From the Movie "Bulworth"
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Film Statistics
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In a limo, within a carport
Cast in this seen includes:
Warren Beatty as "Senator Jay Bulworth" and
Halle Berry as "Nina"
Bulworth: (eyes filled with liquid nostalgia)
So, who walks in the room? Huey Newton.
(looking at NINA)
You know who Huey Newton was?
Nina: (slowly she nods her head) yes.
Bulworth:
You know a lotta people I talk to, the blacks your age, they have no idea who he was.
(long pause)
Huey.
(long pause)
Why do you think there are no more black leaders?
Nina:
(after a pause)
Some people think it's because they all got killed.
But I think it's got more to do with the decimation of the manufacturing base in the urban centers.
Senator, an optimistic population throws up optimistic, energized leaders.
And when you shift manufacturing to the Sun Belt in the Third World,
you destroy the blue-collar core of the black activist population.
Some people would say that problem is purely cultural. The power of the media that is continually controlled by fewer and fewer people, add to that the monopoly of the media, a consumer culture based on self-gratification, and you're not likely to have a population that want's leadership that calls for self-sacrifice.
But the fact is,
I'm just a materialist at heart.
But if I look at the economic base,
higher domestic employment means jobs for African Americans.
World War II meant lots of jobs for black folks.
That is what energized the community for the civil rights movement of the 50's and the 60's.
An energized, hopeful community will not only produce leaders but more importantly it'll produce leaders they'll respond to.
Now what do you think, Senator?
(Bulworth is speechless)
Criticism:
This scene almost tells the entire soical truth.
What it fails to explain is the fact that "decimation of the manufacturing base"
affects more than just African Americans, but every race. - Walter Jensen
The senatorial candidate debate in the TV studio soundstage
James Hill (Debate Host):
The first question will be from Jann Carl and is for Senator Bulworth.
Jann Carl:
Senator Bulworth, the news today requires us to ask you about the sudden change in your campaign style.
Bulworth: (laughing) C'mon (more laughing)
Jann Carl: Could you explain it?
Bulworth: (laughing)
C'mon...why are you here?
Let's admit it...
You're here 'cause you're making a bundle, right?
JANN CARL: I beg your pardon?
Bulworth:
Oh?
You mean...
You're not here 'cause you're getting paid a bundle of money?
C'mon, c'mon, we got three pretty rich guys here,
getting paid by some really rich guys,
to ask a couple of other rich guys,
questions about their campaigns?
But our campaigns are financed by the same guys that pay you guys your money.
So, (laughs) what are we talkin' about here?
I could tell you stories about getting money from these guys that would pin your ears back.
(laughing)
I mean stories about me.
I mean, I don't know about, Hugh.
Do you have... (pause)
But, uh, I tell ya...
(Murphy slips into the busy control room where the technicians focus intently on the debate on monitors or through the front window.)
Bulworth:
We got a club, right?
Republicans, Democrats...what's the difference?
Your guys, my guys, our guys, us guys...it's a club!
(Bulworth: pulls out a flask)
So, why don't we just have a drink?
(Bulworth: laughs, unscrews the cap on a liquor flask)
Bulworth:
Ya know, Hugh...if you win this thing you really gotta think about where you're gonna put your kids in school.
I mean we put our daughter in Sidwell-Friends with the Clintons.
And the Gores really like Saint Albins.
Public school anywhere around Washington is a disaster.
(No response from Hugh. Bulworth shrugs and drinks from the flask. Feldman watches, stunned, as Murphy threads his way to the front of a panel covered with buttons and slides in.)
Dave Clark:
Excuse me, Senator, if you don't mind, at the moment I think we're here to ask about the news of your campaign.
Bulworth: (overriding)
News, What, what, what are you talking about?
C'mon, the guys you and I get our money from, they don't want the people to have the news.
They want you to think the corporations are more efficient than government, right?
You want to know why the health care industry's the most profitable business in the United States?
Cause the insurance companies take twenty-four cents out of every dollar that's spent.
You know what it takes the government to do the same thing for Medicare?
Three cents out of every dollar.
Now, what is all this crap they hand you about business being more efficient than government?
These guys need to be regulated.
What do you think, that these pigs are going to regulate themselves?
(Murphy begins pushing buttons, trying what's available. Then he grabs a key. Lights go out.)
Bulworth:
What's going on?
(Murphy slips out of the control room.)
Stage Manager: (over the P.A.)
Gentlemen, if you'11 please pardon the interruption, it seems as if we're
experiencing some technical difficulties here...
Bulworth: (looking around)
What's going on?
(Technicians scurry around, trying to find what's broken. The two other Candidates are at the podiums, as Bulworth sidles up to Weldie in silhouette trying to hub bub about what just happened.)
(...After much confusion and several segways, the camera returns to the control both...)
PRODUCER:
Senator, Mr. Weldie...I'm sorry to say,
but we're going to have to cancel this for today.
They don't want to bump Jerry Springer.
(He turns to the crew)
I'm sorry, folks. That will be it.
Connie's interview with Bulworth at an ABC studio soundstage
The following text contains obscene language and may upset some readers.
Connie:
Welcome back.
In our Los Angeles studio we have incumbent Democratic
Senator Jay Bulworth of California. Good evening, Senator.
Senator, why this new campaign style?
(long pause)
Why this new manner of dress and speech...
your ethnic manner of speech, your clothes...this use of obscenity?
Bulworth: (rapping...)
The rich is gettin' richer, an richer, an richer,
while the middle class is gettin' more poor.
Jus makin' billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions of bucks?
Well my friend, if ah, you weren't already rich at the start, that situation sucks.
'Cause the richest muthafucker in five of us
Is gettin' ninety-fuckin' eight percent of it.
And every other muthafucker in the world is left
to wonder where the fuck we went with it.
Obscenity?
Bulworth:
Obscenity? I'm a senator. I got to raise $10,000 a day every day I'm in Washington.
I ain't gettin' it in South Central,
I'm gettin' it in Beverly Hills.
So I'm votin' in the Senate
how they wanted me to
Then I been sendin' 'em my bills.
But we got babies in South Central
Dyin' as young as they do in Peru.
We got public schools that're nightmares,
we got a Congress that ain't got a clue.
We got kids with sub machine guns,
we got militias throwin' bombs.
We got Bill just gettin' all weepy,
we got Newt blamin' teenage Moms.
We got so many factories closin down,
Where'd hell all the good jobs go?
My contributors make more profits
Makin... makin... makin...
Hiring kids in Mexico.
Oh a brother can work in fast food,
If he can't invent computer games
But what we used to call America,
That's going down the drains.
How's a young man gonna meet his financial responsibilities
Workin' at a mutha fuckin' Burger King?
He ain't.
And PLEASE don't even start with that school shit.
There ain't no education goin' on up in that muthafucker.
Obscenity?
We got a million brothers in prison,
I mean the walls are really rockin'.
But you can bet your ass they'd all be out,
If they could pay for Johnnie Cochran.
The Constitution sposed to give 'em an equal chance
But that ain't gonna happen for sure.
Ain't it time to take a little from the rich mutha fucka
And just give a little to the poor?
Those gentlemen there on the monitor
(referring to all the 1996 presidential candidates)
They want the government smaller.
Weak.
They'll be speakin' for the richest 20 per cent,
While pretendin' they defendin' the meek.
Aww, shit, fuck, cocksucker.
That's the real obscenity black folks,
Livin' with everyday.
Is tryin' to believe a mutha fuckin' word the Democrats and Republicans say.
Bulworth: (standing)
Obscenity?
I'm Jay Billington Bulworth and I've come to say.
The Democratic Party has got same shit to pay.
They gonna pay it in the ghetto,
They gonna...
Connie:
Senator, are you saying the Democratic Party doesn't care about the African American community?
Bulworth: (sitting and picking up cup)
Isn't that obvious?
Some people say there're no black leaders anymore because
they all'got killed but I happen to think it's because of the decimation of the manufacturing base in the urban centers.
Bulworth:
Don't you think so?
What do you think my age is?
(The engineer gets instructed to pull the plug on the program and informs to Connie by way of her ear peice)
Engineer: He's had his time, Connie. Flush him.
(Connie gets the message)
Bulworth:
(lowering his speech)
You know the guy in the booth who's talkin' to you
On that tiny little earphone.
He's afraid the network
Gonna tell him he's through,
If he let's a guy keep talkin'
Like I'm talkin' to you.
Corporations got the networks
and so they get to say
Who gets to talk about the country,
who's not crazy today.
You better cut to a commercial
If you still want this job,
You might not be back tomorrow with this corporate mob.
Cut to commercial,
Cut to commercial...
Engineer: Flush him...
Bulworth:
Cut to commercial,
Cut to commercial.
O.K. I got a simple question that I'd like to ask,
For the network who pays you for performing this task.
How cum they got the airwaves?
They're the people's aren't they?
Wouldn't they be worth 70 billion to the public today
If a money grubbin' Congress didn't give 'em away
For big campaign money?
It's hopeless, you see.
If you rurmin' for office without no TV.
If you don't get big money you get a defeat.
Corporations and broadcasters make you dead meat.
Bulworth:
You been taught in this country
There's Speech that is free.
Well free will not get you no spots on TV.
Bulworth:
If you want to have Senators
Not on the take,
Then give them free air time,
They won't have to fake.
Bulworth:
Telecommunications is the name of the beast,
That's, that, that, that, that, that's eating the world from the West to the East.
The movies, the tabloids,. TV and magazines,
They tell us what to think and do
And make our hopes and dreams.
All this information makes America fat,
But if the company's out of the country,
How American is that?
Bulworth:
We got Americans with families
Can't even buy a meal.
Ask a brother who's been
Downsized, if he's gettn' any deal.
Bulworth:
Or a white boy bustin' ass,
Till they put him in his grave.
He ain't gotta be no black boy
To be livin' like a slave.
Bulworth:
Rich people've stayed on top, dividing white people from colored people.
But white people've got more in Common with colored people than rich people.
We're just gonna have to eliminate 'em.
Connie:
Eliminate?
Bulworth:
Eliminate.
Connie:
Who?
Rich people?
Bulworth:
White people.
Bulworth:
Black People, too.
Brown people,
Yellow people.
Get rid of 'em all.
Connie:
Get rid of them all?
Bulworth:
We need a voluntary, free Spirited,
compatible, open ended program of
procreative racial deconstruction.
Connie:
Uh...
Bulworth:
Everybody just got to keep fucking everybody
till we're all the same color.
Bulworth: (he leans forward and picks up the coffee) It's gonna take a while but...
(A light CRASHES to the ground near Jay. He puts down the cup and looks around)
Connie: (startled)
Thank you, Senator Bulworth.
We'll return with former Governor Lamar Alexander after this message.
Criticism:
Though Bulworth's solution to the race problem is unrealistic;
there is much truth in his statements concerning the reality of our social,
political, economic environment in which we all live in.
As long as the different races wage war against each other by way of prejudice and discrimination,
they will never see how the rich (those who make over $100,000 a year)
discrimination against the poor (those who make LESS than 100,000 a year). - Walter Jensen