Generation Zero

The best thing I can tell you about this flick is that watching it is a useful exercise, of a sort. It does one welcome thing, which is to exhort us to use our heads, and thereby do honor to a long line of head- using progenitors in western civ.

So: Watch the movie while keeping this in mind: The flick will from time to time try to throw in an inducement to indulge a knee-jerk emotional revulsion to some boogum or other; for example, the "hippies".

Hold back. Follow the better angels of your thoughtful, circumspect self and listen to the welter of "serious" thinkers as the presentation attempts to marshal them toward a larger view of the current "crisis". What I think you'll see (not feel) is that the attempt to deliver a broad, convincing, explanatory perspective falls flat. The individuals spliced into the presentation may each have something interesting to say, but the pageant of this documentary fails to knit them into something cogent and convincing.

There are so, so many ways to interpret economic reality which are much, much more compelling than this rather confused, disparate patchwork.

I watched this for one reason: Bannon (the writer/editor) is now (2017/02) on the NSC. He's the dog who caught the car. I wanted to see if perhaps this documentary would have embedded in it a hint or two as to anything Bannon may be able to claim in the way of praxis: In other words, one would wish that, once the dog catches the car, it turns out to be a magic car that breaks the spell and turns Bannon from a dog into a statesman with a clear, focused perspective; one which contextualizes economic reality in a practical way, suggesting a way forward into what he calls "economic nationalism".

This flick doesn't give me hope. For example, it will not surprise me if his response to the hard economic reality which promises only to continue to rob American futurity is to exercise heavy power. And that's just the old standby/more of the same: Keep us on the hamster wheel, and throw monetary tokens into the pit and torch them--just like in days gone by. He doesn't really have a truly republican vision.

This is a right wing attack ad disguised as a documentary.There are no real facts presented, just the normal right wing rants about how everyone who doesn't agree with their view point is ruining the country.Democrats = communists,all regulations are strangling the business world,social programs are bleeding us dry, etc. At least they could have tried to make this interesting but no the constant attacks on everyone but Wall Street and so self righteous that after less than a quarter of the documentary it starts to grate on your nerves. Hippies, Godlessness, 50's mothers (women), Community Reinvestment Act, ACORN, too much regulation caused the 2008 crash! REALLY?!! If you don't think but follow along and believe all the right wing crap this film will appeal to you, otherwise don't bother watching this.

I give this film three stars because that's about how many true statements it contains. But firstly, this director uses the same psychological machinations that the latest president's political consultants used to get him elected - cognitive dissonance (tension which comes from holding two conflicting or unconnected thoughts in the mind at the same time). The images on the screen hold very little or no reinforcement of what the narrator is saying, and usually distracts from the point. They do, however, reinforce multitudinous snide innuendos.

I could only absorb what was said by not watching the screen, but only listening. Listening was made difficult because the music (also distracting and irrelevant) was way too loud. In order to hear the narratives, you have to turn up the volume and put up with ear-splitting music apparently also designed to enhance the dissonance.

The "meat" of the film is that there are cycles in society which lead to war, peace, prosperity and change. Guess which one we're in. This doomsday presentation traces all the blame to a US generation that is easy to make fun of, with no tenable connection, for the debt and inflation explosion at the inevitable disaster. I've not read all the books by the scholars interviewed, but I'm familiar enough with the liberal organizations they associate themselves with. Economics is the result of more than just opinions, but productivity, creativity and policy. They correctly point out the flaws in the recent (post 2008) desperate machinations of the Fed and US Treasury, but offer no solutions, evasive actions we may take, or even useful warnings.

I found tongue-in-cheek humor in the images that flash continuously past the viewer. Some, like a flash of suckling piglets on a sow's abdomen or the many scenes of exploding buildings, appear so ridiculous in view of the narration that if you turned off the sound, this could be an entertaining film.

Expect to be alarmed, depressed and confused by this film, not enlightened or edified.

In light of the book just put out by a liberal New York Times writer who draws many of the same conclusions the movie does -- and traces the problems back to many of the same decisions made by those in government getting rich off crony capitalism and holes in the regulatory structure they themselves put in place, I'd say our Canadian friend who gave this a one star review might want to put on his thinking cap next time before opening his big sneering maw.

A very nice visual addendum to that book, Reckless Endangerement.

The fact is, we didn't just get where we are by accident; and though many don't want to hear it, actual decisions made by actual politicians trying to control a business sector whose job it is to make profit led directly to the current economic crisis. It's easy to promise people everything they want, to tell them they deserve it, and to run on a platform of "the other side wants to take it all away from you." But the truth is, money has to come from somewhere, and the government can't produce wealth. It can only collect it, spend it, and redistribute it after taking its cut. The sooner people understand economics, the faster we'll be able to fix what ails us.

Wow, i've never seen such a ridiculous piece of right-wing propaganda in my life. With a straight face, they actually try to make the case that the 2008 financial crash was the fault of...get this... 1960s hippies. Yes, you heard me correctly, it was The LIBRULS!!11!!!!!1 The crash didn't happen because of deregulation, corruption and financial deepening - no, it was because Americans lost their 'morals' and began consuming conspicuously. that's right. the consumer's fault. we did this. oh, and the democrats, of course.....and the Chinese for some reason.

This is a sad attempt to say that this wasn't capitalism's fault - that it was a perversion of capitalism with too much government intervention.