I don’t know about you guys, but i’m getting a little tired of all of the political documentaries coming out as of late. I’ve mentioned before, it seems the majority of these films are only carried by their topics, offering no real story, characters or resolutions. I won’t even get into the lack of style. To be fair, there have been some good ones, but i’m just getting sick of it. On that note, here’s another one for you! HBO Films brings us ‘Hacking Democracy’. Here’s a quick synopsis from the HBO Documentary website:
“This cautionary documentary exposes the vulnerability of computers – which count approximately 80% of America’s votes in county, state and federal elections – suggesting that if our votes aren’t safe, then our democracy isn’t safe either.”
Thrilling. Unless these voting computers become self-aware and threaten to launch a worldwide nuclear assault, i’m not interested. Maybe i’m being a little ignorant here, but I just can’t say that i’m THAT interested in this story. I’ve been burned one too many times watching politically driven films with no real story or inspiration. Sometimes it seems like some of these filmmakers are so deseperate to make a documentary that they don’t even consider whether or not there’s a story there or if an audience will even care. I hope someone will prove me wrong on this one. For those of you who ARE interested in Hacking Democracy, you’re in luck because Google video has posted the film in it’s entirety. Now why don’t you go check it out and come back and let me know how it ends. Did the super-intelligent race of vote-counting computers eventually blow up the entire world? Or did our hero manage to shut them down in time? I MUST KNOW!
Related Link: Google Video: Hacking Democracy
Go out and buy WarGames man.
I can’t say I disagree. This is just a trend in documentaries, started by an oscar to Michael Moore, just like Gladiator started the trend of all the swords’n'sandal-movies we got. SO OLD. I actually let out a “Hah” out loud when I read your reaction. Pretty classic. I’m afraid I’m not going to watch this and tell you how it ends though… They should release quality documentaries on google video, so that I would be able to see American Movie for example.
i was reading the about section and Jay, what exactly does a video game cinematographer do? I’m curious.
Hmmm, well there’s different areas of it, but for me specifically, I do the cameras that follow the player during game play. So in a third person game, the camera that captures the player running through the levels. Some games use a set camera that automatically follows the player, but in our game it’s a more cinematic experience so the cameras are manually placed. Hope that sort of answers your question.
ya cool, whats the video game?
It’s called Too Human.
Jay,
I have to disagree with you on this one. This is extremely important to our democracy. This documentary is very amateur, not the most professional documentary put together. But the information that they provide is disturbing to say the least. A private company that sells their product to election boards across the country is fine, but when they back a party with over 20 million dollars that becomes unsettling. Not to mention due to the fact they are a private company it becomes extremely difficult to obtain the records. Those are voting records that need to be in the public domain not behind corporate lawyers with money to burn.
I suggest you at least watch a clip that shows you how important this documentary is. These machines may not push the button that blows up the world, but it may lead to the idiot that does.
I won’t argue the importance of the subject matter, I just think sometimes certain stories might fall into ‘Dateline NBC’ territory.
I agree with you on that. It is such a sad state that our media does not provide the in depth reporting that this story needed. That is why you see more and more of these documentaries. Our media is joke.
Jay,
Some statements are so idiotic that they cannot be addressed. Such was yours.
This is the most critical piece of documentary expose I have seen; it absolutely impacts all of America—your work, your family, YOUR existence, YOUR country being led by a person that corporate America actually, literally elected to the White house.
The “illusion” of democracy that we have allowed to cloud our vision and our judgment is unmistakable.
And now 2008 elections loom. Will we allow our elections to be stolen yet again?
If people listen to you, we will.
God help America.
Hey BarbaraKeep,
Thanks for commenting!
First of, you said:
“…it absolutely impacts all of America—your work, your family, YOUR existence, YOUR country being led by a person that corporate America actually, literally elected to the White house.”
I’m Canadian.
Second, you make it seem as though the only way to stop the 2008 elections from being ‘stolen again’ is to see ‘Hacking Democracy’, which is simply ridiculous. Are you trying to say the information given in this film is exclusive to this documentary? I can’t find out about this stuff anywhere else? I’m sorry Barbara, but passing on this HBO doc will not jeopardize democracy. If so, then the box office numbers for non-fiction films have doomed us all.
All I’m saying in my post is that I look for many things in a documentary, and some of these politically driven message films seem to think they can ignore the craft of filmmaking and storytelling because of their heavy subject matter. Sorry…if I’m watching a film, a message alone is’nt enough for me.
Just because I don’t want to watch a film about this topic doesn’t mean I don’t think it’s important. If I truly want to learn about this subject, I’ll read about it in my choice of mainstream or alternative news papers/sites.