An Open Letter To Nathan Lee, The NYTimes Movie Critic Of "The Reflecting Pool"

[Gold9472]

An open letter to Nathan Lee, the NY Times movie critic of “The Reflecting Pool.”

By Jarek Kupsc

There is a scene in my movie, “The Reflecting Pool,” in which a right-leaning TV program reacts to a 9/11 news article written by the protagonist. In the scene, a professional conspiracy debunker is brought in to offer his two cents. To quote directly from the film, “This is really an example of irresponsible journalism at its worst. This is right up there with the Holocaust denials and the Moon Landing conspiracy theories.”

I wrote this scene into the film in anticipation of such “hit pieces” as the recent NY Times review by Nathan Lee.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/11/mo...tml?ref=movies

In his review of “The Reflecting Pool,” Mr. Lee states that the movie promotes “a complicit, propaganda-foisting media/industrial complex in the pocket of the Bush administration and the Jews and the oil industry!” I’m not sure which movie Mr. Lee watched, but there is not a single mention of Jews or Oil Industry in “The Reflecting Pool.” In fact, the movie doesn’t even mention Mr. Bush by name at any point. I am particularly disturbed by Mr. Lee’s injection of the Jews as culprits in the 9/11 tragedy. Which Jews is he referring to? The Ashkenazi? The Sephardic ones? The Orthodox? Perhaps the Chasidic? Such deliberate generalization is nothing but a cheap shot at discrediting my script as anti-Semitic. Had Mr. Lee paid any reasonable attention to the plot, he surely would have picked up a nice tidbit of information, which incidentally came from a Fox News source, that Israel’s Mossad issued a specific warning to the Bush Administration about the planned terrorist attacks on American soil prior to 9/11.

But Mr. Lee doesn’t stop there. To quote from his review once again, “Written and directed by Jarek Kupsc, the movie has the tone, rhythm and structure of a set of numbered, handwritten notes derived from 9/11 conspiracy Web sites, photocopied at Kinko’s and distributed at an anarchist bookshop.”

Mr. Lee, let me quickly offer you a short list of the sources that I used in researching and writing the script of “The Reflecting Pool.”

NY Times
LA Times
Washington Post
BBC
MSNBC
FOX News
PBS
The White House
The FBI
C-SPAN
USA Today
Newsday
Daily News

Now, if these sources sound like “handwritten notes derived from 9/11 conspiracy Web sites,” then please, go on and discredit yourself and other mainstream media as anarchist bookstore material.

To remind you, Mr. Lee, it was your own NY Times which actively sought to release the 9/11 Oral Histories of firefighters, first-responders, and others, whose testimonies had not been included in the 9/11 Report Commission. The NY Times had to go to court to get the tapes released, won the case, transcribed the materials and posted it on their website.

It was the NY Times that reported about the U.S. planting propaganda articles in Iraq newspapers.

It was the NY Times that reported that “…FEMA was not allowed to enter ground zero to collect other potentially critical evidence in the weeks after the attack, and it did not get a copy of the World Trade Center blueprints until early January, a delay House members found infuriating.”

It was the NY Times that reported on the government agencies which had occupied WTC 7, stating, “The CIA’s clandestine New York station (…) was behind the false front of another federal organization, which intelligence officials requested that The Times not identify.”

It was the NY Times that said, “The Victim Compensation Fund was not really created to help the 9/11 families (…) They were an afterthought to a bill designed to save the airlines.”

It was the NY Times that described the alleged ace pilot of Flight 77, which hit the Pentagon, as “incompetent,” relating how his flight instructors “questioned whether his pilot’s license was genuine,” were concerned “that ‘you really shouldn’t be in the air.’”

It was the NY Times which, reporting on FBI whistleblowers, argued that the 9/11 attacks could have been averted, had the agents not been deliberately prevented from investigating their terrorist suspects.

It was the NY Times that contradicted the statements by President Bush and Condoleezza Rice, who claimed that nobody prior to 9/11 had considered using planes as weapons:

“In the months before the Sept. 11 attacks, federal aviation officials reviewed dozens of intelligence reports that warned about Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, some which specifically discussed airline hijackings and suicide operations, according the a previously undisclosed report from the 9/11 commission.” (Emphasis added).

Again, if these article sources, all from your newspaper, Mr. Lee, seem to belong on an anarchist bookshelf, then perhaps you should work for another publication. It is really dangerous to be an anarchist these days, with FISA and all the domestic surveillance.

Back in 1977, Carl Bernstein, of the Watergate fame, wrote an article for The Rolling Stone magazine, titled “The CIA and the Media.” He bemoaned the ultimately tragic infiltration of our “free” media by government agents posing as journalists and editors. Thirty years later, I am prone to believe the situation has not improved. Now, Mr. Lee, you are too naïve and ignorant of the 9/11 issues to be a CIA operative (they don’t hire fools), but, like so many of your colleagues, you have succumbed to the pressure of protecting the official story of what happened on September 11, 2001. Your piece on “The Reflecting Pool” has all the markings of a deliberate job of discrediting a well-researched story. In your ignorance on the subject matter, you unwittingly attempted to discredit the very publication you work for, which has done a terrific job of reporting on a lot of issues that “The Reflecting Pool” dramatizes.

The last thing I would like this rebuttal to sound like is a cry of a filmmaker disappointed with a bad movie review. I am fully aware that “The Reflecting Pool” is not “Citizen Kane” or “Lawrence of Arabia.” It is not even close to “All the President’s Men.” It is a small, ultra-low budget movie made with a lot of heart by somebody who cares about the state of this nation, and the world, and simply wants honest answers to questions that still linger in the air. Whether you like it or nor, Mr. Lee, September 11 is shaping our daily lives by illegal wiretaps, over 4000 dead American soldiers, hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqi civilians, and the precipitous state of our economy.

It is not about me being a good or bad director. It is not even about you being a good or bad critic. It is about issues that are so much larger and impending. Don’t be afraid to look into the facts, even if they hurt. Because they will hurt a lot. We can’t improve anything without healing the gaping wound of 9/11.

Sincerely,

Jarek Kupsc

Writer/Director

The Reflecting Pool

www.reflectingpoolfilm.com

[Gold9472]

It was the New York Times that reported about the families having to fight for the creation of an Independent 9/11 Commission.

It was the New York Times that reported how the Bush Administration tried to kill the creation of the 9/11 Commission.

It was the New York Times that reported on the "Jersey Girls."

It was the New York Times that reported how the families were not happy with the 9/11 Commission.

It was the New York Times that reported how the families were upset that information was being concealed.

It was the New York Times that reported on Ann Coulter's insane rantings about the "Jersey Girls."

It was the New York Times that posted a letter from 9/11 Family Members Mindy Kleinberg and Lorie Van Auken that said, "a real investigation into the events of Sept. 11 that examines all of the evidence has never been done and is still needed."

However, it wasn't reported by the New York Times when the September 11th Advocates (Jersey Girls) released a statement recently that said, "The bottom line is that the most deadly attack on American soil since Pearl Harbor remains dangerously unexamined. This can only be remedied with an investigation guided by the facts and conducted outside the reach of those with a vested interest in suppressing the truth."

Sounds like Nathan.