The editing of this film is quite original but I find it mostly annoying and the film fails as a whole. The film seems to try to mimic and/or appropriate the structure and techniques of consumer culture through repetitions and associations. Sound bytes and short sequences are repeated over and over again and much like a pop song played on the radio all the time, they begin to feel familiar and get stuck in your head. The sound and video tracks are sometimes obviously manipulated as for example when we hear George W. Bush speak to footage of one of Fidel Castro's speeches. You have the same effect in commercials where a shiny new car is shown moving on a country road but instead of engine noise the sound track plays music. I think I understand why the film is edited that way but still I found it mostly annoying, perhaps because these manipulations are so obvious and unsubtle.
I did not expect this film to present a viable alternative to consumerism, but I feel disappointed nonetheless. What I expected was to be shown the incongruities and absurdities of consumerism. The hard part of every critique of consumerism is that up to a point consuming is a good thing because we all need to fulfill our basic needs. That is why the alternatives juxtaposed with consumerism in the film, namely Cuban socialism and primitivism not only fail to convince but even undermine the film's credibility. Unfortunately, this movie does very little to show that consumerism and economic growth are not always good but come with a high cost in negative effects for individuals, society and environment. This film offers only glimpses of the by now conventional imagery for such negative effects for example with footage of congested freeways or huge garbage dumps.
What I missed most are some suggestions of viable alternatives to a consumerist lifestyle. We all have to consume but the point is to find a good balance between the material and the spiritual. There are some hints at this in the film but they are quite easy to miss. I would have loved to see people who forgo consumerism by building things themselves, by consuming less than they could (by free choice not a lack of supply as in Cuba), by trying alternative modes of working, consuming and living and by spending their resources on non-consumerist goods such as learning and teaching skills, sharing experiences with others and developing meaningful relationships. I have a hunch that the secret of consumerism's success is to a good part its ability to translate our social and spiritual needs into material ones and I would have loved to see some exploration into that direction.
I did not expect this film to present a viable alternative to consumerism, but I feel disappointed nonetheless. What I expected was to be shown the incongruities and absurdities of consumerism. The hard part of every critique of consumerism is that up to a point consuming is a good thing because we all need to fulfill our basic needs. That is why the alternatives juxtaposed with consumerism in the film, namely Cuban socialism and primitivism not only fail to convince but even undermine the film's credibility. Unfortunately, this movie does very little to show that consumerism and economic growth are not always good but come with a high cost in negative effects for individuals, society and environment. This film offers only glimpses of the by now conventional imagery for such negative effects for example with footage of congested freeways or huge garbage dumps.
What I missed most are some suggestions of viable alternatives to a consumerist lifestyle. We all have to consume but the point is to find a good balance between the material and the spiritual. There are some hints at this in the film but they are quite easy to miss. I would have loved to see people who forgo consumerism by building things themselves, by consuming less than they could (by free choice not a lack of supply as in Cuba), by trying alternative modes of working, consuming and living and by spending their resources on non-consumerist goods such as learning and teaching skills, sharing experiences with others and developing meaningful relationships. I have a hunch that the secret of consumerism's success is to a good part its ability to translate our social and spiritual needs into material ones and I would have loved to see some exploration into that direction.