Films that demonstrate how governments or quasigovernmental groups have violated or promoted the values in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
SOUTHLAND TALES BRINGS ORWELL’S 1984 UP TO DATE Two atomic bombs hit Texas in 2004. America is transformed. More civil liberties are lost by a renewed Patriot Act that is specifically credited to the Republicans. By 2008, Democrats and others opposed to the new order, in which surveillance is combined with vigilant snipers on duty […]
IRAN’S PAINFUL HISTORY THROUGH THE EARS & EYES OF A TEENAGER IN PERSEPOLIS Persepolis is a coming-of-age biopic based on a four-volume graphic book (subtitled The Story of a Childhood) that is portrayed on the screen through animation. Based on the life of Marjane Satrapi, who writes the book and directs the animation, the story
REDACTED PROVIDES A HAND-HELD VIEW OF BLOGGERS & RAPISTS On July 7, 2006, two American soldiers raped Abeer Qasim Hamza al-Janabi, a fourteen-year-old girl in Samarra, and killed the rest of her family in cold blood. An Army report of the incident is largely redacted to hide the identity of the soldiers, their victims, and
STRANGE CULTURE DEMONSTRATES THE CANCER OF THE “WAR ON TERROR” Americans, who feed on genetically modified organisms (GMO), are undergoing a massive human experiment in which Europe, Japan, and other countries are interested but skeptical spectators. Without knowing what is happening to their food, Americans are unwittingly becoming sick while corporations patent the GMOs and
RENDITION DRAMATIZES HOW THE UNITED STATES HAS USED TERRORISM TO FIGHT TERRORISM On September 26, 2002, Maher Arar, a Syrian-born Canadian engineer was changing planes at JFK airport in New York when he was seized by American officials because his name was incorrectly on a list of suspected terrorists. After being detained for days of
TRADE EXPOSES HOW HUMAN TRAFFICKERS BRING SEX SLAVES TO THE UNITED STATES Titles at the end of Trade state that one million persons are transported from one country to another for sale and that at least 20,000 slaves enter the United States each year. Directed by Marco Kreuzpainter, Trade focuses on sex slaves, who account
THE HUNTING PARTY LOCATES THE WORLD’S MOST WANTED MAN–A SERBIAN WAR CRIMINAL From 1985, when the Dayton Peace Accords ended the Bosnian War, Radovan Karadžić (aka the Fox), Bosnian Serb leader, has had a $5 million bounty on his head for war crimes (ethnic cleansing, rape, body mutilation, etc.) yet remains at large despite the
IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH PORTRAYS AMERICA MEETING A WATERLOO In the Valley of Elah, directed by Paul Haggis, is a combination of Oliver Stone’s Platoon (1986) and Born on the Fourth of July (1989) but focuses on the Iraq War. One day, Hank Deerfield (played by Tommy Lee Jones) receives a telephone call from
In the Valley of Elah Read More »
SEPTEMBER DAWN INDICTS MORMONS, INCLUDING BRIGHAM YOUNG, FOR A MASSACRE ON 9/11 In 1844, Joseph Smith, Jr., was assassinated in Illinois. Two years later, Brigham Young led many of Smith’s followers on a trek that ended up in barren Utah, then a part of México. After the Mexican War, in 1850, Utah was recognized as
PIERREPONT PROVES THATEXECUTIONS DESTROY THE EXECUTIONER Pierrepoint, directed by Adrian Shergold, is a biopic of England’s most famous and most prolific executioner, Albert Pierrepoint (played by Timothy Spall). From 1933 to 1955, according to titles at the end of the film, he performed 608 hangings, some of which are portrayed on the screen. Hanging was