An Unreasonable Man
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Movie Reviews of An Unreasonable Man
Movie Review: Nader is great
Summary: 5 Stars
I had seen this on public TV, and wanted a copy for my own. To me, Ralph Nader is a real hero, crucified by the money interests and corporations who cannot buy him.Movie Review: Awesome
Summary: 5 Stars
The film was very informative. This is a must see for any political enthusiast.Movie Review: A fair and balanced look at one of the most important figures of the day, and a frightening portrayal of US politics today
Summary: 4 Stars
In "An Unreasonable Man" directors Henriette Mantel and Steve Skrovan present a fair and balanced look at the legendary consumer advocate turned pariah. Most people today only know of Nader as the nutty independent candidate who may have cost Al Gore his election. But, as the movie makes clear, Nader has had an incredible legacy above and beyond this: Nader and his followers were responsible for seat belts, air bags, product (including cigarette, toys, etc) labeling, whistle-blower protection, occupational safety, bike helmets, and on and on and on.
Nader, the son of Arab immigrants, grew up in Winstead Connecticut, where he and his two sisters attended town hall meetings, and were grilled at the dinner table on community issues such as 'how can we solve that parking problem." Things really began in 1966, when Nader, an unknown public-interest lawyer, wrote a book "Unsafe at Any Speed" about the Corvair, a GM automobile, skewering its safety record. GM tried to squash him anyway it could, from sending private investigators to dig up dirt on him to sending babes after him in supermarkets to seduce him. All methods failed, a congressional investigation ensued, validating Nader. The modern consumer movement was born.
Since that time, it seems that Nader pretty much worked about 18 hours a day on the modern consumer movement (never having a family, or, it seems, any other interests). He and his associates, "Nader's Raiders" were rock-stars in the 60s and 70s, pushing congress and government official, establishing safety regulations, and muck-racking corporations.
Things started going down-hill in the 1980s, when the Reagan Administration started tearing government regulations, and kept doing down from there. The 1980s was also when Democrats decided to start accepting political contributions from corporations - following a time-honored practice of Republicans. From that point on, Nader strongly believed that the Democratic position became seriously compromised. After all, how can an elected government official work on consumer issues, and community affairs if his or her election depended on funding from corporations diametrically opposed to such initiatives?
Nader states that from 1984 to 2000 election he supported the Democrats, trying gamely to support the party he believed was still interested (although less and less so) in his issues. By 2000, he had had enough of "the folly of the least worst." Deciding that both parties were squarely in the hands of big business, he felt the only alternative to run for President on an independent ticket.
The movie rightfully spends a good deal of time analyzing the 2000 elections and its aftermath, giving air to both Nader supporters and detractors. Nader won around 96,000 votes, but there was only about 500 votes separating Bush and Gore, so one could argue that he 'gave' Bush the election, as his detractors state. However, one could also argue, as his supporters do, that the vote re-count should have continued, that the Democrats should have run on a stronger platform, that they should have (and should even now) get unregistered groups (such as African Americans) registered, as 90% of them would vote as democrats.
Rightly or wrongly, Nader was skewered after 2000 elections, and lost much of his supporters, including some of his closest associates (such as many of the Nader's Raiders). The former superstar had officially become a pariah - he was accused of egomania, blamed for the Iraq war, called expletives, and had pie thrown on his face.
However, Nader, as stubborn as ever, refuses to give up. Former associates fret about his legacy - but, Nader does not care. His concern is to make sure that justice is served, that people are safe, and corporations are put in their place. He will do whatever he can to make this happen - regardless of what others (including his closest associates), and history, may say about him.
I was a Nader supporter before this film, and became much more so after it. Yet, I worry about the future of America. Nader tellingly said around 1965 (during the Covair debacle) "I don't want to have a climate in the country where one has to have an ascetic existence and steely determination in order to speak truthfully, candidly and critically of American industry." Unfortunately, it seems America has become a place today where only ascetics and those with a steely determination are able to speak power to corporations - but we have reached a point where even these people don't seem to have any effect. They are ignored, labeled as 'the fringe' or as nuts. These people of integrity (Nader, Ron Paul, Dennis Kucinich) are systematically excluded from the electoral process, leaving us candidates who are willing to toe the corporate line - ie, who are approved of by the corporations.
Patrick Buchanan - the ultra-conservative republican who admits he worked in 1980s to tear down gains made by Nader and his colleagues- makes an incredible statement in this film: "Our Democracy is a Fraud. A Consumer Fraud."
Is he correct? If so, what are the ramifications of this? How can we possibly get our democracy back? One can only hope that things turn around, that Nader, and others who are willing to speak truth to power, will be vindicated in history. Perhaps one day, people following their ideals can even become President of the United States.
Movie Review: one of the best documentaries in years
Summary: 4 Stars
****1/2
If any single individual can be said to have influenced the outcome of an election, it would have to be Ralph Nader. And if any one person can be credited with saving thousands of lives through the actions he's performed and the stands he's taken, well that would be Ralph Nader too.
After decades as the world's premiere consumer advocate and all-around corporate gadfly, Nader should, in the sunset of his life, be basking in the glow of unalloyed adulation, a shiny symbol of hope and courage for the common man in this country. Instead, he finds himself a figure more reviled than revered by those who should love him most.
The documentary "An Unreasonable Man" attempts to explore the reason for this mystifying love/hate dichotomy. Filmmakers Henriette Mantel and Steve Skrovan trace the path of Nader's life beginning with his childhood in Connecticut, where he was raised by his socially-conscious parents to champion fairness and the cause of the little guy, to his eventual career as the populist activist par excellence, taking on corporate behemoths in the name of consumer safety. The movie chronicles the run-ins with GM that turned Nader into not only a household name but clearly "one of the most admired men in America." We see him inspiring a band of college students - who came to be known as "Nader's Raders" - who successfully took on any number of corporate giants throughout the 1960's and 1970's, resulting in many of the consumer protection laws we take so much for granted today. He was clearly a pioneer in his field, and the movie is an inspiring tribute to the selflessness, determination and courage that helped this one man make such a difference in the world (the movie reminds us that before Nader even seatbelts were not standard items in automobiles).
It's with the coming of the Reagan Revolution in the 1980's that Nader began to become severely disillusioned, as he watched the new conservative administration, hostile to the very principle of governmental protectionism, dismantle many of the programs Nader had dedicated his life to setting up. But his disillusionment did not extend merely to Republicans. For it was at this point that Nader began to claim that there wasn't a "dime's worth of difference" between the Republicans and Democrats, a realization that compelled him to finally run in 2000 as a Presidential candidate on the Green Party ticket. The rest, of course, is history, with many Democrats, some formerly close friends of Nader, choosing to blame their fallen idol for Gore's squeaker loss in Florida (and, consequently, the nation) on that fateful election night.
Although "An Unreasonable Man" presents Nader in a generally flattering light, it does not shy away from the very genuine anger Nader's actions have aroused in many of his former followers. Many blame him for ensuring Bush's victory and, thus by extension, for eight years of what they would describe as appalling Republican leadership. Others take a more philosophical view, worrying more about how all this might taint the very impressive legacy Nader built up over many decades of tireless social activism. In true maverick style, Nader pooh-poohs this concern, claiming that fighting for people is what he truly cares about, not how he will be viewed by future generations. The movie provides many opportunities for Nader's faithful supporters to have their say, as well, so we get a fascinating debate about whether ideological purity or steely-eyed pragmatism should be the key factor in determining one's vote in a presidential election. One of the most interestingly ironic moments in the film comes when we see Michael Moore, who is usually the one doing the sandbagging in his own films, being sandbagged himself as he is shown flip-flopping on his support for Nader between the 2000 election where he spoke at Nader rallies and the 2004 election where he pleads with Nader not to run.
Even people who are still embittered by Nader's role in the 2000 election may find themselves softening in their attitude towards him a bit after watching this film. The movie certainly reminds us of the great debt of gratitude we owe him as a nation, and, even when he is at his most obstinate in the political realm, we sense that he is being that way for ideologically honest reasons, not out of ego or malice. It's awfully hard not to find oneself cheering him on as he attempts to force his way into the audience for one of the 2000 presidential debates, after he and all the other independent candidates had been officially banned from the premises.
"An Unreasonable Man" provides a generous helping of archival footage to go along with the passionate interviews on both sides of the Nader spectrum (the movie does not, however, provide any real conservative voices, except for Patrick Buchanan, who, on many issues is actually more aligned with Nader's positions than opposed to them).
Love him or loathe him, this is a fantastically interesting and informative documentary about one of the most influential figures of the last hundred years.
Movie Review: Interesting portrait of a controversial icon
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a warts-and-all biography of Ralph Nader, a hero to many for his longtime consumer activism and battles with corporations and a pariah to some for his political campaigns. The film moves chronologically through his early life, his work on car and other product safety issues, the founding of Public Citizen, his involvement with the Carter Administration, his disillusionment with the major parties during the Reagan Years, and his stubborn and ultimately futile quests for the presidency.
I come away from the film with the view that Nader must be counted one of the most important and idealistic Americans in the history of our country, but at the same time a person who unfortunately did not understand, and still does not understand, the value of compromise. He is a bullheaded machine, consumed by his efforts on behalf of social justice to such an extent that he has virtually no personal life and almost completely disregards the personal consequences of these battles.
To accuse Nader of singlehandedly costing the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections for the Democratic candidates is far too simplistic. Both Gore and Kerry ran terrible campaigns. The blame, in the end, must be distributed much further: to the media, which treats elections as entertainment; to political parties, which tightly control who is allowed to speak and what they are permitted to say; and to the American people, who have proved themselves tragically uninformed and shortsighted as to the responsibilities of citizenship, the dangers of fiscal and military recklessness, and the lasting effects of poor electoral choices.
The clips of Nader's public life from the 1960s through the 2000s are well-chosen, as are the interview subjects: Nader himself, his closest associates, and his fiercest critics. All are allowed to speak freely about the man; the filmmakers evidence no overt bias toward or against him. Interviews could have been more tightly edited, however, so as to make a shorter, more effective production.
For political junkies, the bonus disc includes nearly two hours of additional interviews on the subjects of leadership, Nader's agenda, third parties, the Democrats, the Right, the Iraq War, and corporate power.
A fine documentary overall. Recommended.