Even though the 1987 film “Planes, Trains, and Automobiles” got 3 ½ stars from Roger Ebert, a film professor named Mtume Gant said he instead saw a film in which Martin’s upper middle-class and character exploiting Candy’s character, who represents the exploited working class.
The College Fix reports Gant whined about the film on a communist podcast aptly named “Millennials are Killing Capitalism.”
Gant is assistant professor of film at Purchase College, a public liberal arts campus known locally as SUNY Purchase. The professor, himself a Purchase alumnus, teaches in the School of Film and Media Studies.
Miciah Bilger, assistant Editor at The College Fix, says Gant’s complaint about a beloved film is a reminder that many professors, regardless of their field of work, follow a Marxist worldview.
“Where they're looking at the idea,” he said, “that there's an oppressor and an oppressed."
“Planes” tells the story of a cheerful but lowly show ring salesman, played by Candy, who becomes companion to a marketing executive, played by Martin, when their New York City flight is cancelled two days before Thanksgiving.
Describing the film’s plot on the “Killing Capitalism” podcast, Gant claimed the emphasis on Martin getting home to his family was an excuse for his character to mistreat Candy’s lowlier salesman character.
(Major spoiler alert: Martin's character invites Candy's character, who is widowed and alone, to come home with him in the film's final scene).
The film’s famous director, John Hughes, made the “bourgeois” marketing executive clean and organized while the poorer salesman is overweight and sloppy, the professor also stated.
The professor even complained about the film’s “wholesome” approach to family and said the plot about travel was “dangerous” because people should challenge the status quo.
Bilger says students are paying tuition to learn from a professor with such a warped worldview, and taxpayers are paying for his classroom and salary.
"So that means tax dollars are funding this research, this man's classes and projects, and what he's teaching students," he pointed out.
