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This is Hollywood's Liberal Fantasy, and it's Falling Apart

218.2K views· 13,005 likes· 34:29· Jun 28, 2025

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Start your free month of great cinema now at https://mubi.com/likestoriesofold Hollywood liberalism is ready to save the world, or at least; in their own self-constructed fantasies. In reality though, the tropes that have emerged in these movies are actually what we need to get rid off. Videos mentioned: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSfRSh4G8Cw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTpWVm9sZ2U (Cannes video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIzuTabyLS8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpitmEnaYeU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGr0NRx3TKU Watch this video ad-free on Nebula: https://nebula.tv/videos/lsoo-hollywoods-liberal-fantasy-is-falling-apart 0:00 Hollywood's Liberal Fantasy 2:15 “tHe BeSt leAdeR dOeSN’t WAnt to LeAd” 10:15 “I agrEe, bUt NOt liKE thiS” 17:58 “wE cAN do BeTTEr” 25:01 “yEs we CaN” / YES WE CAN -- SUPPORT MY WORK -- Nebula: https://nebula.tv/lsoo Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/LikeStoriesofOld Leave a One-Time Donation: https://www.paypal.me/TomvanderLinden -- FOLLOW ME -- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LikeStoriesofOld Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tom.vd.linden Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/tomvanderlinden.bsky.social -- CONTACT -- Business inquiries: lsoo@standard.tv Say hi: likestoriesofold@gmail.com Music: CHPTRS - A Slow Return Music licensed through Musicbed. Take your films to the next level with music from Musicbed. Sign up for a free account to listen for yourself: https://fm.pxf.io/c/3532571/1347628/16252 Additional Music: Mozart - Symphony No. 39 in E flat major, K 543 Grieg - Peer Gynt Suite No. 1, Op. 46 Albinoni - Concerto a Cinque in C Major, Op. 5, No. 12 Mozart - Symphony No. 39 in E flat major, K 543 Beethoven - Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 61

About This Video

In this essay I try to map out Hollywood’s favorite way of “solving” crisis: the rousing speech, the cleansing moment where truth floods the room, everyone claps, and the world can return to what it was. I’ve been feeling increasingly disillusioned with this liberal fantasy—not because I reject progressive aspirations, but because the stories built around them keep revealing a strange impotence. Again and again, modern Hollywood liberalism performs a posture of humility: the best leader is the one who doesn’t want to lead, the pure soul who is “innocent.” In films like Conclave, that façade isn’t dismantled—it’s rewarded, as if the problem is simply that liberalism hasn’t rejected power enough. From there I look at how liberal Hollywood treats action itself. Radical change is framed as an inevitable slide into corruption: “I agree with your fight, but not like this.” The result is a procedural, purity-obsessed mindset that can only say “no,” and that slowly turns liberalism into a defender of the status quo—something I connect to Marvel’s reactionary heroism and to Ezra Klein’s critique of “lawn sign liberalism.” By comparing Gladiator to Gladiator 2, I show the drift from concrete plans and consequential action toward vague virtue-signaling speeches. Where I land is simple: righteousness without power is just an opinion. If liberalism wants a future again, it has to risk agency—trade-offs, compromise, and the messy reality of acting in history.

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