Directed by Jimmy Leipold • Documentary • With Noam Chomsky, Chris Hedges, Stuart Ewen, David Miller • 2020 • 53 minutes
In 1916, Woodrow Wilson ran on a platform strongly opposing US entry into WWI. But just a few months after taking office, the United States declared war on Germany. Soon after, the American people, so firmly opposed to the war just a year earlier, were enthusiastic supporters. What happened? The short answer: propaganda. PROPAGANDA: THE MANUFACTURE OF CONSENT is a revealing documentary about how public relations grew out of wartime propaganda—and a portrait of one of the key architects of the field, Edward Bernays. The nephew of Sigmund Freud, Bernays refined the techniques used so successfully during the war to sell products to consumers, and ultimately to sell capitalism itself to workers. Public relations was also critical in building support for the New Deal, and in the pushback against it from the National Association of Manufacturers, which created materials including films aimed at children on the glories of manufacturing. Bacon and eggs as part of a hearty breakfast? The work of Bernays on behalf of a bacon company. Cigarettes as a sign of women’s liberation? Bernays, again. Casting the democratically elected government of Guatemala as a Communist threat to justify US invasion on behalf of the United Fruit Company? Once more, Bernays. There was nothing shadowy about Bernays. He wrote a book detailing his techniques and discusses them in an archival interview with Bill Moyers from 1983. Still, it is jarring to see his pride in hijacking the women’s suffrage movement in order to sell more cigarettes—one of many illuminating moments in this film. Featuring Noam Chomsky, Chris Hedges, Public Relations Museum co-founder Shelley Spector, historian Stuart Ewen, sociologist David Miller, and Bernays’ daughter Anne, PROPAGANDA offers an insightful look into the...
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Fate of a Salesman
Directed by Ben Crosbie and Tessa Moran • Documentary • 2013 • 27 minutes
Fate of a Salesman is an intimate portrait of a way of life on the verge of disappearing. In its 60th year of business, Men's Fashion Center in Washington, DC has come to represent identity, legacy and redemption for sales...
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Cafe
Directed by Hatuey Viveros Lavielle • Documentary • 2014 • 80 minutes
Jorge is preparing to graduate from law school-the first person from his mountain village in Mexico ever to do so. Chayo, his pregnant 16-year-old sister, faces the most difficult decision of her young life. Meanwhile their qu...
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Company Town
Directed by Deborah Kaufman, Alan Snitow • Documentary • 2017 • 77 minutes
The once free-spirited city of San Francisco is now a 'Company Town,' a playground for tech moguls of the 'sharing economy.' Airbnb is the biggest hotel, Uber privatizes transit. And now these companies want political pow...
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