What's a "Goldstein movie"?

By RM
saturday, january 31, 2026 at 11:59:00 p.m. est

What's a "Goldstein movie"?

Don't know this one, decided to investigate-sounds like a "McCarthyism" parable-a boy is suspicious of a "strange new neighbor" (presumably foreign to boot, since he's played by Kurt Kasznar)- slanders him, the guy is of course innocent.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk_About_a_Stranger

The director's background is interesting:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Bradley_(director)

Started promisingly with an artsy, well-made Peer Gynt independently-made feature (with a teenaged Charlton Heston!), ended badly with a couple of dull SF movies, 12 to the Moon and Madmen of Mandoras-the latter destined for infamy when it was re-edited and retitled for TV as They Saved Hitler's Brain!

-RM


By Nicholas Stix
sunday, february 1, 2026 at 6:22:00 a.m. est

A Goldstein movie is a pro-communist movie, which depicts patriots as evil. Most of them were made during the blacklist era, by people who were crypto-communists--reds who never joined the party. Goldstein was based on Trotsky, by Orwell in 1984, who was the party's hate figure. However, no hate figure in a Goldstein movie was based on Trotsky, and they were not all based on one man. The most popular "Goldstein" was Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, but there was also Gen. Curtis LeMay, Gen. Edwin Walker, and gossip columnist Walter Winchell.