Blistering NRA ad timed for the Oscars goes after Hollywood, Ocasio-Cortez, and anti-gun activists

A video titled, "A Message from a Real Hollywood Hero," featuring legendary actor and former NRA President Charlton Heston, made its debut on Sunday, just in time for the 91st annual Academy Awards.

What's in the video?

In the video, old snippets of Heston discussing his pro-Second Amendment beliefs are interspersed with clips of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and other anti-gun liberals.

The video — as well as its timing — was an effort to underscore "today's hypocritical and ideologically extreme celebrities, socialist politicians, activists, athletes, [and] the media," the National Rifle Association wrote in a news release.

"Something's gone wrong, for all our vigilance and battle scars over the Bill of Rights, have we let the flame of freedom's torch grow cold? Because there can be no torch to pass where there's no flame," Heston can be heard saying in the video.

Lamenting the curbing of gun rights, the two-time Academy Award winner said, "Politicians legislate against it, media ridicule it, movies pervert it. It's not unreasonable that with one lost generation, we could lose the Second Amendment forever. Because we didn't teach them what the battle's all about.

"Imagine if every kid had learned what we learned — that without a Second Amendment, by what means could a free people expect to protect freedom?" Heston continued. "We learned that, history proves it, common sense confirms it, and any school kid can grasp it. Only people who are free to own firearms can remain free people."

Heston went on to point out that the United States' Second Amendment rights are inalienable rights: "They were ours from the beginning."

"If you consider yourself a freedom-loving patriot, you can't shirk your duty to teach America's young to understand the Second Amendment," he explained. "To revere it. To embrace it. To defend it. And in their turn, to bequeath it."

He concluded, "Only then can we pass the torch with that sacred flame that lights the American way."

What else?

Others seen in the video include late-night show host Jimmy Kimmel, "The View's" Joy Behar, Parkland student activist David Hogg, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), actor Robert De Niro, and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).

A Message from a Real Hollywood Herowww.youtube.com