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Orwell Rolls in His Grave

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The chilling documentary film "Orwell Rolls in His Grave" examines the relationship between the media, corporate America, and government. In a country where the "top 1% control 90% of the wealth", the film argues that the media system is nothing but a "subsidiary of corporate America." It's a stunning fact that the media received 1 billion dollars in campaign ads for the last election. Large corporations own the television networks, and the sheer number of stations/channels available gives the public the "illusion of choice." Yes, there are tons of channels to chose from, but this "ostensible diversity conceals an actual uniformity."

"Orwell Rolls in his Grave" gives the big picture of the media system in America and asks why some important stories are not covered by the mainstream news and remain invisible. Other stories appear and sink rapidly--while some stories are repeated over and over. Using references to George Orwell's masterpiece "1984" the filmmakers establish the idea that "1984" isn't just fiction any more. The premise of Orwell's novel is that language is redesigned and history rewritten to control people's thoughts. According to the filmmakers, the American media system at best--filters the news to the populace, and at worst--is the mouthpiece of its corporate and political masters.

This information packed film examines the ties between media, corporations and the government using facts and figures--as well as a number of news stories. The film focuses on media coverage of the 2000 election, and the juicy detail of the purging of Florida voter rolls. According to the filmmakers, when journalist Greg Palast broke the story for the BBC, major American networks declined to explore the story further as Jeb Bush, Governor of Florida, and naturally the focal point of any investigation into Florida voting, debunked the story. The filmmakers point out the outrageousness of the squashing of a story simply because the person being investigated says it's not true. This section of the film also gives details regarding the Supreme Court Justices who voted to terminate the Florida recount. It's interesting to see who voted against the recount, and that two children of these justices then got positions in the Bush administration. Is a quid pro quo system at work behind the scenes--are deals made, jobs given, contracts awarded to 'friends' of the administration? Well watch the film and decide for yourself.

The film includes interviews with a number of experts on media--including Charles Lewis, the director of the Centre for Public Integrity. Lewis has an engaging candor that is refreshing and genuine. Michael Moore appears in a few brief clips from a speech he gave, and there's also some clips from George Bush. Witty and entertaining Vermont congressman, Bernie Sanders weighs in, and there are also interviews with Danny Schecter, director of "Weapons of Mass Deception", and legal expert Vincent Bugliosi. The film winds up with information on the FCC (Michael Powell, son of Colin Powell is head of the FCC), lobbyists, corporate watchdogs and regulators. For a behind-the-scenes look at the structure of the American media system, I recommend "Orwell Rolls in His Grave." The information here is at once enlightening, chilling and downright depressing--displacedhuman

I'll make this short and sweet. I used to work in spin. I did advance, which is creating media events for politicians. In other words, for a time I was one of those people that manipulated public thought by the way in which we delivered information.

I'll let others speak to the eerie connections to Orwell's foresight. I'll let others write about how effectively the film makers make the case.

That which is represented in this piece is true. The observations are astute. The prognosis is grim.

I wholeheartedly recommend this film to anyone who clings to the belief in the ideas of the founding fathers. Buy it. Watch it. Watch it again. Share it with friends.

"They could be made to accept the most flagrant violations of reality...and were not sufficiently interested in public events to notice what was happening."

This quote from Orwell's "1984" is used in the opening sequence of this film, and sums up America's media structure frighteningly well. Media shapes and alters human consciousness, collectively, it shapes and effects the collective reality.
This film serves as a WARNING: the U.S. media is an ANTI-democratic force, a weapon of "doublespeak,", a subsidiary of corporate America which shapes and determines the legality, constitutionality, and 'facts' of democratically newsworthy events and issues from official, inside sources, instead of(and quite OPPOSED TO, in fact) true journalism, or even any vague sense of it. Specific, essential words/language are not used, not permitted, within our media, in order to reduce cognition. In America, truth is staged and 'managed' to that extent, the pattern with which stories and events are covered, dropped, spun or omitted, is strategically deceptive.

When you consider just how many people either don't understand that, or flat out don't care, or actually believe that we have a free, 'liberal' media....the mind boggles, yet you can't help but marvel at it's efficacy.

As Mark Crispin Miller makes the illustration with a quote from Nazi Joseph Goebbels: "What you want in a media system is ostensible diversity that conceals an actual uniformity."

This doc, previously only available at Buzzflash, examines the consolidation of media(which=consolidation of voice=consolidation of 'one truth')and why certain stories are obviously NOT covered in our "free" press: the illegal behind the scenes actions of, and overall unconstitutionality of, the 2000 (S)election, Bush's SEC violations of insider trading, the WMD's: WEAPONS OF MASS DECEPTION used by our media to get a supposedly democratic nation behind a totalitarian invasion/occupation, the Telecommunications Act, and even delves into the Reagan/Bush years, examining October Surprise(watch "Cover Up: Iran/Contra") their 'Orwellian' use of the term, "de-regulation," again, anti-democratic policies, and the killing of the Fairness Doctrine, which meant that media outlets no longer had to air opposing viewpoints.
This results in less knowledge, less facts, one widely accepted (un)reality, and reveals how the fascist right wing has been on the march for decades, infiltrating *every* aspect of the corporate culture. It's overt and underlying effects of how it's dumbed down collective reality and worked to induce frighteningly large percentages of our populace into chauvinsitic, hate-filled 'super patriotism,' greed, apathy, unconscionability, often through brainwashed fervor and manipulated ignorance(dumb as a stump & fightin' mad to prove it!)can be seen literally everywhere these days.

Imagine 1% of the population effectively conning and convincing the other 99% to support their wants and desires, and those wants and desires are grounded in greed, debasement and mass murder: the media, once a means of keeping power in check, is now the very tool to con and convince the 99% that greed, debasement and mass murder aren't 'really' bad, for such values are generally promoted and exhaulted within the corporate culture...and likewise(to further confuse and control)to convince the 99% that the obvious greed, debasement and mass murder *aren't really so.* This form of indoctrination has gone a long way in creating this widely adhered to perception of a 'reality' which simply doesn not exist: it's a euphemistic unreality.
Naturally, when you try to show evidence of this to people, there is a strong reluctance, a deep seated inability to be capable of understanding it, because the unreality has been accepted by so many, for so long.
Go back to the quote from Orwell: "They could be made to accept the most flagrant violations of reality."

Accept Flagrant VIOLATIONS of REALITY.

If you care about and lament the death of democracy ~ and you either care or you don't ~ and are troubled over what terminal, pitch-black ending this could lead us to, please watch this obelisk of a documentary. The presentation is dead on, the sources reliable and seasoned. Those interviewed are plain speaking communicators who resist the 'kids gloves' approach/denial to the fascist, perilous dilemma which menaces our fragile democracy, and inevitably, civilization, and the fate of our species.
Also watch "Manufacturing Consent," "The Corporation," "The World According To Bush," and "Control Room," (about Al Jazeera's television news coverage of the Iraq invasion)and lastly, I'd recommended the brilliant and overlooked Tim Robbins mockumentary, "Bob Roberts," which chronicles the rise of a fascist, right wing, messianic senator.

This film is unbelievably good. I DVR'd it on Free Speech TV, and I have watched parts of it again and again.

At every turn you will be blown away by the revelations in this film, if you, like me, had never thought much about who controls mainstream media. The first time I watched it I kept having to stop the tape and just cringe, letting the import of the facts sink in.

The talking heads are people you may never have encountered, but whom you are unlikely to forget. Write their names down. Check into their books. Even if you don't buy the film look at the list of people in it and get their books.

Particularly incisive are the inquiries into the most recent Presidential elections. You were there, I was there, but Lewis shows us the ugly underside that the media can't afford to let us see. This is scary, take-to-the-streets stuff.

Finally, Pappas deserves to be more well-known as a documentarian. If you are put off by Michael Moore's whininess and slightly embarassing approach, you may find a new friend in Robert Kane Pappas.

This is a powerful and convincing documentary that claims the media is not reporting the news so much as it is reporting what media moguls say is the news. Pappas also draws a parallel between today and what happened in George Orwell's 1950 classic, "1984." Only this time it is conservative forces, not Stalinists, controlling the message. There are several examples to support the producer's assertion.



In the presidential race of 2000 Al Gore was a called a liar many times during the campaign for things he did not say, but were attributed to him. On the other hand, Mr. Bush lied several times, but was never challenged on some real whoppers. For example, Bush claimed that as Governor of Texas, the state now had the finest health care program in the country. (He left out that he vetoed the bill twice, and left it on his desk unsigned.)



The investigative journalist, Gregory Pallast found a list of ninety some thousand people who were listed as felons in Florida where it is illegal for them to vote. Only most of them were not felons, but were African American (who usually voted democrat.) Over 57,000 people were denied their constitutional right. Compared to white counties, the list was almost nill. Pallast, who is also an economist, claimed this would be a statistical impossibility. But then, Florida's secretary of state was Katherine Harris, who was also working for the Bush campaign. (Conflict of interest here?) Pallast offered the story to CBS who did not run it because, they said, they had checked with the governor's office and Katherine Harris, who claimed it wasn't true. A story of this magnitude got very little press--in the US.



There are perhaps five or six conglomerates that now control what Americans will see or hear as news compared to the hundreds of large and small news varieties that readers could choose from even twenty years ago. The message according to Pappas reflects the political views of the moguls, moguls such as Rupert Murdoch, right-wing advocate. This monopoly was allowed to occur when Ronald Reagan repealed several regulations that guaranteed "fair and balanced" (Whoops, sorry!). A price we are paying for more and more each day.



Pappas asserts that without a free press. or a press that is not allowed to pursue real news, Americans are losing more freedom on a daily basis and are under an illusion that they live in a democracy. Add to this average American disinterest in how their government operates and how the press manipulates them. As the Nazi propaganda minister, Joseph Goebels said, "Repeat a lie often enough, and people will take it as fact."



If you wish to delve deeper into these topics, I urge you to read, "Armed Madhouse..." and "The Best Democracy Money can Buy," "Lapdogs" by Boehlert, "Fraud... by Waldman, "Moyers on America" and Helen Thomas'latest book about the White House Press Corps.



This story presents facts. It is a good starting point for anyone developing an interest in our press and its politics. Anyone who may claim that this work is bogus, has to be in denial. And there's plenty of that going around these days.



This story is so bad, it's double good. Get it? Get it!

As per the title, the movie highlights/compares the warnings found in Orwell's dystopian book 1984 with what is presently occurring in the United States and probably elsewhere.

Basically the premise is that a few large private corporations are forming a global monopoly to control all forms of media communication: the internet, television, newspapers, radio stations, magazines, advertising....and when this wealthy uber minority finally controls all global communication, they can then completely control people's opinions and ultimately the government by controlling access to information and media exposure. They will control people's opinion by selectively feeding the people only "fair and balanced" information that the people "can trust". The ideas presented in the film are nothing new to educated free thinking people, but these ideas may help others who are blind to this developing/worsening threat.

Speakers in the film also remind us that so far the internet temporarily remains the last relatively unconstrained media outlet for the small journalist only because it so new and the uber meister's well paid minions haven't figured out how to completely control it yet. The producer/speakers hope that the "vegged out masses" will stand up and argue/fight for a change to a true pluralistic democracy- and not just for the choice of republican or democrat. Mentioned are good examples of Nazi propaganda ideology, the manipulation methods the media uses for information control, political control, and techniques of "spin" illustrated with recent political events.

On a similar note, a good current example of this media bias/blackout (unfortunately this example is not in the film) is the so called "energy crisis" that has been popular off and on in the U.S. news for decades. Many people in different countries have witnessed and reported on permanent magnet/ pulsed electromagnet based electrical generators (the so called "overunity or free energy" machines), but this critical information- the inexpensive, pollution-free solution to the energy crisis- has not (and probably will not) be allowed by the uber meisters to be discussed in national U.S. news media like Fox or CNN news.

This documentary makes you question what is the true extent of how we are being psychologically manipulated and herded by the interests of private corporations? It also clearly points out why a mainstream, open public access media system is so critical in a real democracy- otherwise we will all soon live in societies completely controlled by faceless global corporations and corrupt politicians that are only interested in the power and comfort of the very,very few.

I gave this documentary 5 stars because its educational mission was well done- entertaining and informative- similar to the documentary "The Corporation".

Oingo boingo said it awhile back-"wake up-its 1984".

If like me, you saw the film in a theater last year and weren't sure you wanted to buy the DVD outright, don't think twice. It's a `must have'! Amazon doesn't list it, but there's 75 MINUTES OF OUTTAKE INTERVIEWS (!), all of which are as compelling as those that are shown in the film. There's even some stuff that the filmmakers tacked on about the 2004 election results that detail the contradictory nature of the exit polls and the conflict of interest (if you are a person who believes in democracy) regarding the voting machines. It's no accident that in the past couple of years, there's been a deluge of documentaries regarding the corruption of our government at every level. If the media really was fair and balanced and practiced real journalism, films like this wouldn't have to be made. Some may scream `liberal bias', but one would really have to be in a major state of denial to not question why the media doesn't investigate itself in regards to any of the issues brought up in this film. What are they afraid of? This film supplies you with ample evidence that will explain why the media will never dig beneath its own very superficial surface. I'd say that this film, "The Corporation", "Mark Crispin Miller's 'A Patriot Act'", and "Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear & The Selling of American Empire", are extremely vital films to be passed around to everyone you know. Think of Winston Smith, scribbling away in a corner. Keep that flow of information alive!

Finally! A real, hard documentary that asks the hard questions. This is exactly what I want to watch on tv, yet never get. When I want to watch news, I want hard news, not softboiled, mindless so called "infotainment." I want something that engages my mind instead of abusing it, something that gets to the real issues.

"Orwell Rolls In His Grave" is a superb though slightly low budget documentary that explores in depth the relationship between our wretched media and our increasingly wretched "democracy." More than ever before, our country is becoming a shallow, manipulative oligarchy where the ultra greedy squeeze not only money out of the poor, but also steal their access to intelligent programming and truly informative information. It also exposes the operations of Diebold and others in the very questionable election process along with the media's weak reaction to this controversy. Another key element is the examination of Bush's FCC, Michael Powell and the myth of deregulation. I would almost label this as essential viewing to anyone that still believes, deep in their heart, about American democracy.

The reviews here are all GREAT! I cannot say anything better than other reviews about this MUST OWN DVD. I agree that this DVD should be distributed to EVERY single American household. Our Nation is being sold down the river and this DVD is proof. All facts presented are indisputable and iron clad.

Its too late to save this great Nation and this DVD is proof of that. The American People are too conditioned to believe whatever party they follow. Neocons (Bush Republicans) and True Republicans (Reagan Republicans) are programmed to believe that whatever bad thing is said about their leaders is a Liberal Bias Lie. A Democrat or Liberal is programmed to believe that whatever bad thing is said about their leaders is a Right Wing Conspiracy. Both sides miss the point completely because it is all about Corporations control over the media and influence. Who can own the biggest most broad based corporation. AOL-Internet. Time Magazine. Warner Brothers. AOL Time Warner. A company that has a stake in movies, music, magazines, and the Internet. Thats just the most basic example. (Ever wonder why there are SO MANY commercials on TV?) I dont have enough room here to get into other HUGE media outlets, but you get the point. This DVD goes into that aspect and presents it in every detail.

Until a few days ago I used to think people who thought the Government was *Out to get them* were a couple cans short of a six pack. But now...I don't know. In light of our present Government...who just happen to be Republicans...a coincidence...I'm sure. Nevermind that our Government is SPYING on everyday American Citizens. Bush got caught spying on everyday normal US Citizens. Wow. Now, I dont believe Bush is sitting there listening into conversations. No, he authorized the act. There's just too many questionable things that have happened on W's watch, since 2001.

Here are some quotes that can refer to our current Governments policies, but are from Nazi leaders:

"If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it". Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels.

"Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of their leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the peacemakers for LACK of patriotism and exposing the Country to danger. IT WORKS THE SAME IN ANY COUNTRY". Herman Goering Nazi Marshall.

Hmm...Fox News has a morning show that has a live audience. Today Fox was asking their audience if it was OK that the Bush Regime was spying on them. The answer, was of course, predictable. A resounding yes. But what is really scary about that is these answers came from normal, every day, American Citizens. Nevermind politics. Nevermind Right or Left, these are American Citizens saying it's OK that the Government spies on them.

It's easy to say that these Americans are blinded by their beliefs. Its easy to say that the Sean Hannitys, Ann Coulters, and Bill O Reillys of the world keep these Americans in line. Keep them in line by spouting hate and anyone who disagrees with them is a card carrying Liberal. Keep em divided. Its easy to say that the Government keeps them in fear. Keeps them in line by thinking they are being protected when their basic rights are under attack. But to actually SEE these lost souls is another thing.

Indeed, it IS too late to save this Country. You can only hope to slow the inevitable. Pick up a copy of this DVD or rent it, but whatever you do...SEE THIS DOCUMENTARY. Not only is Orwell rolling in his grave but also our Founding Fathers. If I had the money I would buy a copy of this DVD for every single American Citizen and place it in their mail box.

As a high school English teacher, I frothed at the opportunity to use this film in a "banned books" unit. It had all the makings of a documentary that would objectively weigh the influence of politics, power, and commercialism on the media (specifically, the "news," A.K.A., the truth for sale). Yes, there were a few expletives that made the use of this piece a bit tricky, but beyond that, the political agenda that is inherent in the film was even harder to mitigate. As a teacher, I have to strike as politically-neutral a tone as possible. With the relentless anti-Bush tirades, disparaging remarks re: Reagan, etc., it was hard to mask the political agenda of this "documentary." Believe me, when it comes to personal politics, I side with Mr. Pappas much more often than not; however, I would file his work under the same sort of pseudo-documentary category as I would Michael Moore. Many parts / points are perfectly legitimate-- it is the packaging and presentation that is stilted. As a personally informative / entertaining piece, I would give it 5 stars, but as a work that is supposed to be objective, I have to give it less. I prefer the educational tools I bring into class to have a more subversive quality that gets students to question the status quo without being indoctrinating, per se.