The Corporation

[trotskyist]

I dont know if people do docs much but i saw super size me (OH MY GOD ITS SO HARD TO CLIMB THESE STAIRS :rolleyes: ) so here goes,

The Corporation is a great documentary that explores the nature, evolution, impacts and possible future for the corporation as we know it today. it contains good but not over the top footage from advertising, TV news and corporate propaganda and puts forward its argument with disturbing case studies, anecdotes and interviews.

This documentary mainly focuses on American corporations because of the "Legal person Legislation", that is a corporation by american law is regarded as a single person. So a corporation is usually only interested in its shareholders. The doc puts forward the interesting argument, "that if a corporation is a person, then what kind of person?".

The doc makes a phsycological checklist and gives a diagnosis of the nature of the corporations "legal person". using shocking and disturbing case histories the diagnosis results in the corporation being regarded physcologically as a physcopath!. eg Monsanto's involvement with "DDT" and "Agent Orange".

this doc also uses a great narrator, the cold, alomost mechanical voice further freaked me out when i viewed this film. Viewers expecting entertainment of Micheal Moore proportoins you may be dissapointed, although you also might pleasantly surprised. at a 145 minutes some people might get bored but i advise you to sit through it, it is well worth it.

the question immediately popped into my headwhen viewing this, Do we really want the most dominant institution of our time to have this personality and records. When will these things change? and what can be done about the current situation of capitalization, globalization and the corporate world today?. this doc made me laugh, growl and get an anxiety attack all at the same time.

4 stars.

PS
Only after the Last Tree has been cut down,
Only after the Last River has been poisoned,
Only after the Last Fish has been caught,
Only then will you find that
Money Cannot Be Eaten.
Cree Indian Prophecy

[ash_is_the_gal]

good review. i enjoyed this one, but didn't finish watching it because i had to return it :(

[vd853]

I saw the whole thing, and understood most of it. It makes me loath those corporations more than ever.

[7thson]

A wake up call for many.............but yet are we really suprised? I was not. Nice review though.

[Cousin Avi]

its like you know most of it, yet it still shocks you.

[Piddzilla]

I loved this film. More serious and actually less biased than the films of Michael Moore, who as a matter of fact gets not only a lot of time but even the last word in this one as well. I liked the fact that the filmmakers let all kinds of people speak out in the film, from militant enivromental activists to hardcore capitalists. And I liked the fact that it ended with a positive vibe - there's not only hope, we're also definitely going to make it. And I didn't know everything about these things. I mean, of course I know about how this planet is dying and about slave and child labour, but there was a lot of examples and facts I wasn't aware of. And I did not have a clue about the coup that was planned to overthrow FDR.

I had seen segments of it before but I don't remember where... Hmmm... And the cover said it was 144 mins long but in fact it was closer to 170. Funny.....

[TheUsualSuspect]

I thought the film lost it's direction in the last act. Other then that, it was a good doc.

[Piddzilla]

I thought the film lost it's direction in the last act. Other then that, it was a good doc.

Hmm, perhaps... In what way do you think it lost its direction? To me the first two acts were a lot about lining up facts and examples and arguments while the last one was about people trying to fight corporations and injustices.