What's interesting to me is how much this, and the rest of his documentaries, focus on Marx's idea of "commodity fetishism." It seems that in the past decade, liberal documentary directors have attempted to make audience members aware of our ongoing fetish. Documentaries talking about Walmart, Nike, and other manufacturing corporations seem to almost GUILT viewers into admitting our lack of awareness about the production of the items we consume.
However, I have to wonder about the medium of this consumer guilt-trip. Television, film-industry (even in the realm of documentaries) are items of mass consumption. The biased views and interviews (notice that Michael Moore's experts consist of exclusively Democratic representatives) and camera editing (with its lighting darkening the shadows of corporate america, yet the light on the low-class truck driver's face is light and innocent) seem to align directly with the ways Marx believed the bourgeoise would utilize media to brainwash our society. You call it awareness, I call it propaganda set in by a hegemonic-class (film industry, hollywood... I'd call that bourgeoise).
While I certainly believe it's a good thing to be aware of where I food, clothes, and cars come from (and the people who produce them), I think perhaps the film industry should start with connecting themselves with the under-represented people making the MOVIE ("these camera men don't speak english...") and then move on to matters at hand. It just goes to show that just because one person is a revolutionary, doesn't mean that they don't represent a dominant ideology (right Karl?).
On a last note: I did like this documentary, and it is enlightening to the attitudes of some citizens of our capitalist society. I recommend it.
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