|
Narrated by Sean Penn and based on the work of media critic and best-
selling author Norman Solomon, who traveled with Penn to Baghdad just
before the war to call attention to the dangers of a U.S. invasion,
WAR MADE EASY reaches into the Orwellian memory hole to expose 50
years of government spin and media collusion that has dragged our
country into one war after another from Vietnam to Iraq. With
remarkable archival footage of official distortion and exaggeration
from LBJ to George W. Bush, the documentary exposes how presidential
administrations of both parties have relied on a combination of
deception and media complicity to sell one war after another to the
American people.
Giving special attention to parallels between Vietnam and Iraq, WAR
MADE EASY sets government spin and media collusion from the present
alongside virtually identical patterns from the past, guided by
Solomon s meticulous research and tough-minded analysis. Rare footage
of political leaders and journalists from the past includes
Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon, Defense Secretary Robert
McNamara and news correspondents Walter Cronkite and Morley Safer.
According to Solomon, whose work has been praised by The Los Angeles
Times as brutally persuasive, the positive attention the film has
received may indicate a new willingness to counter years of pro-war
media spin and government deception. These deep patterns of ongoing
perception management must be demystified and decoded if we're going
to move beyond the horrors of perpetual war, he said. The way War
Made Easy is being embraced could be an important step in that
direction.
An Official Selection of 2007 s International Documentary Film
Festival in Amsterdam and the 2007 Montreal and Vancouver
International Film Festivals, WAR MADE EASY, directed by Loretta
Alper and Jeremy Earp, is an invaluable introduction to war
propaganda and public relations that transcends partisan politics,
and raises serious questions about the role of journalism and
political communication in our society.
|
DVDs