The Trap … (Episode 3: We will Force You to be Free): picking apart arguments over nature of freedom
Adam Curtis, “The Trap – What Happened to Our Dream of Freedom? (Episode 3: We will Force You to be Free)” (2007) Part of Adam Curtis’s “The Trap…
Documentaries
The Living Dead (Episode 3: The Attic): how a romantic fantasy of a glorious past disguised a thirst for power at any cost
Adam Curtis, “The Living Dead (Episode 3: The Attic)” (1995) Having seen the mishmash that was “The Iron Lady”, I figured it was high time I…
French and French-language Films
Blood Coltan: fact-finding documentary on coltan mining in DRC tells the horror like it is
Patrick Forestier, “Blood Coltan” (2007) Saw mention of this documentary in Arena magazine (December 2011 / January 2012 issue) so I was curious as to what…
French and French-language Films
Blood of the Beasts: horror, death, poetry and beauty co-exist in slaughterhouse
Georges Franju, “Le sang des bêtes” / “Blood of the Beasts” (1949) An amazing if very graphic realist film documentary of the work done in abbatoirs…
Human Resources: documentary on mind control is mind-exploding
Scott Noble, “Human Resources” (2010) What can I say? This two-hour documentary on the history of government and elite attempts to control human behaviour and direct…
Italian and Italian-language Films
Fallujah, the Hidden Massacre: documentary makes case for war crime but provides no context for attack
Sigfrido Ranucci and Maurizio Torrealta, “Fallujah, the Hidden Massacre” (2005) This 27-minute film plays like an extended news or current affairs report: it originally aired on…
Sprawling from Grace, Driven to Madness: a fair documentary on car culture and its effects on American economy and society
David M Edwards, “Sprawling from Grace, Driven to Madness” (2008) Stumbled across this very pertinent documentary on the consequences of Western societies’ dependence on cars as…
How to Start a Revolution: documentary gives too much credit to DIY revolution manual
Ruaridh Arrow, “How to Start a Revolution” (2011) Here’s an interesting one-hour documentary about Gene Sharp, a modest political science professor at the Massachusetts Institute of…
Zoo: film teeters gingerly around its subject and suffers for that
Robinson Devor, “Zoo” (2007) Based on the case of a Boeing employee who died from a perforated colon while being anally penetrated by a horse in…
All Watched Over … (Episode 3: The Monkey in the Machine and the Machine in the Monkey): falling apart under its own shaky premise
Adam Curtis, “All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace (Episode 3: The Monkey in the Machine and the Machine in the Monkey)” (2011) Final installation…