Clarksville, TN Online » Steven Spielberg

Israeli Independence War hero pardoned by President Bush

Turner McCullough Jr. — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 14:00:24 +0000

1948 ‘Gunrunner’ for Israel pardoned posthumously by Bush.

Among the twenty presidential pardons announced on Dec. 22nd, was one of significant distinction. In 1949, an American citizen, a Irish Protestant, defied the U.S. Neutrality Act and took actions which directly aided the emerging Jewish state of Israel in its war of independence.

President Bush has pardoned a man who broke the law by providing planes and weapons to Jews fighting for the fledgling state of Israel in its 1948 War of Independence.

Charles Winters, an Irish Protestant who died in 1984 in Miami and was buried in Israel, served eighteen months in prison for violating the US Neutrality Act by helping deliver three converted B-17 Flying Fortress bombers to the Jewish homeland. He piloted one of the planes himself. The three planes became the first heavy bombers of the Israel Air Force.

Two of Winters’ colleagues, Herman Greenspun and Al Schwimmer, were pardoned in 1961 and 2000, respectively.

The posthumous pardon of Winters, who was commended in 1961 by Prime Minister Golda Meir for his contributions to Israel, came after a lengthy campaign by his son, Jimmy. Jimmy Winters said of his father, “I’m overwhelmed. It happened sixteen years before I was born. He went to jail and he didn’t want his kids to know. He was old-school and proud.” He only became aware of his father’s famous past after seeing an outpouring of gratitude from the Jewish community upon his father’s death in 1984.

The fledging Israeli army was not allowed to arm by the British government, which had ruled Palestine until Israel’s independence in 1948. Nor did the United States allow the sale of weapons to Israel or other Middle East countries. The U.S. Army rejected Mr. Winters for service during the Second World War due to a limp left by polio. Winters, nevertheless, worked during the war as a government purchasing agent — a profession he would put in practice in helping Israel in 1948.

Al Schwimmer, a flight engineer who led American efforts to aid Israel’s military, recruited Winters, then 38, to procure three planes for Schwimmer’s group. Winter’s motives remains a mystery, even to his friends and family.

One friend and fellow bomber pilot, Sy Cohen, write in an obituary in the Miami Herald, “To the Jewish people in Palestine, this deed that he did was phenomenal. Why should an Irishman from Boston do such a thing?” Hollywood film director Steven Spielberg was one of the many people who wrote to President Bush asking for a presidential pardon for Winters.

“There are probably many unsung heroes of America and of Israel, but Charlie Winters is surely one of them,” Spielberg stated.

Charles Winters was among nineteen people granted pardons by President Bush in honor of the 2008 winter holiday season. A twentieth person had his prison sentence commuted.

In related news, Tel Aviv chief rabbi Yisrael Lau has asked President Bush to pardon Jonathan Pollard, who has spent twenty-one years imprisoned for spying for Israel.

Source: www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1049403.html

Indiana Jones: big adventure, big nostalgia

David W. Shelton — Fri, 23 May 2008 22:00:42 +0000

With the advent of Memorial Day Weekend, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull kicks off the holiday stretch with a rousing race through jungles of all types, promising action, reunions, and lots of booby-trapped labyrinths and ancient artifacts. This third sequel to 1982’s masterpiece, Raiders of the Lost Ark, is a fitting addition to the Jones pantheon. It clearly resides in the shadows of Raiders, and never quite reaches the fever pitch of breathtaking awe that it could achieve.

It’s by no means a bad movie. In fact, it’s really quite good. Director Steven Spielberg, Producer George Lucas, and Harrison Ford all fit back into their old clothes quite nicely, especially the latter as he puts on the famous hat and title role once again. To put it plainly, he’s still got it. Harrison Ford is Indiana Jones. He owns the role like a seasoned Rolex, and there’s no sign that he ever let it go.

Set in 1957, nearly twenty years after the events of the Last Crusade, Crystal Skull picks up in an eerily-familiar warehouse that supposedly houses a particular artifact that Soviet KGB officials seem to require. The Soviets are led by Irina Spalko(Cate Blanchett), one of the least-developed villains in the entire series. Blanchett has done well with her Russian accent, but aside from that, there’s really not a whole lot going for her.

David Koepp, a long-time screenwriting ally of Spielberg, has delivered a capable script, presenting great dialogue between the lead characters. One of the downfalls of this sequel is the same with most sequels: an assumed knowledge of previous films. Koepp reunites Jones with Raiders flame Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen), which could have been a great moment in the film, but turns into little more than a rehash of the last time they were together.

Allen retains much of the spark and passion that gave her character such a boost in Raiders, but her involvement seems to be more contrived than a real necessity to the film. In fact, this only illustrates one of the film’s greatest weakness: it tries too much to be another Raiders.

Shia LaBeouf appears as greaser slacker “Mutt” Williams, who enters Indy’s life just while everyone else is looking for him. Of course, this is yet another setup for an action scene for the old teacher and young man who has a knack for getting out of tight spaces.

Rounding out the cast is the quirky and entirely too underdeveloped Professor Oxley (John Hurt) who was widely rumored to be cast as Dr. Abner Ravenwood. Well, the rumor wasn’t true, but Hurt’s contribution is sadly a little too trite for my taste, and is a bit of a waste of his talents. Both Marion and Oxley could have been great characters, but they are mere shadows of what they could have been.

The film culminates in an ancient tomb and temple, and its ultimate payoff will leave many audiences satisfied with its grandeur. But then, it’s no Raiders. It’s better than Temple of Doom, and it’s still a great bit of fun. Hey, it’s Indiana Jones! It’s a story that is filled with action, sword fights (yes, sword fights), betrayal, big explosions – REALLY big explosions, and plenty of McCarthyism-era atmosphere to give chills down the spine of anyone familiar with that era in American history.

What makes these films work is that they are a kind of nostalgia in and of themselves. The first three films were a throwback to the old movie serials, and gave 1980s summer audiences a hero to root for no matter how bad things got. This new film carries on that legacy quite well, and adds 1950’s science fiction schtick into the mix. Not only that, the nostalgia for its own predecessors.

Spielberg, Lucas, Ford, and Allen appear to all be looking to relive a time when summer adventure movies were still thought of as a risk, and and everything had to be big and bold in order for it to work. LeBeouf adds a new element to the mix, and his smarmy smile is a perfect fit for a tale set in a rather dark time in America’s history.

Their latest collaboration is indeed a success, giving us another chapter in both ancient legends and modern heroes, with a glimpse of a new generation of yet another Jones to take the reins in future films. Early in the film, Indy is goaded by his Russian captors about how great communism is. His response is distinctly American: “I like Ike.”

For me, despite all of its very real flaws, “I like Indy.”

Indiana Jones whips through Drive-In Saturday Night; Indy 4 coming in 2008

Christine Anne Piesyk — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 14:00:06 +0000

The first time I watched Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), I left the theater exhausted, as if I had raced through the adventure right alongside the now legendary Indiana Jones. I raced back to the studio with my partner Jesse and we wrote our review that night, taped our radio program in the wee hours of the morning for a 7 a.m. airtime, and made plans to see it again. That night.

Harrison Ford made the inter-gallactic leap from his dashing Han Solo of the futuristic Star Wars to the historic backdrop of pre-World War II and carved a niche in a second, equally swashbuckling role as a seemingly mild-mannered college professor with a secret life as a treasure hunter. Raiders hits the screen on a dead run, with ‘Indy’ scooping a golden idol and fleeing angry natives (Hovitos) in a plane that has the one thing he hates most: a huge snake. That ‘little’ weakness is endearing in this tough guy persona.

Indy is about to get the biggest challenge of his life in the form of a quest for a holy grail of sorts: the Ark of the Covenant, the supposed repository for the Ten Commandments of biblical fame. He has to grab it before the Nazis do, for whoever holds the covenant will rule the world.

Enter Marion (Karen Allen) as his gutsy former lover turned partner, a woman who holds her own against killers, conspirators, and all things evil. A Princess Leia for the 1930s.

The series continued with a prequel, Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom (1984), my least favorite of the original trio. Set in 1935, the film — based on a George Lucas short story — opens in Shanghai in a club called Obi Wan, where an illegal artifacts trade involving diamonds goes bad and the characters are quickly on the run, this time with a juvenile sidekick called Short Round. They escape on plane which is abandoned by its pilots; the bail out in a life raft and ride the raft down snow-covered Himalayan slopes, tumbling into a temple and a mystery involving stolen idols and the hopes of a native people.

The series jumps forward in time with Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). This time Indy’s sidekick is his dad, Professor Henry Jones, marvelous played by Sean Connery, who wields an umbrella as well as Indy does his whip. Religion and relics are once again the quest: this time it’s the pursuit of the Holy Grail (a cup — this film pre-dates the Dan Drown versions of Grail legend rooted in Mary Magdalene, but that another movie altogether). Here, Kate Capshaw is the love interest, but without the charm and spunk exhibited by Karen Allen.

Steven Spielberg exploded this film series over 25 years ago, and it has stood the test of time and a generation of new viewers. With it, he launched a series that, after an 18-year hiatus, will resume again in May 2008, with the Memorial Day weekend release of Indy film #4, listed on websites only as the Fourth Installment of the Indiana Jones Adventures, or more simply, Indy 4.

Ford, now 64, apparently still has what it takes to be an action hero. Cate Blanchette will be the new love interest, but Karen Allen reprises her Marion role. This film is the fourth of five originally planned when the Indy series was first debated in the 1970s. John Williams will once again score an Indy film.

Editors’ note: this is the last of the summer series, Drive-In Saturday Night, which took a look at films of yesterday, old favorites from the era of drive in movie theaters with sound boxes that hooked over the windows, homemade popcorn and triple features on Saturday nights. We hope you’ve enjoyed the films, and that they’ve brought back terrific memories.