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It might be overlong, but isn't there a way to just bulk up the other sections, instead of deleting the plot section? I actually read it and realized several things about the movie, that I didn't realize before, it seems fine just the way it is. Browncoat101 22:44, 9 September 2007 (UTC)
Hey, I always thought the plot section was for a synopsis of the film and NOT a blow-by-blow account of the entire film.
I suppose under a heading of "Criticism" and "Controversy," this could be a relative complaint, but I wonder if the chain-listing of three different "pro-Third-World" programs near the end are necessary.
At the same time, I don't feel like slighting any one particular company that could be considered a "target" of the film/book ... maybe I need a closer reading of the balance rules, but it seems like a gray area. I may end up adding to this article later, perhaps to clarify the book's own "criticism" of the pharm industry to balance out the "criticism" of the work.
I don't think the opinions of "Johnny Web and Tuna" constitute a reliable source of criticism. Also removed some thoroughly unsourced material. The Nation and the Washington Post I can buy as reliable sources of criticism and information re. the subject of the movie, but unsourced material and... uh... the word of somebody who calls himself "Tuna" isn't exactly rock-solid reliable. -- MattShepherd 01:00, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Doesn't matter, just as sourceable as Sonia Shah. You made the criticism section pretty biased towards anti-pharma POV. It should be balanced. Also, the pharma philanthropic efforts in the developing world are easily sourced. Sandwich Eater 02:29, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Hi all, just happened to see this listed at RFC. I've actually seen neither the movie nor the book so maybe coming at this with a fresh pair of eyes will be helpful. I take it from the history that the following paragraph is what's at issue:
Critics contend that both the movie and book failed to use the opportunity to level realistic and needed criticism of the pharmaceutical industry and the plight of Africa. Instead, they argue, both mediums created an unrealistic, naive and almost laughable plot typical of many in the paranoid thriller genre but less entertaining or believable than the best of them 1. Equally adamant, the films supporters point out tragic corruption such as that depicted in a Washington Post article from December 2000 2, wherein a clinical trial conducted by Pfizer in Nigeria in 1996 allegedly used children to test Trovan, which had been proven efficacious in adults but not in children. In turn, critics of the movie point out that a company still has no profit motive in purposely developing a dangerous drug, particularly in light of the lawsuits that would result in the West. Other critics point to pro-Third World measures that pharmaceutical companies have enacted, such as "Merck's Gift," wherein billions of free drugs were donated to cure River Blindness in Africa 3, or Pfizer's gift of free/discounted fluconazole and other drugs in AIDS-ravaged South Africa 4, or GSK's development of a treatment for chloroquine-resistant malaria, despite the lack of profit potential 5. Sonia Shah, a very vocal critic of the drug industry and an investigative reporter describes a more realistic portrait of the ethical dilemmas facing the industry and the developing world, as published in The Nation. 6
You've already verified that the criticism is verifiable and the original critique grew out of the input of several wikipedians. I don't think it right to delete everything and start over. The edits went like this:
Some critics feel the movie and book have an unrealistic plot- references
--->It is too realistic blah blah blah, eventual addition of Trovan incident as a verifiable incidence
OK, but the critics would still content it is factually innacurate and that was just one corrupt MD in Nigeria here are 3 massively expensive things the industry has done, reference, reference, reference
So the whole thing grew out of a balanced discussion with a point/counter-point. And it doesn't make sense to delete these verifiable facts. Sandwich Eater 17:42, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Hi Ripley, You're right. The background section is out of place since there is no secondary film critique source discussing the background (that I've read yet) that hits upon that. It grew out of defending inclusion of the criticism regarding the realism of the plot. I suspect Shah writes more about it in her book, so it could perhaps be added here as a reference from her book. But it would be better to point to a separate article on the 3rd world and pharma which is sure to exist already on wikipedia. So I agree that we should eliminate the section in a favor of a line that says something like "More information on the intersection of pharma & developing nations can be found here..." and points and counter points regarding Trovan vs. various gift programs would be more appropriate in that forum. I would appreciate a link to the anti-blog discussion. It seems a bit unliberal to ban the use of blogs on an open access encyclopedia so I need to read more about that... Sandwich Eater 01:43, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
"websites and blogs, particularly those associated with reliable sources of information. For example, the blog of an academic department is not merely a personal blog, but should be looked at in the totality of the source."
Note that what we are doing is sourcing critics. A critic can voice any opinion that they have since they are criticising a movie. I do not think we can say that Shah is authoratative while Tuna is not. The only argument there is that Tuna is not using a name, even a reasonable Pen Name. But I actually think that his writing is pretty good and there is little other than choice of Pen name to distinguish him from other critics. One could easily argue that other critics are more susceptible to corruption by the film industry.
Wikipedia is an open source encyclopedia. All editors are free to edit regardless of screen name or putative authority. In this case, I think we should include the reference to the blog because in the same manner, he is providing subjective criticism of a film that has the same authority as anyone else's criticism or praise of a film. Sandwich Eater 16:59, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Lost in the whole controversy argument is the fact that there are very few details about this movie. I've never seen it and from this WP entry I can tell it is a movie seemingly critical of the big drug companies. Is it a documentary? I doubt it, but you cant tell from this page.
Who are the characters? What do they do? Why do they do it?
There is exactly one sentence of plot in the whole entry: "It tells the story of Justin Quayle, who finds his wife murdered and seeks to uncover the reasons behind her death."
125.187.178.32 05:41, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
In this revision in January, 2007, somebody added a massive braindump, not really a plot summary but a blow-by-blow account of the events of the film. There is no intermediate version to revert to, so I've taken the unusual step of removing the entire thing. Would somebody who has seen this film care to add a concise summary of the plot? -- Tony Sidaway 23:51, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
I've removed a whole section of very recently added trivia that seemed to be designed to insert spam for the trivia section of some kind of fan site into the references section. References must be to reliable sources and adding long lists of poorly referenced trivia to an article does not improve it. -- Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 13:28, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I haven't watched the movie closely enough to do this now (although maybe I'll re-watch it sometime and then take this up myself), but someone really needs to fix the current plot section (added in this edit...not very long ago, just about a month and a half). As it is, it doesn't really tell what happens in the movie; it's written more like a teaser or a promotional snippet. And the style in which it is written makes it almost appear to be copied from somewhere else...the only reason I'm not more concerned about that is that I can't find the same wording in a Google search, and Julia Rossi (the editor who wrote the section) has been around a long time and knows better than that...nevertheless, the section still does have that sort of appearance.
I agree with everyone that the ridiculously long plot section that was there earlier had to be fixed, but this isn't really much better. It's just bad in a different way. Politizer talk/ contribs 08:31, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
Why is it called "the constant gardener" when it appears to be unrelated to gardening? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.241.212.160 ( talk) 05:32, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
Formal request has been received to merge Constant Gardener Trust into The Constant Gardener (film); dated: September 19, 2021. Proposer's rationale: Not enough material in the former article to justify it not being a subsection of the latter. Pinging proposer @ QuietHere: Richard3120 ( talk) 14:59, 27 September 2021 (UTC)
Merger complete.
TheBirdsShedTears (
talk)
19:47, 26 November 2021 (UTC)
Having watched the film for the first time last night and then read the plot summary here... it's not great, is it? I see from the talk page it's been an issue for over a decade! I'm not sure it being written in chronological order makes much sense (it gives little impression of how the film plays out), and while there's a massive excess of detail (exactly how Arnold was tortured etc) it also omits some quite significant moments - conversations in Germany and in Kenya with Sandy, Tim and Curtis. It's weighted far too heavily on Tessa's actions and making it explicit what she/the drug companies did, rather than the narrative of the film. I'm also not entirely sure it has the relationship between KVH and Three Bees right - isn't KVH the developer and Three Bees the distributor?
I'd need to watch it again to write a proper summary and get a few things straight in my head (what exactly happens to Curtis and his loans etc). I'm not especially inclined to do that immediately after having seen it, but might I suggest that if anyone else decides to rewatch that they might consider drafting something? HornetMike ( talk) 14:18, 3 January 2022 (UTC)
![]() | The contents of the Constant Gardener Trust page were merged into The Constant Gardener (film) on 26 November 2021. For the contribution history and old versions of the redirected page, please see its history; for the discussion at that location, see its talk page. |
![]() | This article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
It might be overlong, but isn't there a way to just bulk up the other sections, instead of deleting the plot section? I actually read it and realized several things about the movie, that I didn't realize before, it seems fine just the way it is. Browncoat101 22:44, 9 September 2007 (UTC)
Hey, I always thought the plot section was for a synopsis of the film and NOT a blow-by-blow account of the entire film.
I suppose under a heading of "Criticism" and "Controversy," this could be a relative complaint, but I wonder if the chain-listing of three different "pro-Third-World" programs near the end are necessary.
At the same time, I don't feel like slighting any one particular company that could be considered a "target" of the film/book ... maybe I need a closer reading of the balance rules, but it seems like a gray area. I may end up adding to this article later, perhaps to clarify the book's own "criticism" of the pharm industry to balance out the "criticism" of the work.
I don't think the opinions of "Johnny Web and Tuna" constitute a reliable source of criticism. Also removed some thoroughly unsourced material. The Nation and the Washington Post I can buy as reliable sources of criticism and information re. the subject of the movie, but unsourced material and... uh... the word of somebody who calls himself "Tuna" isn't exactly rock-solid reliable. -- MattShepherd 01:00, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Doesn't matter, just as sourceable as Sonia Shah. You made the criticism section pretty biased towards anti-pharma POV. It should be balanced. Also, the pharma philanthropic efforts in the developing world are easily sourced. Sandwich Eater 02:29, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Hi all, just happened to see this listed at RFC. I've actually seen neither the movie nor the book so maybe coming at this with a fresh pair of eyes will be helpful. I take it from the history that the following paragraph is what's at issue:
Critics contend that both the movie and book failed to use the opportunity to level realistic and needed criticism of the pharmaceutical industry and the plight of Africa. Instead, they argue, both mediums created an unrealistic, naive and almost laughable plot typical of many in the paranoid thriller genre but less entertaining or believable than the best of them 1. Equally adamant, the films supporters point out tragic corruption such as that depicted in a Washington Post article from December 2000 2, wherein a clinical trial conducted by Pfizer in Nigeria in 1996 allegedly used children to test Trovan, which had been proven efficacious in adults but not in children. In turn, critics of the movie point out that a company still has no profit motive in purposely developing a dangerous drug, particularly in light of the lawsuits that would result in the West. Other critics point to pro-Third World measures that pharmaceutical companies have enacted, such as "Merck's Gift," wherein billions of free drugs were donated to cure River Blindness in Africa 3, or Pfizer's gift of free/discounted fluconazole and other drugs in AIDS-ravaged South Africa 4, or GSK's development of a treatment for chloroquine-resistant malaria, despite the lack of profit potential 5. Sonia Shah, a very vocal critic of the drug industry and an investigative reporter describes a more realistic portrait of the ethical dilemmas facing the industry and the developing world, as published in The Nation. 6
You've already verified that the criticism is verifiable and the original critique grew out of the input of several wikipedians. I don't think it right to delete everything and start over. The edits went like this:
Some critics feel the movie and book have an unrealistic plot- references
--->It is too realistic blah blah blah, eventual addition of Trovan incident as a verifiable incidence
OK, but the critics would still content it is factually innacurate and that was just one corrupt MD in Nigeria here are 3 massively expensive things the industry has done, reference, reference, reference
So the whole thing grew out of a balanced discussion with a point/counter-point. And it doesn't make sense to delete these verifiable facts. Sandwich Eater 17:42, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Hi Ripley, You're right. The background section is out of place since there is no secondary film critique source discussing the background (that I've read yet) that hits upon that. It grew out of defending inclusion of the criticism regarding the realism of the plot. I suspect Shah writes more about it in her book, so it could perhaps be added here as a reference from her book. But it would be better to point to a separate article on the 3rd world and pharma which is sure to exist already on wikipedia. So I agree that we should eliminate the section in a favor of a line that says something like "More information on the intersection of pharma & developing nations can be found here..." and points and counter points regarding Trovan vs. various gift programs would be more appropriate in that forum. I would appreciate a link to the anti-blog discussion. It seems a bit unliberal to ban the use of blogs on an open access encyclopedia so I need to read more about that... Sandwich Eater 01:43, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
"websites and blogs, particularly those associated with reliable sources of information. For example, the blog of an academic department is not merely a personal blog, but should be looked at in the totality of the source."
Note that what we are doing is sourcing critics. A critic can voice any opinion that they have since they are criticising a movie. I do not think we can say that Shah is authoratative while Tuna is not. The only argument there is that Tuna is not using a name, even a reasonable Pen Name. But I actually think that his writing is pretty good and there is little other than choice of Pen name to distinguish him from other critics. One could easily argue that other critics are more susceptible to corruption by the film industry.
Wikipedia is an open source encyclopedia. All editors are free to edit regardless of screen name or putative authority. In this case, I think we should include the reference to the blog because in the same manner, he is providing subjective criticism of a film that has the same authority as anyone else's criticism or praise of a film. Sandwich Eater 16:59, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Lost in the whole controversy argument is the fact that there are very few details about this movie. I've never seen it and from this WP entry I can tell it is a movie seemingly critical of the big drug companies. Is it a documentary? I doubt it, but you cant tell from this page.
Who are the characters? What do they do? Why do they do it?
There is exactly one sentence of plot in the whole entry: "It tells the story of Justin Quayle, who finds his wife murdered and seeks to uncover the reasons behind her death."
125.187.178.32 05:41, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
In this revision in January, 2007, somebody added a massive braindump, not really a plot summary but a blow-by-blow account of the events of the film. There is no intermediate version to revert to, so I've taken the unusual step of removing the entire thing. Would somebody who has seen this film care to add a concise summary of the plot? -- Tony Sidaway 23:51, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
I've removed a whole section of very recently added trivia that seemed to be designed to insert spam for the trivia section of some kind of fan site into the references section. References must be to reliable sources and adding long lists of poorly referenced trivia to an article does not improve it. -- Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The 13:28, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I haven't watched the movie closely enough to do this now (although maybe I'll re-watch it sometime and then take this up myself), but someone really needs to fix the current plot section (added in this edit...not very long ago, just about a month and a half). As it is, it doesn't really tell what happens in the movie; it's written more like a teaser or a promotional snippet. And the style in which it is written makes it almost appear to be copied from somewhere else...the only reason I'm not more concerned about that is that I can't find the same wording in a Google search, and Julia Rossi (the editor who wrote the section) has been around a long time and knows better than that...nevertheless, the section still does have that sort of appearance.
I agree with everyone that the ridiculously long plot section that was there earlier had to be fixed, but this isn't really much better. It's just bad in a different way. Politizer talk/ contribs 08:31, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
Why is it called "the constant gardener" when it appears to be unrelated to gardening? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.241.212.160 ( talk) 05:32, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
Formal request has been received to merge Constant Gardener Trust into The Constant Gardener (film); dated: September 19, 2021. Proposer's rationale: Not enough material in the former article to justify it not being a subsection of the latter. Pinging proposer @ QuietHere: Richard3120 ( talk) 14:59, 27 September 2021 (UTC)
Merger complete.
TheBirdsShedTears (
talk)
19:47, 26 November 2021 (UTC)
Having watched the film for the first time last night and then read the plot summary here... it's not great, is it? I see from the talk page it's been an issue for over a decade! I'm not sure it being written in chronological order makes much sense (it gives little impression of how the film plays out), and while there's a massive excess of detail (exactly how Arnold was tortured etc) it also omits some quite significant moments - conversations in Germany and in Kenya with Sandy, Tim and Curtis. It's weighted far too heavily on Tessa's actions and making it explicit what she/the drug companies did, rather than the narrative of the film. I'm also not entirely sure it has the relationship between KVH and Three Bees right - isn't KVH the developer and Three Bees the distributor?
I'd need to watch it again to write a proper summary and get a few things straight in my head (what exactly happens to Curtis and his loans etc). I'm not especially inclined to do that immediately after having seen it, but might I suggest that if anyone else decides to rewatch that they might consider drafting something? HornetMike ( talk) 14:18, 3 January 2022 (UTC)