Watchmen: An excellent film that shows the need for indvidual citizens to do the right things to help others when the cops/government cant do things(I think its particularly amusing that the Comidian, the one character who is a true sociopath, is the one who becomes a government agent), and shows a capatalist/industralist as the one who saves mankind from being blow to hell by their governments(well Washington and the Soviet Union). and if I may say so its by far one the best adaptiations of a comic book to film I have ever seen.
Firefly/Serenity-Firefly was a great show, it was a futeristic western, where humans have moved to different planets, and those on the fringe of the galaxy have become the equivelent of the wild west. The interesting thing is that the ‘central planets’(Where the almost authortian government is located) are generally portrayed as making life more difficult for those on the fringe.
And, as far as animated movies, I was seriously surprised at what this director has done. I thought animated movies were basically for kids. They are, except these two. Probably the only serious animations I’ve ever seen.
Texholnyze (basically every sort of socialist group against each other: the technocrats, the environmentalists, the mystics, the fascists, the utopian egalitarians, etc.)
Incidently, in the movie his actions are somewhat less fraudlent than in teh comic…I was under the impression that he actually WAS using his research on Dr. Manhattan to help humanity as well as for his plot to ‘save the world.’
Regardless, that’s one thing I always liked about Watchmen(even before it was made into a movie), it takes ‘shades of grey’ to a whole new level. Whether or not Veidt was ‘wrong’ or not is an open(and, I think unanswerable) question. Hell, the only character who clearly acted immorally was the Comidian(What with his raping the Silk Spector, and murdering god-knows how many people in cold blood).
Although this is something typical of Alan Moore: He almost never writes nice neat stories with clear-cut morality. Hell, he even made the Joker a sympathitic character in The Killing Joke(or at least tried to).
Actually thats only really true in America. Asian filmmakers in particular have long been writing and making ‘serious’ animiated films. Probably best known to Americans are Japanese ‘anime.’ But Korea and Indonisia also have their fair share of quality animated films that arent ment for children.
The ending implies that the truth about Veidt will come out and possibly undermine his ‘noble lie.’ Sally Jupiter as well ends up sleeping with the man who tried to rape her and having his child.
The Watchmen it seems to me shows how private use of violence to solve problems, for the good of society of course, is very problematic. Note how the US winning in Vietnam seems to create even more problems for the US. Veidt commits unspeakable crimes to get to paradise. Lawlessness to combat lawlessness is problematic morally and in practice.
A great scene in the movie is when The Comedian is questioned about what happened to the American dream, and he says ‘you’re looking at it.’
The show Heroes, which was obviously inspired by The Watchmen, has a similar theme. The Heroes in the first two seasons are running around trying to save the world. But they’re saving the world from the insane schemes to save the world put in motion by the previous generation of Heroes.
I actually prefer the end of the movie over the comics in Watchmen. Sometimes Alan Moore tries to hard be “alternative”, weird for the sake of weird, and ends being too nonsense like “let’s create a weird creature whose mission is to kill a lot of people sending mental shockwaves based on bleak comics about pirates!”. I was relieved they changed that on the movie adaptation, it made much more sense and didnt’ look retarded.
I found TNT’s miniseries The Company to portray a fairly libertarian view, although that may not have been the intent. The CIA is shown as completely incompetent. It seems like every time they get involved, they botch the situation completely. They had a mole very high up within the company for decades and failed for successfully root it out. And at the end, the great plan of the Soviets is an even bigger abject failure because the West became too rich to be taken down by the amount of money that the commies were playing with.
Dancer in the Dark (2000) (very emotional film by Lars von Trier, where he shows the dark side of police monopoly. Gold Palm in Cannes)
House of Sand and Fog (2003) (governmental mistakes and police power caused huge problems for few innocent people. Also very emotional)
Pink Floyd The Wall (1982) (famous musical movie. I’m very surprised, why it isn’t in your list. Shows the dark side of state school, which produces equal “bricks to the wall”. Anti-war, .anti-conformist, individualist)
La Vita e bella (1997) (anti-nazi dramatic comedy by and with Roberto Begnini. Grand Prix in Cannes)
Zivot je cudo (2004) (one more Kusturica’s anti-war)
Good Bye Lenin (2003) (not too pro-market, but shows huge difference between life in West and East Germany before collapse of the wall)
Das Leben der Anderen (2006) (about East Germany again. Anti-totalitarian pro-free-speech)
The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (2008) (sad-ending story about the son of nazi officer)
Die Welle (2008) (based on true story about experiment in American school. Strong anti-totalitarian)
The Believer (2001) (very close to American History X. About racism)
Dear Wendy (2005) (Lars von Trier shows again, how bad police can be)
4 luni, 3 saptamani si 2 zile (2007) (about one case of illegal abortion in Romania. Explains why it should be legal. Golden Palm in Cannes)
Johnny Mad Dog (2008) (strong anti-war)
Most of films are very emotional (with sad end). But, in my opinion, it will cause a lot of thinking.
Valkyrie (2008) - entertaining. Saw it awhile ago - forgot parts, but is a movie you can see again.
The Lives of Others (2006) - Great anti terror, pro civil liberties, explicit anti socialist comments.
The King of Hearts (1966) - Near the end, there is the “aha!” moment that is kind of cool. Bit of ‘love’ thrown in there. Enjoyable movie. Fairly hard to explain though - its kind of slow to get into (so if fast paced action is your thing, this probably isn’t your type of film), but is ok once it does. Quirky kind of comedy. Not worthy of “must see” though.
The International (2009) - some real good quality dialogue when it comes to explaining the banking system / nature of it. Conspiracy element - bankers, governments indicted etc. Deserves to be in the must see conspiracy section.
Changeling (2008) - saw it awhile ago. Better than I expected. Anti-corruption. Also explicit conspiracy element on behalf of police, politicians. Deserves to be in must see.
Logan’s Run (1976) - good concepts, but didn’t hold my attention for too long though. The Island would probably be better replacement.
Keep the suggestions coming… apologies that they’re all over the place. I can’t edit the first post, so the “finalized” list can’t be put up for easy access.
I must strongly advocate FightClub. First of all, it’s an amazingly well-done movie, and its entertaining to see each time. But more importantly it uses the only approach possible these days to speak of anarchy: anarcho-primalism. If most people will take it only in this form, so be it. The fact remains that, despite blatant anti-consumerism, blaming all on money and so on, Fight Club is by far the closes thing I’ve seen on screen to an actual advocacy of the abolition of the State. V for Vendetta (the movie, of course) is nothing in comparison.
