{"id":44005,"date":"2020-01-01T06:34:30","date_gmt":"2019-12-31T20:34:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/billmitchell.org\/blog\/?p=44005"},"modified":"2020-01-01T06:34:30","modified_gmt":"2019-12-31T20:34:30","slug":"two-films-to-watch-which-wont-make-you-happy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/billmitchell.org\/blog\/?p=44005","title":{"rendered":"Two films to watch which won’t make you happy …"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\tBest wishes to all for 2020. It is a public holiday today in Australia and I have to catch a plane to travel North. And it is Wednesday anyway and I am training myself off writing blog posts for that day. Earlier this week, I saw the Ken Loach’s latest movie – Sorry We Missed You<\/a> – which I can attest is a very harrowing experience of life in Britain under neoliberalism. I was going to say under the Tories, but then life under the previous Labour government was also made harder for those in the regional areas, particularly as fiscal rectitude became the norm. You will find the movie hard going that is for sure. I also saw the newly released movie – Where’s My Roy Cohn<\/a> – which is also a rather difficult movie to watch, given the way it resonates with the way the modern political classes behave in most nations.
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Sorry We Missed You<\/h2>\n

I read a review of it in the UK Guardian (May 16, 2019) – Sorry We Missed You review – Ken Loach’s superb swipe at zero-hours Britain<\/a> – which gave it five stars.<\/p>\n

In general, the review was okay until it decided to pull the Remain card out of the pack and try to suggest that the movie was foreshadowing the grim future that the Leavers will have forced onto Britain as a result of their foolishness.<\/p>\n

The reviewer wrote:<\/p>\n

\nYet my emotions were clouded by my feelings about a certain toxic political issue … <\/p>\n

Many people will see this film as a portrayal of real issues facing people – not silly old Brexit, which only worries people in the London bubble. Does the director himself feel like this? I don’t know. But I can only say that the European Union is the modern-day nursery of employment rights, and outside it is where working people will find more cynicism, more cruelty, more exploitation, more economic isolation and more poverty. This brilliant film will focus minds.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ken Loach, himself is pro-EU with misgivings and acknowledges that it is a “neo-liberal project … It’s a drive towards privatisation and a drive towards de-regulation. The safeguards that are there for workers and for the environment are constantly under attack so it’s not doing us any favours at the moment” (Source<\/a> – May 13, 2016).<\/p>\n

But I found the Reviewer’s claims about the movie and Brexit as being rather odd.<\/p>\n

Here we are watching a movie about Britain descending into a cruel, anti-worker, anti-poor state, over many years, during which it has been a fully-paid up member of the EU.<\/p>\n

And, yet, the reviewer can claim that the “is the modern-day nursery of employment rights” and Brexit will expose British workers to all sorts of cruelty and exploitation.<\/p>\n

The contradiction seems to escape the reviewer.<\/p>\n

If the EU has been the protector of employment rights, then Ken Loach would not have had any material upon which to make a film like ‘Sorry We Missed You’.<\/p>\n

The sorry tale captures life in the UK as a member of the EU.<\/p>\n

Further, just think of what Emmanuel Macron is trying to do in France as an expression of how the EU is the “nursery of employment rights”.<\/p>\n

The Morning Star article (December 27, 2019) – French strikes enter 23rd day, beating 1995 record<\/a> – report a very harmonious state in France, not!<\/p>\n

Workers from all over France are striking in protest of Macron’s comprehensive attacks on their pension right, which is supported by Medef (business lobby) and the big insurance companies, who want to screw even more income out of the system at the workers’ expense.<\/p>\n

Macron has been trying to divide and conquer the solid worker response – typical neoliberal strategy.<\/p>\n

Where’s My Roy Cohn<\/h2>\n

I also took the chance to see the newly released (for Australia) movie – Where’s My Roy Cohn<\/a> – which traced the career of the lawyer who helped Joe McCarthy and later Donald Trump.<\/p>\n

It is about the way in which class and politics in America mixes and the corruption that is endemic at the highest levels of American society.<\/p>\n

Roy Cohn’s approach – never admit you are wrong, never apologise, and win at all costs – describes the way the current polities operate. They have refined his mantra.<\/p>\n

Call for financial assistance to make the MMT University project a reality<\/h2>\n

If I am to get the – MMTed Project<\/a> (aka MMT University) – up and going to provide formal courses to students in all nations to advance their understanding of Modern Monetary Theory then I need financial assistance.<\/p>\n

We have established the – Foundation for Monetary Studies Inc.<\/a> – aka The MMT Foundation to serves as a legal vehicle to raise funds and provide financial resources for the MMTed Project.<\/p>\n

The Foundation is a non-profit corporation registered in the State of Delaware as a Section 501(c)(3) company. Its legal structure allows people can make donations without their identity being revealed publicly.<\/p>\n

Some sponsors have already offered their generous assistance.<\/p>\n

We need significantly more funds to get the operations off the ground.<\/p>\n

Please help if you can.<\/p>\n

We cannot make the MMTed project viable without funding support.<\/p>\n

Music for today …<\/h2>\n

Here is some lovely music from one of my favourite post-minimalist composers Max Richter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It is off the re-released album (May 2018)- The Blue Notebooks<\/a> – which was originally released on February 26, 2004 on Fat Cat Records.<\/p>\n

It was originally recorded as a protest by Max Richter to the Iraq invasion in 2003.<\/p>\n

This track On the Nature of Daylight<\/em> was re-recorded for the new release, with different musicians. The new album is called The Blue Notebooks – 15 Years Edition<\/em>.<\/p>\n

It still resonates after first hearing it in 2004.<\/p>\n