Imagine our world in the not-too-distant future? In parts of the northern hemisphere, the temperature plummets to -90 F. At 130 below, public transportation fails. Those caught outside freeze to death. Buildings collapse under the weight of snow and ice. The power goes out, society collapses, and anarchy takes its place. Could this be a vision of our future?
The iconography of climate disaster has now acquired an almost religious inflexibility. Just as the image of the Crucifixion is inseparable from Christian devotions, the contemplation of planetary ruin is invariably attended by a set of familiar visual clichés. You’ll get glaciers slumping into the sea, polar bears looking glum, chimney stacks belching smoke, and a passenger
Amazing that a nearly hour-long film about a Beatle that contains almost no music could still be worthwhile, but that’s the case with John & Yoko’s Year of Peace. The year in question is 1969, when the newly married couple staged the notorious “bed-in” at a Toronto hotel to promote their somewhat naive but sincere campaign for world peace; they then moved on
The winner of the 2001 International Emmy award for Best Documentary, Welcome to North Korea is a grotesquely surreal look at the all-too-real conditions in modern-day North Korea. Dutch filmmaker Peter Tetteroo and his associate Raymond Feddema spent a week in and around the North Korean capital of Pyongyang — ample time to represent the starvation and
Who is this famous boxer who one the title in the WBC, WBA and IBF? Mike Tyson was once the most famous and successful boxer in the world. Mike was the youngest man ever to win a world heavyweight title at just 20 years old. But his life was not always easy. Mike Tyson – Beyond the Glory shows the becoming of the fighting machine Mike Tyson until the downfall of his
Following in the deeply idiosyncratic footsteps of Last Days, About a Son plays more like autobiography than documentary. Gus Van Sant’s feature extrapolates moments from the life of Kurt Cobain (with Michael Pitt as a musician named Blake), while A.J. Schnack’s non-fiction film adheres closer to the facts, but advances a more radical Koyaanisqatsi-like approach.
Before there was Osama bin Laden there was Ayatollah Khomeini, a radical Muslim leader who challenged the world’s “infidels” in the name of Allah. After his father was killed by bandits, the young Khomeini was brought up by his mother and aunt. However, when he was only fifteen he suffered further loss as his aunt died and then shortly afterwards his mother
The very notion is deliciously ghoulish: What happens to earth if–or when–people suddenly vanished? The History Channel presents a dramatic, fascinating what-if scenario, part science fiction and part true natural science. “Welcome to Earth, Population: 0″ is the catchy tagline, Life After People’s 94 minutes are so gripping you nearly forget while you watch
Mobster Frank Santos Cotroni was known in mob circles as “Le Gros,” French for the Big Guy, and “Il Cice,” Italian for the tender, life-giving core at the centre of a hard nut. The youngest of six Cotroni children, the Montreal-born mobster was certainly a hard nut. He served more than half his adult life in prison, some of it for ordering five underworld killings of mob
