Videoactive: 8pm - Surplus/Embedded: Weapons of Mass Deception

dublin | arts and media | event notice Friday October 22, 2004 16:39 by k

Closing screening.

Embedded: Weapons of Mass Deception (100 Mins)
There were two wars going on in Iraq - one was fought with armies of soldiers, bombs and a fearsome military force. The other was fought alongside it with cameras, satellites, armies of journalists and propaganda techniques. One war was rationalized as an effort to find and disarm WMDs - Weapons of Mass Destruction; the other was carried out by even more powerful WMDs, Weapons of Mass Deception. The TV networks in America considered their non-stop coverage their finest hour, pointing to the use of embedded journalists and new technologies that permitted viewers to see a war up close for the first time. But different countries saw different wars. Why? For those of us watching the coverage, war was more of a spectacle, an around the clock global media marathon, pitting media outlets against each other in ways that distorted truth and raised as many questions about the methods of TV news, as it did the armed intervention it was covering-and it some cases-promoting.WMD, a 100 minute non-fiction film, explores this story with the findings of a gutsy, media insider-turned-outsider, former network journalist, Danny Schechter, who is one of America's most prolific media critics. Schechter says he "self-embedded" himself in his living room to monitor media coverage, by fastidiously tracking the TV coverage on a daily basis.

Surplus: Terrorized into being Consumers (52 Mins)
Why is the lifestyle of consumerism a source of such rage today? How come the privilege of buying goods does not automatically lead to happiness? Why all this emptiness despite our wealth? Surplus approach is to portray this issue from an emotional rather than a factual perspective, shot in the US, India, China, Italy, Sweden, Hungary, Canada and Cuba during three years. It is the result of a complicated editing process by talented music composer/editor/percussionist Johan Söderberg. George W Bush's famous "shopping-speech" calling for a war against terrorism that deters the nation from the fear of consumption. Castro responding with hymns to the anti-consumerist, advertising-free island of Cuba. Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer preaching that the computer will give us peace on earth "bringing people together" while Adbuster Kalle Lasn warns that advertising pollutes us mentally, that over-consumption is unsustainable and that we are running out of oil. Surplus main man is John Zerzan, controversial philosopher whose call for PROPERTY DAMAGE has inspired many to take to the streets. "That is not violence. Sitting there doing dope and watching MTV . Then you go and get a job. Just schlep along. To me that is violence," says Zerzan. "We are terrorized into being consumers."

PDF of the Festival Programme:

http://www.indymedia.ie/attachments/oct2004/timetable.pdf

Posters and Flyers:

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