Latest news with #OliverStone
Metro
10-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Metro
Hollywood legend smiles as he watches Victory Day military parade in Moscow
Hollywood filmmaker Oliver Stone put in a smiley appearance as he attended the Victory Day military parade in Russia on Friday. The esteemed US director, 78, is known for tackling various subjects, including war and politics, in his work, while he's also made dramas and biopics. With three Academy Awards, a Bafta, an Emmy, and five Golden Globes to his name, it's no surprise he drew attention during the celebrations, given that he's behind some of the most iconic movies. The military parade took place in Moscow for the 80th anniversary of the Soviet Union's victory over Nazi Germany during World War II. Meticulously choreographed with fine detail, the parade occurred in the capital's Red Square and was attended by over 20 global leaders, including China's President Xi Jinping and Brazil's Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Leaders from the United States and Africa were also present. Stone was in high spirits among the crowd, dressed in smart attire of a white shirt, red tie, and camel coat. He also shielded his eyes with a pair of red sunglasses and added the black and orange Saint George's ribbon to his lapel. Also among attendees yesterday was American actor Steven Seagal. The 73-year-old was dressed in all black as he attempted to blend in with the pack of spectators. Stone has an extensive military background himself, having risen to notoriety in the late 1980s for his movies about the Vietnam War, in which he also participated as an infantry soldier. The acclaimed director served from 1967 to 1968 in the 25th Infantry and 1st Cavalry Divisions and was wounded twice in action. He is the proud owner of several honours awarded for his service, including a Bronze Star for valour, an Air Medal, and an Oak Leaf Cluster to recognise the two wounds. Speaking last November during a Vietnam at 50 lecture, Stone reflected on his decision to enlist in the army, spending a year in South Vietnam as a teacher but leaving with more questions. 'I didn't feel like my education was complete. I was still confused about what was going on because I didn't understand all of the politics. I went back because I didn't feel that I knew enough. I didn't want to be a fraud.' He continued: 'I felt like I had to go to this war to understand it. I had to go back. I had already seen a bit of it from the fringes, but I went right into the heart of it in '67.' Several years following his return from war, he would struggle with his mental health, but managed to overcome the challenges and attend film school. Stone went on to depict the brutality of war in his Vietnam trilogy, which included 1986's Platoon, which starred Johnny Depp and Willem Dafoe; Born on the Fourth of July (1989), starring Tom Cruise; and Heaven & Earth (1993), with Tommy Lee Jones. Platoon, specifically, was, in part, inspired by Stone's own experiences on the frontlines. It won four Academy Awards, including best picture. More Trending The Oscar-winning best director is also behind controversial flicks such as The Putin Interviews (2017), having hailed the Russian dictator as a 'great leader' for the country and a 'very refined individual'. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Speaking about the longest-serving Russian President Putin's leadership in 2017, he said that the 'Russian people have never been better off'. Other divisive films from Stone include those that critics have used to accuse him of promoting conspiracy theories. For example, 1991's JFK examined the investigation into the assassination of John F. Kennedy by New Orleans attorney Jim Garrison, who believed there was a conspiracy behind the assassination and that shooter, Lee Harvey Oswald, was scapegoated. Got a story? If you've got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@ calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we'd love to hear from you. MORE: Star of $105,000,000 flop didn't realise film would be so 'wacky' MORE: Jennifer Aniston's 'stalker' appears in court half-naked in unsettling footage MORE: Putin's army of Telegram war bloggers and TV propagandists unmasked
Yahoo
30-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Oliver Stone Looks Back at the Fall of Saigon 50 Years Later: 'We're Back to Learning Nothing' (Exclusive)
April 30 marks the 50th anniversary of the fall of Saigon, the capture of the capital of South Vietnam by the Communist North Vietnamese army that marked the official end of the Vietnam War — a conflict that stretched two long decades and cost millions of lives. Approximately 60,000 of them were U.S. soldiers. Among the survivors was director Oliver Stone, whose combat injuries earned him multiple decorations, including a Bronze Star with 'V' Device for valor, Purple Heart with Oak Leaf Cluster (to denote two wounds), an Air Medal and the Combat Infantryman Badge. Stone — who through landmark films like 1986's Platoon and 1989's Born on the Fourth of July allowed the country to process the trauma of war — reflected on his time in Vietnam, his conversion to pacifism upon his return to the U.S. and his thoughts on similar endless and deadly conflicts currently plaguing the planet. I went to Vietnam as a teacher first in 1965. I was 18, and I taught there after I had attended Yale. I went again three years later as a soldier. I was young, and I didn't have the conscience we all have now. It was just something that we all believed in at the time. Vietnam was all of a sudden the center of the world. It was like Ukraine is now, where people were going nuts and saying that we have to fight for Ukraine. More from The Hollywood Reporter Agatha Christie Comes to Life in AI-Enhanced BBC Maestro Writing Course Daniel Ings Joins Catherine Zeta-Jones in Prime Video Series Adapted From Nick Harkaway Novel Cannes: 'March of the Penguins' Director to Judge Immersive Competition That mentality of militarism was born in America. It was in our blood. I grew up relatively conservative. In 1965, Vietnam was an interesting place to be a teacher. It felt like a divine mission. But as I traveled around Asia, I saw Cambodia before the war — before Pol Pot — and I ended up in Laos. And the more I saw, the worse it looked. By the time I went back as a soldier, it was depressing. All barbed wire camps. We put half a million men on the ground and as a soldier, I could see that it was a mess. It was just this poorly run war, and we were counting the bodies and pretending that we were winning. The whole thing was based on a lie. There was a lot of other lying going on. In my book, Chasing the Light, it tells my version of Vietnam. By the time I left in December '68, I had been wounded twice and seen quite a bit of action. I was shot in the neck and had shrapnel on my lower body. It was a miracle I survived the neck injury because that was close — about a quarter-inch from my carotid. But I went back into combat anyway. I served most of my 15 months in the jungle, in the plains around the beaches. I was exposed to quite a bit and who knows, maybe I got Agent Orange poisoning. We used to walk through that stuff. You've seen the movies — Platoon, Born on the 4th of July — and then I told the Vietnamese side of it with my 1993 adaptation of the Le Ly Hayslip book, Heaven & Earth, which depicted a beautiful Vietnam before we got there. When Richard Nixon came into the White House in January 1969, I had left already Vietnam a month earlier. For Americans, the war dragged on for another four years till 1973. And then Nixon made his deal to get the POWs out. Most of the American combat troops were out by '73. And the amount of casualties was amazing between '69 and '73. I think it was rather an even split between the two regimes, Lyndon B. Johnson and Nixon. I came back to the U.S. in '68. In 1970, I went to NYU film school. That was a very revolutionary kind of place. The student body distrusted veterans and stuff, so I kept my mouth shut. In the early 1970s my feelings about the war changed, but by the mid-'70s, I would be on the other side of the fence completely. I was more aligned with Jane Fonda. I grew to admire her after the war. When it was going on, her opposition seemed strange. We knew it was over when Johnson refused to run in March '68. So he wasn't backing his policy in Vietnam. And the army kept going. The American media had been so 'rah rah' on Vietnam. It's part of the problem that we have in our country — the media tells us what to think. The New York Times is awful. In every single war — Vietnam, Iraq, etc. — read their editorials. They were so jingoistic and pro-government. They always were the government. They were the government line, I guess you could say. At the end of the Vietnam, they changed, because they hated Nixon. Now they hate Trump. So they go after Trump all the time. But the truth is, they support the Ukraine war. So it's the same crap. And the Ukraine war is another one that's completely a lie. They keep lying to the American public and the public falls for it. When Saigon fell — on April 30, 1975 — I was relieved. Everyone was. It was a wonderful moment in the sense that it was the end. There was a wave of movies that started with The Deer Hunter (1978), Apocalypse Now (1978) and Jane [Fonda]'s movie Coming Home. All of these were noble, good movies. And then I got to make Platoon. I made Born on the Fourth of July, a very strong, anti-military movie. It came out Dec. 20, 1989. The U.S. invaded Panama that day. It was the beginning of a change — a shift back to the use of our military and belief again in the system. It was George H. W. Bush. The next thing you know, we're in the Iraq war, which was all based on propaganda. According to the media, we were heroes. The military had done a great job. The next thing you know, we were back in Iraq for the second Iraq war. It hasn't stopped. As Bush 41 said, 'The specter of Vietnam has been buried forever in the desert sands of the Arabian Peninsula.' There was this fear that we were becoming too pacifist, too soft. So that was why they reclaimed that sense that we had to get tough again. And we did. We got very tough. And before you knew it, by the late '90s, we had this policy — it's written in ink and we've lived up to most of it — to take out the seven countries on the NeoCon list. We hit six of them so far. The seventh one, of course, is Iran. If we go after Iran, it's a huge mistake. We're going to bury Bush's bullshit in the sands of the ashes of history. But I think we'll go. Netanyahu, he's our leader. He's our foreign policy. Middle East policy goes through him. I think that guy is absolutely fanatical. I interviewed him years ago, and I thought he was mad then. He really hates the Arabs. He just can't get over it. So we're back to learning nothing. This country really has a problem with history, I think. 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Russia Today
29-04-2025
- Politics
- Russia Today
EU engaging in ‘perversion of history'
Attempts by EU elites to diminish the significance of the USSR's contribution to the victory over Nazism are a 'perversion of history,' Oscar-winning American movie director Oliver Stone has told RT ahead of World War II Victory Day celebrations in Russia. The bloc's 'elitist leadership' has distorted the message that World War II provides to humanity, the filmmaker has said. 'I'm shocked by it, by [what] is happening,' he stated, calling it 'a shame' and 'a disgrace that we forgot or pretend to [have forgotten]' about the sacrifices the Soviet Union made during the war. Stone also said he did not believe people in Europe 'buy this at all.' 'I think the people don't agree with the government,' Stone maintained, going on to say that 'the futility of this campaign against Russia by the EU' is obvious to 'anybody, who reads history [books] and is intelligent.' The director of 'Platoon' and 'JFK' expressed his doubts that 'fascism is popular' nowadays and stated instead that European elites had lost their way because of their 'worship of the EU.' 'We are not back to the times of Hitler, but what is happening is a loss of perspective and we need to get back to a sense of reason,' Stone told RT as he called on Western leaders to 'listen to the Russians' instead of antagonizing them. He also expressed his hope that the US and Russia would manage to mend their relationship, opening the way to a better future for humanity. 'Russia and the United States are a great partnership, as is China, by the way, and I think we could have a world that is much safer… if we all get together and realize that it's a multilateral world.' US President Donald Trump's administration has been engaged in efforts to restore bilateral ties with Russia and resolve the Ukraine conflict. On Wednesday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that America now has a 'better' understanding of the Russian position on the crisis. Moscow's key conditions for ending the conflict are Ukraine's neutrality, demilitarization, and recognition of the new territorial reality on the ground. Last week, Trump also said that Russian President Vladimir Putin was easier to deal with than Ukraine's Vladimir Zelensky. Russian officials maintain they have always been ready to engage in peace talks, provided the discussions aim for a permanent solution that addresses the root causes of the conflict. Moscow has rejected any temporary agreement, explaining that it could be used by Kiev and its backers to rearm the Ukrainian military.
Yahoo
06-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Opinion: Lauren Boebert's ‘Stone' Gaffe Proves She's Dumb as Rocks
Listen to this full episode of The New Abnormal on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon and Stitcher (update links). Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert's attempt to throw sticks and stones during a congressional hearing embarrassingly backfired in the latest show that the Republican congresswoman is dumber than a pile of rocks, says The New Abnormal co-hosts Andy Levy and Danielle Moodie. During a congressional hearing examining newly released files related to former President John F. Kennedy Jr.'s assassination, Boebert seemed to mistake filmmaker Oliver Stone for conservative political strategist Roger Stone as she asked him about a book the latter wrote. 'Mr. Stone, you wrote a book accusing (Lyndon B. Johnson) of being involved in the killing of President Kennedy Jr. Do these most recent releases confirm or negate your initial charge... being involved in the assassination of President Kennedy,' asked Boebert. Journalist Jefferson Morley called out Boebert's flub. 'I think you're confusing Mr. Oliver Stone with Mr. Roger Stone,' said Morley. 'It's Roger Stone who implicated LBJ in the assassination of the president. It's not my friend Oliver Stone.' To which Boebert replied, 'I may have misinterpreted that, and I apologize for that... But there seems to be some alluding of, like you said, incompetence or some sort of involvement there on the back end.' Then she added, 'Sorry, I'm going to move on.' Subscribe to The New Abnormal on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Amazon Music, or Overcast. The blunder got co-host Moodie thinking, 'Is she going to interrogate an actual stone next? Like a pile of fucking rocks. Is that coming in next?' Levy added, 'It's just one dumb member of Congress after another.' Producer Jesse Cannon chimed in to add that Boebert is rumored to be dating rockstar Kid Rock, '—who's a stoner,' alleged Cannon. 'I mean, close enough.' Plus! Author Chad Lewis' examines how foreign interests exploited Trump's inner circle in his new book The Persuasion Game: The Influence Peddlers to the Trump Administration Who Jeopardized America Listen to this full episode of The New Abnormal on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon and Stitcher (update links).
Miami Herald
02-04-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Lauren Boebert Confuses Oliver Stone With Roger Stone In Congress Mishap
Congresswoman Lauren Boebert appeared to confused the filmmaker Oliver Stone with the conservative political strategist Roger Stone on Tuesday. The Colorado Republican Representative made the error when speaking at a congressional hearing about the assassination of former president John F. Kennedy. "Mr. Stone you wrote a book accusing LBJ of being involved in the killing of president Kennedy. Do these most recent releases confirm or negate your initial charge... being involved in the assassination of president Kennedy," Boebert said, referring to President Donald Trump's release of the remaining files related to JFK's assassination of last month. Oliver Stone responded: "No, I didn't. If you look closely at the film, there's no — it accuses the President Johnson of part, being part of, complicit in a cover-up of the case, but no Journalist Jefferson Morley stepped in and told Boebert: "I think you're confusing Mr. Oliver Stone with Mr. Roger Stone. It's Roger Stone who implicated LBJ in the assassination of the president. It's not my friend Oliver Stone." Boebert then replied: "I may have misinterpreted that and I apologize for that." This is a breaking story. More to follow. Related Articles Capitol Police Respond to Claim Man With Gun Got Into Room With Donald TrumpRoger Stone Urges Trump to Sue Illinois Governor for Calling Him a 'Rapist'How Matt Gaetz's Cameo Compares to Other RepublicansDonald Trump Can't Trust Mike Pompeo For Cabinet Position: Roger Stone 2025 NEWSWEEK DIGITAL LLC.
