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Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 5:46 am
by sparky_Archive
Missed it. Rats.

Sounds fascinating, if thoroughly depressing. Terrifying, in fact. Although this apparent revelation about "Yes, Minister" is thoroughly amusing.

I fear these big ideas, and those who seek to impose them on us. What is so often labelled as progress is so often brutal and obscene.

Ach. My hangover.

Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 5:54 am
by fantasmatical thorr_Archive
This was brilliant. I was glued to the screen. What a excellent programme, really. Why are these things not on an hour earlier and on the main channels? I can't wait for the next two episodes. Margaret fucking Thatcher. The vietnam body counts. Disgusting.

Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 6:04 am
by Earwicker_Archive
Absolutely great.

This fella Curtis has pretty much taken the Earwicker Oscar for best documentarian.
I like well made political/socially relevant documentaries but often they have a tendency to be a vehicle for the documentarians ego or to not actually tell me too much I don't already know - they might shed a little extra light in a dim room but I could still make my way round the room beforehand.
Curtis doesn't just shed a little light in the dim room he shows me there's a room next door I hadn't even noticed.

great stuff.

Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 6:11 am
by Adam CR
Started watching it, experienced despair, stopped watching it.

Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 7:52 am
by glueman_Archive
I just downloaded an ISO of Power of Nightmares from this site. Hopefully, I will be able to watch it sometime this week.

They also have Century of the Self for download in MPEG4 format......

Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 3:39 pm
by GypsumFantastic_Archive
Here's a torrent for another series he has done Pandora's Box (1992)

http://scifi.dead-donkey.com/viewtopic.php?t=1527





DivX, 640x480 46 mins x 6 episodes

Rebroadcast 2005 on UKTVHistory

01 The Engineer's Plot.

The revolutionaries who toppled the Tsar in 1917 thought science held the key to
their new world. In fact, it ended up creating a bewildering world for millions
of Soviet people. In this light-hearted investigation, one industrial planner
tells how she decided the people wanted platform shoes, only to discover that
they had gone out of fashion by the time that the factory to manufacture them
had been built.

02 To The Brink of Eternity.

Focusing on the men of the Cold War on whom 'Dr Strangelove' was based. These
were people who believed that the world could be controlled by the scientific
manipulation of fear - mathematical geniuses employed by the American Rand
Corporation. In the end, their visions were the stuff of science fiction
fantasy.

03 The League of Gentlemen.

Thirty years ago, a group of economists managed to convince British politicians
that they had foolproof technical means to make Britain great again. Pandora's
Box tells the saga of how their experiments have led the country deeper into
economic decline, and asks - is their game finally up?

04 Goodbye Mrs Ant.

A modern fable about science and society, focusing on our attitude to nature.
Should we let scientists be the prime movers of social or political change when,
for instance, DDT made post-war heroes of American scientists only to be put on
trial by other scientists in 1968? What kind of in-fighting goes on between
rival camps before one scientific truth emerges, and when it does emerge, just
how true is it?


05 Black Power.

A look at how former Ghanaian leader Kwame Nkrumah set Africa ablaze with his
vision of a new industrial and scientific age. At the heart of his dream was to
be the huge Volta dam, generating enough power to transform West Africa into an
advanced utopia. But as his grand experiment took shape, it brought with it
dangerous forces Nkrumah couldn't control, and he slowly watched his metropolis
of science sink into corruption and debt.

06 A is For Atom.

An insight into the rise and fall of nuclear power. In the 1950s scientists and
politicians thought they could create a different world with a limitless source
of nuclear energy. But things began to go wrong. Scientists in America and the
Soviet Union were duped into building dozens of potentially dangerous plants.
Then came the disasters of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl which changed views
on the safeness of this invisible fuel.

Clips from The Trap here - http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctwo/noise/?id=trap

Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 4:20 pm
by Earwicker_Archive
here is first one of the trap - not watched it all the way through on here yet but it looks promising.

http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?doc ... dam+curtis

Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 10:19 am
by Cranius_Archive
Rick Reuben wrote:Letting people also know that The War Game ( not Adam Curtis ) is up on Google Video:
the war game
Here is the complete, uncut print of the Peter Watkins masterpiece, The War Game (1965). This BBC production about a hypothetical nuclear attack on Britain was deemed so disturbingly realistic that they banned it from broadcast. It was released theatrically in the US, and went on to win an Oscar.


Thanks, I've seen this movie, but I'd love to see it again. It includes that great line stating that the sound of the bomb is like 'a steel door closing in hell'. There is a Punishment Park thread if anyone cares to search. I've still to see Peter Watkin's Edvard Munch film, which they have at my video shop on VHS.

Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2007 9:29 am
by Earwicker_Archive
Rick Reuben wrote:Letting people also know that The War Game ( not Adam Curtis ) is up on Google Video:
the war game


Cheers for that i'd been wanting to see it for a quite a while.

I personally think Threads is a much more effective way of scaring the living Jesus out of yourself regarding the subject but I can appreciate how influential The War Game was.

Also noticed Punishment Park was watchable in full from the same page which is annoying cause i spent 20 quid on it a few months back.

never mind.

Documentary: The Power of Nightmares

Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2007 6:15 pm
by chairman_hall_Archive
On a similar theme.

When The Wind Blows:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdguWMF1abU