Anybody can now make a movie.
But Hollywood will tell you you can't get anybody to SEE IT!
Ah, there's that old distribution lock. But now it's getting picked.
Digital camcorders are under $500. A Macintosh computer can be purchased for $2000. You can employ the included free software program iMovie, or you can spring for less than a grand and buy Final Cut Pro. Which was even used to edit "Cold Mountain".
And you can burn these movies to DVD. Place them on the Web.
And suddenly, people want to SEE THEM!
I used to be addicted to the movies. I believe I've literally been to every theatre in L.A. And I haven't seen a crowd in the daytime since the seventies, when pictures only opened in two theatres in town.
The fan of film today is not the same fan of yore. The business has been ceded to adolescents who are thrilled by special effects and grossology. But those people who used to go, like me, they've still got the hankering.
The major studios want NOTHING TO DO with these people. After all, they don't fit the PARADIGM! These teen pictures are sold on HYPE! Yup, you stir the pot into a FRENZY just before release, and everybody goes to see the flick on the very first weekend, before word of mouth lets everybody know the movie SUCKS! Whereas an oldster is interested in REVIEWS! Is this going to be a FULFILLING experience? Otherwise, they want nothing to do with the picture. So, the major studios want nothing to do with THEM! They're too smart for the game. The fact that they keep alive companies like BMW doesn't make any difference. A $60,000 automobile is not an impulse purchase. Nor is a home. The oldsters have one thing the adolescents DON'T, and that's MONEY! But to extract this money from this demo would be just too tough. So the movie studios blame the oldsters THEMSELVES! That they're too fickle, too picky, too hard to motivate. And they just go on making shitty pictures.
But what if someone were to MAKE a picture for these people. What would happen THEN?
Believe me, the people lining up to see "Fahrenheit 9/11" opening weekend were not adolescents. Hell, the film was rated "R". But you couldn't get in the theatre. $20 million was collected the first weekend, even though the film was playing in fewer than ONE THIRD of the theatres of a blockbuster like "Spider-Man".
Something is going on. The people are reclaiming the landscape. They're PISSED OFF!
Even if you're a Republican, even if you're against Michael Moore and for Fox News, you're not immune to society. Everybody can FEEL IT! People are paying ATTENTION!
I arrived at the Nuart and couldn't get to the box office, for all the people exiting from the 2:00 p.m. performance. There were HUNDREDS of people. To see a film that most people haven't even HEARD OF! There's no campaign inundating the target audience with spots on late night TV shows. No, you almost had to know about "The Corporation" by word of mouth. They say that there's no adult word of mouth? Well, there was nobody under 21 at the 5:15 show I attende d.
What is the goal of the corporation?
TO MAKE MONEY FOR ITS SHAREHOLDERS!
That's it folks. There's no social responsibility, no moral responsibility, no doing what's right, just doing what's EXPEDIENT!
For all those community benefit programs corporations employ to burnish their image their taxes have been lowered MANY TIMES OVER! Yes, forty years ago corporations paid taxes. Which helped pay for schools. Now schools have to have SPONSORSHIPS to make ends meet. You want a scoreboard? There's no money for that. You've got to make a deal with Coke or Pepsi. And then you can't say ANYTHING BAD about these companies you're in bed with. You say they're doing you a favor? They're fucking you where you can't see it.
But isn't the government supposed to be LOOKING OUT FOR US? The PEOPLE?
Just ask Tom DeLay.
Better yet, ask Dick Cheney. I'd tell you to ask George Bush, but really I don't think he knows much. He's just a puppet.
Is what's good for the oil companies REALLY good for America?
What about pollution? What about other environmental effects?
The Administration says there's just not enough science. Just like big tobacco said smoking doesn't cause cancer. Until finally, a WHISTLEBLOWER showed that they knew the deleterious effects of smoking for EONS but kept them down.
Well, there's the NEWS!
It'll blow your mind when you see the Fox News segment in "The Corporation". Their own investigative team did a story on how a DuPont chemical injected into cows to cause them to make more milk not only harmed the cows, but caused cancer in HUMANS!
DuPont sent a letter to Fox.
Bottom line, the story was not aired with the salient facts. Fox had just spent billions on television stations and couldn't afford to piss off a major advertiser.
Oh, this isn't spin, the Fox people ADMITTED IT!
The reason George Bush can get away with his heinous policies is IGNORANCE! Kind of like those states that want to teach the Bible alongside evolution. Somehow these charlatans have convinced parishioners God will save them. They've just got to pray and donate dough. But ALL this dough isn't gonna prevent a child being born without eyes because of the spread of toxic chemicals. Yup, you can see him in the movie.
And sitting there, I couldn't help but think of the record business.
The record business has spread a FALSEHOOD! That if P2P isn't stopped, there will be no MUSIC!
Really, where did they come up with that? Where's the evidence for that? People made music BEFORE it was recorded, why would they not make it if recorded music were suddenly free?
The major labels say we've got to have a system like the iTunes Music Store. Why? How does this help the customer? Really, unless you truly only want one track, you're better off buying the album. You get the CD, which won't get lost in a computer crash. You can burn it as many times as you want. You can rip it. But, OH YEAH, now they're selling copy protected CDs.
What's the benefit?
Does it benefit the public? I can't see how.
The artist? With all the P2P activity going on, sales are dramatically UP! And if, theoretically, 2 million CDs were sold instead of 3 million, would it really hurt the artist? Hell, most artists survive on touring income. They make almost no record royalties.
But the major labels are not interested in the artists. They're only interested in short term profits. If the artist is burned out in the process, who gives a fuck.
And the major labels tell us that people only want the commercialized hip-hop and vapid teen stars. Is that really true? Has their really been a major effort to sell adult fare? Quality fare? And, how is it that Norah Jones is one of the biggest acts in the business and she flies in the face of the complete PARADIGM!
But the major labels control the marketplace. They control MTV, radio and retail. And their goal is to RETAIN this control. All under the aegis of doing it for OUR BENEFIT!
It's a ruse. It's a falsehood. But who's going to blow the whistle on them? And, will they be heard anyway? What with the RIAA and its expenditure of MILLIONS?
Suddenly, you don't need a major record company.
That same computer upon which you can make your movie, you can also make a record. Hell, GO TO A STUDIO, they're recording straight to hard disk on Macs.
But the studio rats, the old line producers, they'll tell you that you've got to spend a couple of hundred grand in a major studio to get it RIGHT!
God, how much did Michael Moore spend on "Fahrenheit 9/11"? Not even ONE-TENTH of what it costs to make a major studio blockbuster. There are no extravagant special effects. No two-dimensional overpaid stars. No layers of fat getting paid, keeping the industry afloat. And, these documentaries might look a bit better, more PROFESSIONAL, if Steven Spielberg made them, but their lack of perfect quality is not hurting their box office. FURTHERMORE, they wouldn't be the same movies if Spielberg made them. You see, like Fox News, Spielberg owes people. He can't risk the truth. No, the truth is the province of the PEOPLE!
And having made this record, you can put it up on a Website. And then have it traded P2P.
Well, even though P2P is good for YOU, the major labels think it's bad for THEM! So YOU can't use it. And you might think this is a crock of shit, but they introduced a bill in Congress to prevent YOU from doing it any way but THEIRS! They're crippling YOU! Not for the public's benefit, but for THEIRS!
But then we've got "Outfoxed". Which was sold via a word of mouth network. Even without P2P, even without Internet Radio crippled by exorbitant royalties by the RIAA, people are SO HUNGRY for something that speaks to them honestly, that they'll invest without even being exposed first. You see, they want to BELIEVE!
Isn't this exactly the OPPOSITE of what the major labels say? That NO ONE believes anymore? And since they don't they might as well whore the product out with sponsorship money, because the economics are so horrendous?
Wait a minute. You can record the record for almost nothing. Distribute it almost for free. What are the huge COSTS?
Promotion and marketing.
But really, is this the kind of promotion and marketing we WANT? Of acts we want to HEAR? And, how much money is blown? And how much goes directly into the execs' pockets, and then to the bottom line.
We're being lied to from beginning to end. But the corporations' press machine is SO good that the truth is constantly being batted down, swept under the rug.
Make no mistake, the MAJOR LABELS made music shitty. They wanted stuff they could sell EASILY, by people who wouldn't cause trouble. Then they said their hands were tied, the market DEMANDED this stuff. HUH?
Isn't it interesting that everything got so bad once the indies left the landscape?
As long as true artists could go to A&M and Island. Places where the owners treated the musicians as PEOPLE! Were ASHAMED to do what was expedient. We had meaningful music.
Make no mistake, P2P IS about stealing, but it's also about SOCIAL PROTEST! Against shitty, overpriced albums with only one good track. Hell, even the people who WORK at the labels won't stand up for the product. You can't get one to go on TV and say the albums they've been producing for the last decade have been good. All they know is THEIR GRAVY TRAIN IS THREATENED! Think of the motivation before you listen to the BULLSHIT!
The major labels will tell you the Internet is bullshit. That things have to be done THEIR WAY! That only THEY know how to break a record.
Well, if Michael Moore can break a MOVIE? If Robert Greenwald, who does not have the cachet of Mr. Moore, can break a movie. If people are going to see "The Corporation" in droves, one must ask if there's another way.
We're in the midst of a cultural revolution as strong as the one in the late sixties. It's just that the corporations, run, ironically, by profiteers who used to protest in the sixties, are denying this.
And you. Are you aware of the fact that SUVs pollute more than cars? Oh, there's no SCIENCE involved. It's just that to make them pollute less costs MONEY! It's not hard to do. Cars conform to a lower standard with no problem. But Detroit lost the car market to the Japanese. They couldn't make any money on small cars. But then they caught the Japanese sleeping with these SUVs. They're inherently unsafe, with a higher center of gravity. They kill others in collisions. But Detroit says people WANT THEM! No, DETROIT wants them. Because profits are GARGANTUAN! They could AT LEAST make them not pollute. But they've got lobbyists who have prevented the passage of legislation. All the time spreading propaganda that the government is going to TAKE YOUR SUV!
People have lost sight. They're part of society. We DEPEND on other people. What in the hell gives you the right to pollute the air much more than car drivers, causing all kinds of health problems? Really!
Oh, Detroit wants the news quashed. You're bombarded with contrary info. Everything but the truth.
The truth is SUVs are massive polluters.
How about doing your part. How about trading yours in.
That's the kind of mentality that's got to grow in the U.S. Doing what's right for society, instead of shopping mindlessly after 9/11, which our so-called President urged.
And even if you work for the major company, under the ruse of paying your bills, can't you SEE? YOU'RE PERPETUATING THE PROBLEM!!!
Don't tell me you're powerless. The power of the individual is GREAT! One individual wrote the Napster program. Without which we wouldn't have the iPod.
"The Corporation" is a long movie. It's not as entertaining as "Fahrenheit 9/11". You might not be up to it.
But know a huge movement of people IS!
And these people are questioning the lies and the manipulation of corporations beholden to nobody but themselves.
It's a new day.
Now, more than ever, don't believe what you hear.
And know it's close to our last chance. If we don't stand up for the truth, what's right, against these corporate bullies RIGHT NOW, it's going to be next to impossible soon.
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