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| Saturday, February 23, 2008 |
| Trustafarian |
The Wall Street Journal article: The Rich Man's Michael Moore takes a look at trust fund film maker Jamie Johnson's (IV) latest project - The One Percent (currently airing on Cinemax). "I think most wealthy people want to live with this myth of equal opportunity and equality in this country," he says. "I don't think they want to question their right to this wealth."
The films have generated their share of controversy. "Born Rich", which featured several of Mr. Johnson's childhood friends talking about everything from drugs to prenuptial agreements, sparked a lawsuit and accusations from a few of his friends that Mr. Johnson portrayed them unfairly.
"The One Percent," which is running on Cinemax until April 1, has spawned its own mini scandal. After Warren Buffett's adopted granddaughter, Nicole Buffett, spoke to Mr. Johnson on camera about her views on money, Mr. Buffett sent her a letter stating that she was not legally his granddaughter. The clip below shows Jamie Johnson being called a "trustafarian" by his father's financial advisor after they try to persuade him to drop his film project.
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| posted by Boston Gal @ 4:23 PM *
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| 3 Comments: |
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In another instance of "the rich are different": what father brings in his financial manager to reprimand his son about a hobby he finds embarrassing?
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The thing with "Born Rich" is it just wasn't a good documentary. It caused some problems with one of his "friends" and it made some news because of its subject matter which appeals to the popular voyeurism of the rich but all in all, from a documentary point of view it just wasn't good. It wasn't entertaining, there was nothing in it that was illuminating. He focused on a handful of his friends, all a part of the same circle of New York rich kids (though there are many such circles), and he never asked any questions that were probing or insightful. It was boring, and while watching it I was just waiting for it to be over. OK, big surprise, him and his friends have big trust funds. Most of them aren't driven to work much at all and don't have much to do all day. Its no surprise. A lot of people I know, including myself, have gone through mini-versions of this. Maybe making a nice windfall from a dot-com job, or saving up some serious money working on Wall Street, and then you decide to take some time off but after a little while of "off time" you want to do something again. The only revealing thing about these kids was that they were always on "off time" and were pretty uncreative in finding ways to occupy their days. One girl liked to shop all day, another guy liked to try on clothes and work with his tailor on his suits, another liked to get high and hostile at parties, another liked to hang out in his college dorm room instead of going to one of his family's homes where he felt uncomfortable, and so on.......boring.
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I think you'll find that the family's asset manager was there as part of the original interview (presumably because Jamie's father himself has no idea what kind of assets the family has) and was not "brought in" to reprimand Jamie. He rebuked Jamie because Jamie's father is a shy and retiring man whom Jamie bullies throughout the film. His father doesn't really object to his son's films; he just didn't want to be in it himself, a desire which Jamie shows a rather flagrant disregard for.
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In another instance of "the rich are different": what father brings in his financial manager to reprimand his son about a hobby he finds embarrassing?