What are your favorite, and in your opinion, most successful/effective political films?
This for a project of mine, that may end up being too ambitious for me. I'll post my own list soon, but wanna hears yoursss'sss.
Political Films
2I really liked The Fog of War, although I wouldn't say its been very effective, at least in terms of changes in the political world.
Political Films
3Are we talking documentary or drama?
Lawrence of Arabia is a great middle-eastern political epic.
The Battle of Algiers by Gillo Pontecorvo, which is one of the best films ever made IMO.
Peter Watkins' drama-documentaries Culloden, The War Game and Punishment Park are all fantastic.
I recently saw a very good Cuban movie entitled The Last Supper, a fascinating meditation on slavery and religion, in which a plantation owner invites twelve slaves to dinner on Good Friday.
Lars Von Triers films Dogville and Manderlay were good in terms of being political allegory.
Werner Herzog's Heart of Glass, in which the entire cast are hypnotized to act, is a broadly political movie. It certainly has a political reading, although a slightly oblique one.
And finally Alexander Nevsky, the classic Russian wartime propaganda film by Eisenstein, is one of my all time favourites.
Lawrence of Arabia is a great middle-eastern political epic.
The Battle of Algiers by Gillo Pontecorvo, which is one of the best films ever made IMO.
Peter Watkins' drama-documentaries Culloden, The War Game and Punishment Park are all fantastic.
I recently saw a very good Cuban movie entitled The Last Supper, a fascinating meditation on slavery and religion, in which a plantation owner invites twelve slaves to dinner on Good Friday.
Lars Von Triers films Dogville and Manderlay were good in terms of being political allegory.
Werner Herzog's Heart of Glass, in which the entire cast are hypnotized to act, is a broadly political movie. It certainly has a political reading, although a slightly oblique one.
And finally Alexander Nevsky, the classic Russian wartime propaganda film by Eisenstein, is one of my all time favourites.
Political Films
4Land and Freedom. Go on, Ken!
Last edited by Chapter Two_Archive on Tue Sep 05, 2006 11:03 am, edited 1 time in total.
Political Films
5Check out Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media, a really fine documentary on the big guy and his work. It's very entertaining and offers a good introduction to his ideas and influence.
The recent Why We Fight is a really powerful look at the military industrial complex and the current quagmire in Iraq that's well worth a look. The same man directed The Trials of Henry Kissinger, also well worth a rental.
And two Leftist political dramas of no small importance -- Our Daily Bread, King Vidor's story about collective farming during the Depression, and Salt Of The Earth, a docudrama about a miner's strike in the Southwest which was made by blacklisted filmmakers and writers in the 1950's.
The recent Why We Fight is a really powerful look at the military industrial complex and the current quagmire in Iraq that's well worth a look. The same man directed The Trials of Henry Kissinger, also well worth a rental.
And two Leftist political dramas of no small importance -- Our Daily Bread, King Vidor's story about collective farming during the Depression, and Salt Of The Earth, a docudrama about a miner's strike in the Southwest which was made by blacklisted filmmakers and writers in the 1950's.
"Everything should be kept. I regret everything I’ve ever thrown away." -- Richard Hell
Political Films
6I'd agree on the Errol Morris front, and add that a film's effectiveness may not just be measured by how much it did or didn't alter history, as I'm not sure what effect Battle Of Algiers had, though I don't know who would deny its worth or political merit... but rather how articulately its ideas are communicated to the audience.
Drama or documentary, whatever. I'm curious to see the divide between the eventual list I'll compile, which medium seems to have "worked" better, historically - whatever that may mean.
And yeah, Tomas Gutierrez Alea's work has come up in my research for this project, his Memories Of Subdesarrallo, in particular. I'm not really familiar with him, so will have to check these out.
I'm also a fan of von Trier's work, and in this respect, in particular Manderlay.
And this project was somewhat inspired by an interest I had this summer in the work of the earlier Soviets... beginning with Vertov, and extending to Dovzhenko, Pudovkin, and Eisenstein. Their politicism was to a large extent mandatory, which allowed for an interesting tension watching them develop "cinema", from the ground up.
I'm also a fan of Chris Marker's, and Godard's work 65-75.
Curious to hear more suggestions, and appreciate your descriptions. I'm hoping that through threads like these I'll be able to fill in some of the gaps I had in my own list, like Wajda.
Drama or documentary, whatever. I'm curious to see the divide between the eventual list I'll compile, which medium seems to have "worked" better, historically - whatever that may mean.
And yeah, Tomas Gutierrez Alea's work has come up in my research for this project, his Memories Of Subdesarrallo, in particular. I'm not really familiar with him, so will have to check these out.
I'm also a fan of von Trier's work, and in this respect, in particular Manderlay.
And this project was somewhat inspired by an interest I had this summer in the work of the earlier Soviets... beginning with Vertov, and extending to Dovzhenko, Pudovkin, and Eisenstein. Their politicism was to a large extent mandatory, which allowed for an interesting tension watching them develop "cinema", from the ground up.
I'm also a fan of Chris Marker's, and Godard's work 65-75.
Curious to hear more suggestions, and appreciate your descriptions. I'm hoping that through threads like these I'll be able to fill in some of the gaps I had in my own list, like Wajda.
Political Films
7All others mentioned plus...
The Weather Underground
A State Of Mind
The Corporation
None of which have had any serious impact.
The Weather Underground
A State Of Mind
The Corporation
None of which have had any serious impact.
Political Films
9My own preliminary list:
MASH - Robert Altman - 1970 - USA
Michelangelo Antonioni - Italy
Chain - Jem Cohen - 2005 - USA
Z - Costa Gavras - 1969
Alexander Dovzhenko - USSR
Sergei Eisenstein - USSR
Jean-Luc Godard - Switzerland
Jean-Pierre Gorin - France
Michael Haneke - Austria
Lessons Of Darkness - Werner Herzog - 1992
The Decalogue - Krzysztof Kieslowski - 1988 - Poland
Stanley Kubrick - USA
Chris Marker - France
Anne-Marie Mieville
Michael Moore - USA
Fog Of War - Errol Morris - 2003 - USA
Gillo Pontecorvo - Italy
Vsevolod Pudovkin - Russa
Triumph Of The Will - Leni Riefenstahl - 1934 - Germany
Dziga Vertov - USSR
Lars von Trier - Denmark
Medium Cool - Haskell Wexler - 1969 - USA[/i]
MASH - Robert Altman - 1970 - USA
Michelangelo Antonioni - Italy
Chain - Jem Cohen - 2005 - USA
Z - Costa Gavras - 1969
Alexander Dovzhenko - USSR
Sergei Eisenstein - USSR
Jean-Luc Godard - Switzerland
Jean-Pierre Gorin - France
Michael Haneke - Austria
Lessons Of Darkness - Werner Herzog - 1992
The Decalogue - Krzysztof Kieslowski - 1988 - Poland
Stanley Kubrick - USA
Chris Marker - France
Anne-Marie Mieville
Michael Moore - USA
Fog Of War - Errol Morris - 2003 - USA
Gillo Pontecorvo - Italy
Vsevolod Pudovkin - Russa
Triumph Of The Will - Leni Riefenstahl - 1934 - Germany
Dziga Vertov - USSR
Lars von Trier - Denmark
Medium Cool - Haskell Wexler - 1969 - USA[/i]
Political Films
10Mark Lansing wrote:Check out Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media, a really fine documentary on the big guy and his work. It's very entertaining and offers a good introduction to his ideas and influence.
Seconded.