I recently discovered the documentary works of Adam Curtis. Most of Curtis films are available online. I’ve watched the three most recent. Century of the Self, The Power of Nightmares and The Trap. The central subject Curtis explores through all of these documentaries is the relationship between the masses and those in power. This essentially brings us to question what it is we means by ‘freedom’ when we discuss living in a ‘free’ society. I encourage everyone to watch these films. Some of the following descriptions are taken from their respective wikipedia entries.
The Century of The Self
Curtis traces the influence of psychoanalysis on Freud’s nephew Edward Bernays and his development of the field of public relations. Bernays saw the manipulation of public opinion as necessary in a society which he regarded as irrational and dangerous as a result of the ‘herd instinct’. The documentary describes the impact of Freud’s theories on the perception of the human mind, and the ways public relations agencies and politicians have used this during the last 100 years for their “engineering of consent”.
http://www.archive.org/details/AdaCurtisCenturyoftheSelf_0
Episode 1 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8953172273825999151
The films compare the rise of the American Neo-Conservative movement and the radical Islamist movement, making comparisons on their origins and suggesting a strong connection between the two. More controversially, it argues that the threat of radical Islamism as a massive, sinister organised force of destruction, specifically in the form of al-Qaeda, is in fact a myth perpetrated by politicians in many countries — and particularly American Neo-Conservatives — in an attempt to unite and inspire their people following the failure of earlier, more utopian ideologies.
http://www.archive.org/details/ThePowerOfNightmares
Episode 1 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=881321004838285177
The Trap: What Happened to Our Dream of Freedom
The series consists of three, one-hour programmes which explore the concept and definition of freedom, specifically “how a simplistic model of human beings as self-seeking, almost robotic, creatures led to today’s idea of freedom”. The films look at Game Theory as developed by John Nash (Better known from the film ‘A Beautiful Mind’) during the cold war. The influence of Game Theory on Scottish psychoanalyst R.D Laing. Laing’s challenging of the psychoanalytic institution and the subsequent influence on the development on new approaches to defining mental illness which in turn led to the mass introduction and use of drugs such as Prozac. The final programme focussed on the concepts of positive and negative liberty introduced in the 1950s by Isaiah Berlin. Curtis briefly explained how negative liberty could be defined as freedom from coercion and positive liberty as the opportunity to strive to fulfill one’s potential.
Episode 1 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8372545413887273321
I’ve got to go to watch these again.
There is an excellent review by Brian Holmes at
http://brianholmes.wordpress.com/2007/06/25/neolib-goes-neocon/
