No End in Sight
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Movie Reviews of No End in Sight
Movie Review: An Uber-Easy Documentary That Tries To Look At Multiple Viewpoints
Summary: 5 Stars
I've often complained about the one-sidedness of various documentaries. I appreciate the fact that they're trying to stress a point, but it's nice to see the other side so that the I can best judge for myself. Barring that, I at least want to see an attempt made at getting the other side; perhaps a journalist chasing after someone who doesn't want to talk about whatever subject is being focused upon.
Which brings me to NO END IN SIGHT. Anyone with any wits about them knows that we're involved in a war that is heading straight into the toilet. The U.S. has spent billions upon billions of dollars and lost thousands of armed forces personnel for a cause that is often quite unclear. Are we there for the U.S.'s best interests? For the oil? For the world? Muddied is an adequate descriptor.
What No End In Sight does is show us, precisely, how we got where we are today. And director Charles Ferguson pulls out all the stops, trying, succeeding, and sometimes failing to get the higher-ups of the higher-ups on video, explaining what went wrong. No one is left out. Whether its archived footage or direct interviews, Ferguson puts it in perfect perspective for all viewers.
From inappropriate foreign relations assignments by the Bush Administration (they often sent over field personnel who had no foreign relations experience and didn't even speak Arabic), to failing to listen to commanders on the ground, the entire restructuring of Iraq was doomed from the start. Completely disbanding the Baathists and the Iraqi army not only caused an extremely dangerous increase in unemployment, it also aided those with no love for the U.S. in the first place to embrace fundamentalism (see Roadside Bomb-Making 101).
It is to Mr. Ferguson's credit that he tried to get politicos like Condoleeza Rice, Colin Powell, George Tenet, Donald Rumsfeld, and Dick Cheney to agree to interviews. When they refused, he put up on-screen the words "{This person} refused to be interviewed for the film." I like that. I like it a lot. It shows that the director wasn't afraid to get the other side of the story, that he tried. And when he failed, he wanted the audience to know it. It is also very telling that these highest of higher-ups didn't want to answer some very tough questions surrounding their involvement in the early Iraq War.
What makes this documentary so great, though, is that it's laid out in uber-easy points, following one problem until it intertwined with another, then another, then another, showing that not only is this "war" a terrible injustice to the people of Iraq, but to the U.S. as well since it's our tax dollars that are funding such incompetence.
Movie Review: Monumental Fraud
Summary: 5 Stars
Excellent documentary on the perversion this Administration has foisted on the American public under the guise of the "Iraq War."
The creators bypass the element of the lie that led us into this deception, but take up with the way this action has been carried out. There was no planning, no preparation, no concern for consequences. Advice was not sought and was not accepted. Unqualified cronies and loyalists were selected over experts to fill positions and determine policies. The Iraqis were not brought in as partners, but were subjugated to our command.
What I found exceptional about this film was how it imparted to the viewer the experience of the Iraqi people. You share their somewhat qualified sense of hopefulness as the invading army rolls in. Perhaps it will lead to something better. We promised "democracy" and all the benefits that would come with it. We were there as "liberators." So they waited. But what followed was rampant looting and lawlessness. Shops, museums, schools, factories, hospitals all stripped not only of equipment and supplies, but down to the wiring and rebar. The army, which was mandatory and a source of employment for Iraqi males, was disbanded (but left armed). Bremer imposed "de-Bathification" which prohibited those in the Bath Party from normal employment. (Membership in the Bath Party had been a requirement for employment under Saddam, and was not necessarily indicative of loyalty.) Government food rations were cut off. So there was massive unemployment, no income to buy food, no hospitals, no schools, limited safe water, lack of electricity, etc. The "liberators" turned a deaf ear to the Iraqi people. So the liberators became unwelcome occupiers, and disgruntled citizens became insurgents. The troops the citizens had once welcomed, were now the same troops breaking down their doors at night and carting off their husbands, sons, and fathers. The viewer internalizes all this from the Iraqis perspective and is left with a sense of anger.
These events unfold as interviews are conducted with government and military officials. It becomes clear that the Administration was repeatedly advised of the circumstances that were developing, but the warnings were ignored. Those who complained were removed from their positions. Those here at home made light of the situation. The public was reassured that all was going well. The interviews reveal the discrepancies, as officials disclose the information they conveyed and the indifference they were met with.
For anyone who still feels there is any reason to defend this Administration for its policy in Iraq, insist they see this documentary.
Movie Review: "What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless......"-Gandhi
Summary: 5 Stars
"What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?" - Gandhi
This is a valuable and informative documentary; the experts interviewed are not individuals brimming with arrogance and ignorance, but mostly decent American citizens who had faith in their government and did what a loyal citizen would do!
I remember, when Baghdad was "freed", watching an Iraqi old man on CNN hitting Saddam's picture with his shoe then holding the picture and crying. It's not an easy thing to understand; the anguish of Iraqi people, who were oppressed by the Iraqi regimen then freed, only to discover, that it's not about their freedom. When you watch this documentary you will understand why American soldiers were welcome by the Iraqi people but were confronted later by their anger. You will also understand the emotional suffering of our American soldiers who found out that they as well as the Iraqi people are being played.
Watch and learn, as our American boys and girls learned after starting the war that there is a bigger nastier game at play. Listen to Paul Hughes, David Yancey, Ann Gildroy, Seth Moulton, and Paul Pillar among others and find out how experts like General Jay Garner and Ambassador Barbara Bodine were pulled out of Iraq when they started figuring out the truth just to be replaced by inexperienced people.
Learn how Bremer's disbanding of Iraq's military entities affected the situation in Iraq; Why Bremer didn't consult the American military commanders in Iraq before making decisions? Why people like Bremer, Cheney and Rumsfeld declined interviews? How great minds like Sergio Vieira de Mello were lost? How Muqtada alsadr along with other parasites found a stage for their craziness in Iraq? Why precious libraries and museums have been destroyed while the oil ministry has been fully protected? Why was it ok for Saddam to oppress his people and use chemical weapons against them and against Iranian civilians? How come our government didn't intervene then? Do the math and figure out why the average hard working American person is struggling to live when tremendous amount of money has been spent on war.
So you said we have prevailed? Sure, Mr. President, you are officially a new Pyrrhus!
Movie Review: The banality of evil
Summary: 5 Stars
Watching this DVD doesn't replace reading a good history of events such as FIASCO (Thomas E. Ricks). But its visuals reinforce a lesson.
This is the banality of evil.
In American discourse, "Nazis" and "Fascism" are ex nihilo, emerging, as maggots were said in the Middle Ages to emerge from meat, from nothing: in American discourse, Nazis appear as they do in Indiana Jones, suddenly and unannounced, Nazi Space Monsters from the Planet Bnarg.
Which of course makes it bad behavior and farting during the sermon to use "fascism" in reference to people or institutions in American life, despite Adorno's and Arendt's desire to participate in a real "never again" project (unlinked at the time to the survival of an apartheid state whose name I'd rather not mention)...in which the preconditions for some sort of fascism (fascism having strong national variations) in smirks, winks, sighs and idiotic grins.
Such as Walt Slocombe's idiotic smirks when he confirms through his pathetic attempts to lie on this DVD. Slocombe was more concerned about having a cozy deal in the Green Zone than the fact that Arthur Bremer (the clown in the Brooks Brothers suit and Timberlands boots) "de-Baathified" Iraq through an idiot mass layoff.
With his stupid post-Iraq beard, Slocombe is in fact the face of world-historical evil: its origin: the belief, in fact, that events make no sense, cannot be known, and that our at best partial control of events, by exposing our inadequacies, means that there's no point in even trying a more complex plan, which would keep the Iraqi army and police force together.
Slocombe is the man in the glass booth and an Eichmann. Bremer's policy was of course no mass liquidation of Jews. But if it had been, Slocombe would have gone along to get along.
One's shame for one's country increases when this DVD shows the United Nations' Sergio de Meilho bravely setting up HQ in an unprotected area only to be ignored by Arthur Bremer...and martyred in a truck bomb explosion not even noticed by most fat Americans as they sit gaping in front of their made-in-China HDTV sets.
There is no end in sight. Hilary is going to get elected and then she will become a monster, an Imelda Marcos, Indira Ghandi or Lady Macbeth. She will be compelled by the tragic equations of American politics to hang "tough" in a country where voters are little more than "gang leaders of the self", people without hope, without love, and filled with fear, raging against the dying of the light.
Movie Review: "Nero's fire against Christians", brilliantly biased yourself...
Summary: 5 Stars
I personally think that this movie is something that every man, woman, and child of the world should watch because it provides insightful perspective on what went on during the early years. Granted it's not a complete perspective but considering that Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld all declined their time and chance to defend themselves, I dont' see how that one reviewer's rant is relative at all.
I agree that this movie might lean towards being one-sided but I think the main point was to give a voice to those who were being ignored by the incompetant administration. The point of the movie was to show that in the early days of the war, the chance of stabalizing the region and creating an autonomous democratic government was undeniably possible. The blunders of the administration created the hell that it was in 2004-2006. Now, whether or not you agree with the war or not shouldn't prevent you from watching and gaining whatever insight you may, and will be able to take from this movie.
This movie is neither one produced by "ideologues" nor is it propaganda... I'm sorry sir, but ideology tends to deal with religious persuasion not an objective documentary like this one. If you found this movie to be pro Christianity or bias towards Islam in any way then you are a sensitive prick who is part of the problem. If anything, you are sounding very much like a Neo-Con citing the recent downsizing in violence as a victory for Bush.
The filmmakers gave a voice to everyone that wanted one, nothing more. It shows what was possible in Iraq and what actually happened and if you can't appreciate that then I will have to say that I'm at a loss for words.
If there was one thing that the movie cleared up for me completely, it was the body dragging done by the Iraqis to the Americans. When I glanced at that scene on the news one day it made me very angry because I could not understand why they hated Americans so much that they'd do that to some random Americans in the region. However, after seeing that home video of the American contractors shooting at people all over the streets for no reason killing dozens, it's obvious why they hate Americans...
Not that I condone such hateful behavior but the problem in the middle east is immensely complicated and will have impacts for decades to come. I think it's every persons' responsibility to try and fully comprehend the situation and the people involved. This movie is a very good start.