biden to Stay in the Race But he still won’t say that the President is capable of serving a second term. By Isaac Chotiner Editor’s Pick The Summer of Sci-Fi A new book claims that a few big summer movies in 1982 heralded an epochal shift in the motion-picture industry, but is that really how cultural history works? Illustration by La Boca E.T. phoned home. Conan the Barbarian pushed the Wheel of Pain. And a poltergeist terrorized a suburban family. Over the course of a few months in 1982, these and other indelible scenes appeared on movie screens across the country, as a group of eight science-fiction and fantasy movies dominated the summer schedule. A new book by Chris Nashawaty argues that these films combined to “radically transform the way that the movie industry did—and continues to do—business.” In a probing review from this week’s issue, our critic Anthony Lane suggests that a wider consideration of that movie year tells a slightly different story. Read or listen to the story If you know someone who would enjoy this newsletter, please share it. Was this newsletter forwarded to you? Sign up. Kyle Chayka The Trump Assassination Attempt Meets the Internet’s Brain-Rot Era Illustration by Ariel Davis; Source photograph by Evan Vucci / AP The assassination attempt on Donald Trump is a momentous event that will be chronicled in histories of the era. But it is also a moment that is being rapidly digested, and reshaped, right now. The past few days, Kyle Chayka writes, demonstrate “just how rapidly today’s social platforms can distort a deadly serious news event into misleading tidbits and gleefully empty jokes.” Read more » Culture Dept. Cultural Comment Are Hollywood’s Jewish Founders Worth Defending? Jews in the industry called for the Academy Museum to highlight the men who created the movie business. A voice in my head went, Uh-oh. By Michael Schulman Under Review Olivia Laing Goes Back to the Garden In the writer’s new book, cultivating your own plot is both a contemplative practice and a communal act. By Katie Kadue Fifty Days of Flash Fiction Flash Fiction “The Wife on Ambien” You don’t want to know what I did in Tucson, she says, patting me on the head, like a child. By Ed Park Fun & Games Dept. Daily Cartoon Wednesday, July 17th By Brendan Loper Shouts & Murmurs Influencers I’d Actually Want Influencing Me Jeremy Allen White doing literally anything. By Irving Ruan and Ellis Rosen Crossword A Beginner-Friendly Puzzle Month when procrastinators start thinking about their taxes: five letters. By Robyn Weintraub P.S. Last week, NASA transmitted Missy Elliott’s song “The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly)” into outer space, covering a distance of about a hundred and fifty-eight million miles from a dish in California to the surface of Venus. As part of our Touchstones series, Doreen St. Félix wrote about how Elliott’s music had shaped her life. Of the rapper’s iconic performance in the music video for “The Rain,” St. Félix notes, “It’s hard to describe how indelible these images were to a young black girl starting to learn that this planet is inhospitable to her body.” What did you think of today’s newsletter? Let us know. If you like the daily newsletter, browse more New Yorker newsletters. You’re receiving this e-mail because you signed up for the daily newsletter from The New Yorker. Manage your preferences | View our Privacy Policy | Unsubscribe Copyright © Condé Nast 2024. One World Trade Center, New York, NY 10007. All rights reserved.