Way of Life: Rare Footage of the Hiroshima Aftermath, 1946

in Film, History, Life, Video - Politics/Society | May 3rd, 2011

The recent 9.0‑magnitude Tōhoku earth­quake and tsuna­mi, and sub­se­quent Fukushi­ma nuclear acci­dents were among the most dev­as­tat­ing envi­ron­men­tal dis­as­ters in record­ed his­to­ry. The imme­di­ate con­se­quences are fright­en­ing, but their full, long-term impact remains an unset­tling mys­tery.

This, of course, isn’t the first time Japan has faced a nuclear emer­gency. After the World War II atom­ic bomb­ings of Hiroshi­ma and Nagasa­ki, the U.S. gov­ern­ment record­ed the raw after­math of Hiroshi­ma in can­did, grim detail (while Hol­ly­wood was busy lam­poon­ing Amer­i­ca’s nuclear obses­sion). Filmed in the spring of 1946 by the Depart­ment of Defense, Way of Life doc­u­ments how the peo­ple of Hiroshi­ma adapt­ed to life after the atom­ic bomb. Though the archival footage lacks sound, its imagery — mov­ing, heart­break­ing, deeply human — speaks vol­umes about the del­i­cate dual­i­ty of despair and resilience.

Maria Popo­va is the founder and edi­tor in chief of Brain Pick­ings, a curat­ed inven­to­ry of cross-dis­ci­pli­nary inter­est­ing­ness. She writes for Wired UK, The Atlantic and Desig­nOb­serv­er, and spends a great deal of time on Twit­ter.

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Phoenix Still Rising: Egypt After The Revolution

in Current Affairs, Film, Politics, Video - Politics/Society | May 3rd, 2011

Much has been said, tweet­ed and writ­ten about the 2011 Egypt­ian Rev­o­lu­tion, glo­ri­fy­ing it as one of the most land­mark tri­umphs of free­dom in recent his­to­ry. Yet the West­ern media has deliv­ered sur­pris­ing­ly lit­tle on its after­math, leav­ing the lived post-rev­o­lu­tion real­i­ty of the Egypt­ian peo­ple a near-mys­tery.

This beau­ti­ful short film by British film stu­dio Scat­tered Images offers a rare glimpse of a phoenix still strug­gling to rise from the ash­es of oppres­sion. With incred­i­ble visu­al elo­quence, the film peels away at the now-worn media iconog­ra­phy of the rev­o­lu­tion itself, reveal­ing how life after it has actu­al­ly changed — or has­n’t — as Egypt remains a nation in tran­si­tion, with a future yet to be decid­ed.

Polit­i­cal­ly, there is a vac­u­um. The rev­o­lu­tion demand­ed a gov­ern­ment account­able to the peo­ple and ruled by trans­par­ent insti­tu­tions. But now, the only ruler is uncer­tain­ty.

Maria Popo­va is the founder and edi­tor in chief of Brain Pick­ings, a curat­ed inven­to­ry of cross-dis­ci­pli­nary inter­est­ing­ness. She writes for Wired UK, The Atlantic and Desig­nOb­serv­er, and spends a great deal of time on Twit­ter.

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Oil’d, by Chris Harmon

in Current Affairs, Video - Politics/Society | May 2nd, 2011

We’re often obsessed with oil. A year ago, the issue was off­shore drilling. The Deep­wa­ter Hori­zon rig had explod­ed, and crude oil was spilling into the Gulf of Mex­i­co at a rate of 53,000 bar­rels a day. We all watched help­less­ly as BP threw every­thing but the kitchen sink at the prob­lem. (Remem­ber the golf balls?) Three months passed and 4.9 mil­lion bar­rels ripped into the ecosys­tem before the well was final­ly capped. Time to talk about it? Hard­ly. Now the dis­cus­sion has moved on to sky­rock­et­ing oil prices and the issues sur­round­ing them, like the caus­es (con­flict in the Mid­dle East, ris­ing con­sump­tion in Chi­na and India, com­mod­i­ty spec­u­la­tion at home…) and the polit­i­cal impli­ca­tions for the 2012 U.S. pres­i­den­tial elec­tion if gas prices stay high. Weighty issues, to be sure. But before we allow the Deep­wa­ter Hori­zon oil spill of 2010 to fade into our col­lec­tive amne­sia, Chris Har­mon, a Brook­lyn-based design­er, ani­ma­tor and writer, has cre­at­ed a work of ani­mat­ed typog­ra­phy to put some of the stag­ger­ing facts into per­spec­tive.

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Sartre, Heidegger, Nietzsche: Documentary Presents Three Philosophers in Three Hours

in Philosophy, Video - Politics/Society | April 26th, 2011

“Human, All Too Human” is a three-hour BBC series from 1999, about the lives and work of Friedrich Niet­zsche, Mar­tin Hei­deg­ger, and Jean-Paul Sartre. The film­mak­ers focus heav­i­ly on pol­i­tics and his­tor­i­cal con­text — the Hei­deg­ger hour, for exam­ple, focus­es almost exclu­sive­ly on his trou­bling rela­tion­ship with Nazism.

The most engag­ing chap­ter is “Jean-Paul Sartre: The Road to Free­dom,” in part because the film­mak­ers had so much archival footage and inter­view mate­r­i­al (Check out a still love­ly Simone de Bou­voir at minute 9:00, gig­gling that Sartre was the ugli­est, dirt­i­est, most unshaven stu­dent at the Sor­bonne).

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Wal­ter Kaufmann’s Lec­tures on Niet­zsche, Kierkegaard and Sartre (1960)

Down­load Free Cours­es from Famous Philoso­phers: From Bertrand Rus­sell to Michel Fou­cault

Down­load 90 Free Phi­los­o­phy Cours­es and Start Liv­ing the Exam­ined Life

Sheer­ly Avni is a San Fran­cis­co-based arts and cul­ture writer. Her work has appeared in Salon, LA Week­ly, Moth­er Jones, and many oth­er pub­li­ca­tions. You can fol­low her on twit­ter at @sheerly

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Kevin Spacey & Alec Baldwin Go to Bat for the Arts

in Art, Current Affairs, Video - Politics/Society | April 22nd, 2011

Both Alec Bald­win and Kevin Spacey are long­time advo­cates for gov­ern­ment fund­ing of  the Arts. If you missed their tes­ti­mo­ny before the House Appro­pri­a­tions Subcom­mi­tee on the Inte­ri­or ear­li­er this month, you aren’t alone. They were kicked off the sched­ule because of prepa­ra­tions for a con­gres­sion­al shut­down. These speech­es were deliv­ered not to the sub­com­mit­tee but to a crowd of advo­cates and fans.

Both are well worth watch­ing. Spacey, who is also the artis­tic direc­tor of Lon­don’s Old Vic The­atre, has long been one of the most respect­ed and artic­u­late actors in Hol­ly­wood. (See his inspir­ing pep talk to a young actor on Inside the Actor’s Stu­dio here.) He packs more wis­dom in these 12 and a half min­utes than some per­form­ers do in a life­time.

As for Alec Bald­win, his speech is short­er, but equal­ly com­pelling. If you’re in a rush, head straight to minute  4:00, which begins with this teas­er: “I come from a busi­ness where we all know a great secret …”

Sheer­ly Avni is a San Fran­cis­co-based arts and cul­ture writer. Her work has appeared in Salon, LA Week­ly, Moth­er Jones, and many oth­er pub­li­ca­tions. You can fol­low her on twit­ter at @sheerly.

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The Bay of Pigs: 50 Years Later

in History, Video - Politics/Society | April 18th, 2011

50 years ago (April 17, 1961), the CIA launched one of its famous­ly botched oper­a­tions. On that day, 1,500 CIA-trained Cuban exiles stormed the beach­es of south­ern Cuba, begin­ning an inva­sion meant to top­ple Fidel Cas­tro and his Sovi­et-aligned gov­ern­ment.

The plan called for airstrikes to soft­en up Cas­tro’s defens­es, then for troops to land on the beach­es along the Bahía de cochi­nos. But things went quick­ly awry. Ships got stuck in shal­low Cuban waters. Bombers missed tar­gets. Fur­ther airstrikes were called off. And ground forces were even­tu­al­ly left with­out sup­port — as good as dead in the water.

The bun­gled affair, a sting­ing embar­rass­ment for the young Kennedy admin­is­tra­tion, gets revis­it­ed in a new book by Jim Rasen­berg­er, The Bril­liant Dis­as­ter: JFK, Cas­tro, and Amer­i­ca’s Doomed Inva­sion of Cuba’s Bay of Pigs. The video above suc­cinct­ly recaps the events at the Bay of Pigs with the help of his­tor­i­cal footage and inter­views with his­tor­i­cal actors…

via NPR

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American Philosophy on Film: Pragmatism, Richard Rorty and More

in Philosophy, Video - Politics/Society | April 15th, 2011

In his online bio, Penn State lec­tur­er Phillip McReynolds con­fess­es his “unhealthy fas­ci­na­tion with movies.”  McReynolds chan­nels that obses­sion to healthy effect in his doc­u­men­tary “Amer­i­can Philoso­pher.” The film — which is real­ly a series of 8 shorts — fea­tures inter­views with Richard Rorty, Hilary Put­nam, Joseph Mar­go­lis, Crispin Sartwell, Richard Bern­stein, and many oth­er promi­nent philoso­phers. The con­ver­sa­tion gen­er­al­ly turns around prag­ma­tism, the nation­al char­ac­ter, and the cen­tral ques­tion: Is there such a thing as a native Amer­i­can Phi­los­o­phy?

Our favorite sec­tion is prob­a­bly Part 6, “Progress:” It fea­tures a live­ly 2002 debate between Rorty and Put­nam which (the film argues) was large­ly respon­si­ble for the revival of prag­ma­tism as a viable school of thought.

(Not sur­pris­ing­ly, Mr. McReynolds did his dis­ser­ta­tion on John Dewey.)

Sheer­ly Avni is a San Fran­cis­co-based arts and cul­ture writer. Her work has appeared in Salon, LA Week­ly, Moth­er Jones, and many oth­er pub­li­ca­tions. You can fol­low her on twit­ter at @sheerly.

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Hofmann’s Potion: 2002 Documentary Revisits the History of LSD

in Film, History, Video - Politics/Society | April 11th, 2011

A few years ago, we post­ed this 1978 inter­view with Tim­o­thy Leary, in which the charis­mat­ic LSD cham­pi­on, pris­on­er, and future Ron Paul sup­port­er speaks pas­sion­ate­ly about the ben­e­fits of tak­ing acid. But for a more bal­anced per­spec­tive on the con­tro­ver­sial drug, we rec­om­mend the 2002 film Hof­man­n’s Potion, by Cana­di­an film­mak­er Con­nie Lit­tle­feld.

Lit­tle­field struc­tures her nar­ra­tive chrono­log­i­cal­ly, begin­ning with Swiss sci­en­tist Albert Hof­man­n’s first syn­the­sis of the com­pound in 1938, and its ear­ly exper­i­men­tal use in the treat­ment of schiz­o­phren­ics and alco­holics. She then traces LSD’s rise to promi­nence when it became the drug of choice dur­ing the 60’s coun­ter­cul­ture, fol­lowed by the drug’s ulti­mate vil­i­fi­ca­tion and crim­i­nal­iza­tion.

The 56-minute doc­u­men­tary fea­tures new and archival footage of dis­cus­sions with Hof­mann, Aldous Hux­ley, Stanislav Grof, Abram Hof­fer and oth­er ear­ly fig­ures in the drug’s brief but tur­bu­lent his­to­ry. The inter­view with Leary’s Har­vard col­league Richard Alpert — now known as Ram Dass — at minute 43:37 is par­tic­u­lar­ly inter­est­ing, as is the film’s ulti­mate con­clu­sion that the cor­rect realm for eval­u­at­ing the val­ue of LSD is nei­ther med­ical nor recre­ation­al, but spir­i­tu­al.

After watch­ing the Lit­tle­field doc­u­men­tary, take a look at this dis­turb­ing 10-minute dis­cus­sion of Project MKULTRA, a decades-long CIA pro­gram which exposed Amer­i­can cit­i­zens to LSD and oth­er drugs for study, often with­out their knowl­edge or per­mis­sion.

Also worth a read, a new book by Don Lat­tin called The Har­vard Psy­che­del­ic Club: How Tim­o­thy Leary, Ram Dass, Hus­ton Smith, and Andrew Weil Killed the Fifties and Ush­ered in a New Age for Amer­i­ca.

Sheer­ly Avni is a San Fran­cis­co-based arts and cul­ture writer. Her work has appeared in Salon, LA Week­ly, Moth­er Jones, and many oth­er pub­li­ca­tions. You can fol­low her on twit­ter at @sheerly.

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