“Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat is a tremendous historical thesis into the early years of post-coloniality and the crunching, brutal machinery of Western imperialism. America’s puppeteering of foreign governments in the Global South during the Cold War warrants little elaboration, and what makes Johan Gimonprez’s effort a revelation is that it argues that American arts and…
Category: film
Michael A. Allen & Julie VanDusky-Allen: “The ‘Barbie’ and ‘Star Wars’ universes”
Both “Barbie” and “Andor” are useful for those who want to understand why revolutions happen and what it takes for them to happen. Their fundamental point: Before the start of any revolution, the oppressed have to first recognize their oppression.
Tyson Leuchter: “Les Aristocrates, Mangeurs de Peuple: On Zombies, Revolution, and Netflix’s La Révolution”
“La Révolution is a new original series from Netflix, released on 16 October 2020. The first season runs eight episodes. It purports to be an “alternative” telling of the French Revolution of 1789, though apart from the cold open, the vast majority of the action takes place in pre-revolutionary 1787.”
Assembling a revolutionary movement
My reflections on Robert Kramer’s movie Ice (1970) 10 June 2020
“‘Black Patriots’ Were Heroes Of The Revolution — But Not The History Books”
“A new documentary, Black Patriots: Heroes of the Revolution, introduces us to heroes of the American Revolution who aren’t typically found in history books. They are a writer, a double agent, a martyr and a soldier — and they are all black.”
Joseph Fronczak: “Melancholy and Mobilisation”
A review of Left-Wing Melancholia: Marxism, History, and Memory by Enzo Traverso
A.O. Scott: “Review: ‘Edge of Democracy’ Looks at Brazil with Outrage and Heartbreak”
‘One of the implications of “The Edge of Democracy” is that as Lula and the Workers’ Party lost touch with the mass movement that brought them to power and mastered the levers of the political system, they made themselves vulnerable to popular anger on the right. Corruption and back room dealing were longstanding norms of…
“Love and revolution” (2018): A film by Yannis Youlountas
A documentary film-testimony of struggles for autonomy in Greece, letting those who are directly engaged in these struggles speak for themselves.
“Night School on Anarres”
Night School on Anarres is an educational experiment examining the utopian proposals of twentieth-century anarchism, drawing from Ursula K Le Guin’s seminal sci-fi novel The Dispossessed. … Part sci-fi set, part classroom, part roundhouse theatre, the Night School on Anarres installation is a site where utopic ambitions can be collectively imagined, performed and discussed.”
“The care and feeding of radical men”
“By glossing over Karl Marx’s numerous personal misdeeds, Raoul Peck’s biopic ‘The Young Karl Marx’ fails to give his collaborators their due.”