Movies
-
Why bad movies keep coming out and what to do about it By John Pilger
As an inveterate film fan, I turn to the listings every week and try not to lose hope. I search the guff that often passes for previews, and I queue for a ticket with that flicker of excitement reminiscent of matinees in art deco splendour. Once inside, lights down, beer in hand, hope recedes as… Continue reading
-
The Art of Collaborating with the Nazi’s: Hollywood & America Reek of Nazi Influence
Ben Urwand’s The Collaboration: Hollywood’s Pact with Hitler (The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2013) is a disturbing, unsettling and must-read. That Hollywood’s studio heavyweights like Jack Warner and Carl Laemmle would cut scenes and dialog offensive to the ideology of National Socialism is a tough fact to digest. But aggressive capitalists, whether operating… Continue reading
-
Movie Review: “We Steal Secrets”: A Masterclass in Propaganda. The Assassination of Julian Assange By Jonathan Cook
I have just watched We Steal Secrets, Alex Gibney’s documentary about Wikileaks and Julian Assange. One useful thing I learnt is the difference between a hatchet job and character assassination. Gibney is too clever for a hatchet job, and his propaganda is all the more effective for it. Continue reading
-
“We Steal Secrets” The New Movie About Wikileaks Infuriates Wikileaks By Danny Schecter
You could say that Wikileaks, the subject of We Steal Secrets also began with a fury – a fury against war and secrecy, and was moving as fast as it could to challenge media complacency in the digital realm. Now, it is being ganged up on by a media that invariably builds you up before… Continue reading
-
New John Pilger film, Utopia, to be broadcast on ITV and released worldwide
Eleven miles by ferry from Perth is Western Australia’s “premier tourist destination”. This is Rottnest Island, whose scabrous wild beauty and isolation evoked for me Robben Island in South Africa. Empires are never short of devil’s islands; what makes Rottnest different, indeed what makes Australia different, is a silence and denial on an epic scale. Continue reading
-
Video: Victims of Hollywood’s Blacklist
Former cast and crew of Hollywood talk about being labeled as a communist and being blacklisted from the entertainment business. Continue reading
-
Movie Review: Robbery of Books and Ownership of Narrative By Susan Abulhawa
I finally watched The Great Book Robbery at the University of Pennsylvania this weekend with some friends. It’s a film documenting Israel’s systematic looting of over 70,000 books from Palestinian public and private libraries after Jewish gangs in Palestine proclaimed the state of Israel and ethnically cleansed the native population. Continue reading
-
London Screening of the film Stealing the Arab Spring
This documentary exposes the body of lies that led to the suspension of Libya from the Human Rights Council and generated the Nato-led war to protect the Libyan population. The allegations which claimed that Gaddafi had violently repressed and killed 6,000 of his own people had originated from human rights organisations within Libya and were… Continue reading
-
Director Kathryn Bigelow defends her indefensible Zero Dark Thirty By David Walsh
Director Kathryn Bigelow took to the pages of the Los Angeles Times Tuesday to defend her pro-CIA film Zero Dark Thirty which has provoked opposition inside and outside the film industry. Bigelow’s column, which reveals her as a slavish admirer of the US intelligence and military apparatus, only sinks her—deservedly—deeper in the mire. Continue reading
-
2013 Academy Award Nominations: “And the Winner is … The CIA” By David Walsh
In 2012 the American film industry presented an extraordinary contradiction, between those showing an interest in social life and history, on the one hand, and those eagerly endorsing the “dark side” of imperialist policy, on the other. In their own inimitably muddle-headed fashion, the Oscar nominations reflect this divide. Continue reading
-
Movie Review: “Zero Dark Thirty”: Torturing the Facts By Marjorie Cohn
Zero Dark Thirty is disturbing for two reasons. First and foremost, it leaves the viewer with the erroneous impression that torture helped the CIA find bin Laden’s hiding place in Pakistan. Secondarily, it ignores both the illegality and immorality of using torture as an interrogation tool. Continue reading
-
The CIA’s Hollywood Release: “Zero Dark Thirty”, or How People Lose Their Humanity By Annie Day
So how did they feel about liking a film that upholds something they would otherwise find deplorable? Several people said it’s just a movie and shouldn’t be taken so seriously. One woman said she appreciated coming to understand, from the CIA’s perspective, why they used torture. And far too often, the answer was, “It’s complicated.” Continue reading
-
Movie Review: Django Unchained: Great Vengeance and Furious Anger By Jordy Cummings
Of all the “b-movie” film genres of the 20th century, none was more consistently radical than the spaghetti western. So-named because of its Italian lineage, these films used the setting of the wild west to portray thinly veiled allegories about popular uprisings, class and racial oppression, and armed rebellion against the ruling classes. Continue reading
-
TIFF: Cultural Starwars By Eric Walberg
This year’s Toronto International Film Festival highlights the new direction in filmmaking: Iran is the enemy du jour, but at the same time it is not longer kosher to praise everything Israel does, notes Eric Walberg Continue reading
Ahram Weekly, Arab, Canada, Eric Walberg, Film, Hollywood, Iran, Israel, Palestinian, PR, Tel Aviv, Toronto -
Palestine: Hackney PSC’s Catastrophe Club presents a film and discussion
Tuesday 28th February, 7 for 7.30 start: on “Defamation” (dir. <strong class=’StrictlyAutoTagBold’>Yoav Shamir, 2010, 93 mins) Plus: Q&A with <strong class=’StrictlyAutoTagBold’>Miri Weingarten This fascinating film looks at the political use of <strong class=’StrictlyAutoTagBold’>Holocaust memory and anti-semitism claims. In his exploration of modern Israeli life, the filmmaker travels the world in search of the most modern Continue reading
-
Video: Documentary film with Joe Bageant opens
THE KINGDOM OF SURVIVAL seeks out radical and alternative visions that challenge the status quo and features Prof. Noam Chomsky, Joe Bageant, and Mark Mirabello. Continue reading
-
The Spook Who Sat By The Door Trailer
The Spook Who Sat By The Door TrailerFollow my videos on vodpod For those who don’t know or haven’t seen The Spook Who Sat By The Door it’s an important film that has unfortunately been relegated to cult status. The film is about a Black CIA agent who takes his CIA training and goes back Continue reading
-
Driving with Fanon By Steve Mokwena
20 October, 2010 — Steve Mokwena DRIVING WITH FANON is a filmic meditation on violence, memory and the human condition in post-colonial Africa. Avant-garde filmmaker, Kwena Mokwena travels through Freetown, Sierra Leone with the ghost of Frantz Fanon in his back pocket. Continue reading
-
‘CANTOS’ based on Dante’s Inferno (Trailer)
Much came about in only one room and a couple of exterior locations around Deptford,London; home to Christopher Marlowe, Pepy’s, Sir Walter Raleigh, and the original Cross Bones of St. Nicholas Church mixed with allegorical references to love, loss and chiaroscuro feelings of low light and Dante’s voyage with Virgil. Continue reading
-
`South of the Border’: An Interview with Oliver Stone & Tariq Ali
Oliver Stone’s new documentary South of the Border chronicles the emergence of progressive governments in Latin America, their quest for social and political transformation and their growing independence from Washington. Roberto Navarrete interviews Oliver Stone and Tariq Ali (one of the film’s scriptwriters) to find out some background. Continue reading
The New Dark Age 