exttraspecial

I knew he got into trouble for exposing the Pentagon Papers. This was a huge deal and brouhaha in the 1970's. What I didn't know was he was a Republican, he worked for the Rand Corporation, a think tank that did secret government work, like how to avoid nuclear annihilation. A Phd from Harvard, he thought the only way to know what is going on in the Vietnam war was to put on an army uniform and hit the ground. That took brass aggots. Upon his return and with the help of his wife-to-be, he changed from a hawk to a dove, which eventually led him to leak the Pentagon Papers, which led to the Nixon administration trying to discredit Elsberg, which led to the Watergate Burglary, which lead to Nixon's resignation. The rest is history. For additional context, watch Citizenfour (2014) about Edward Snowden's leak about mass surveillance by the US government. There's some uncanny parallels to both of these events in American history.

There's very few actors that have enunciation like Edward G. Robinson. He's Bugs Ahern who shuns the life of a Chicago gangster to become a member of high society in Calfiornia. He uses his powerful oratory to make mincemeat of the English language, all while enduring many faux pas and self inflicted embarassments. Mary Astor, a matinee idol of the 30's, plays a down and out society women and is the perfect foil to Robinson's Bugs Ahern. I'm not going to discuss the plot, except to say there is involvement with monkey suits, polo and what else? Scoundrels. This film is from the golden age of Hollywood, when actors like Bogart, Becall, Cagney and others helped to lift the country out of the Great Depression.

Tagline: A fish out of water.

This socially conscious film tells a disturbing story about a poor nation, Jamaica, but I get a feeling that it could be about any so called third world country that is duped to make a deal with the devil. The devil being wealthy and powerful nations (eq. The USA) who are in cahoots with the IMF. That human beings can be so destructive to one and other is shocking. It is difficult to reconcile the level of corruption in the name of foreign aid that has gone wildly off the rails. That the film is a documentary makes it all the more devastating.

There's a lot to process here and viewers should draw their own conclusions. But this is a serious film that will get under your skin and it will haunt you for a long, long time to come.