DominguezAmandaAnnotation5

__FILM ANNOTATION: THE CORPORATION__

- The Corporation, Mark Achbar and Jennifer Abbott, 2003
 * 1.** **Title, director and release year?**

- The lack of control over corporations and their influences in politics and government regulation is a major obstacle in making industries sustainable and transitioning to green technology. - The concept of corporations as having the rights of an immortal person is implausible and has caused injustice to the human population while businesses continue to prosper.
 * 2.** **What is the central argument or narrative of the film?**

- Corporations make it nearly impossible to create change in government policy that could produce green practices because industry has too much of an influence in government decisions. Corporations see themselves as god-sends when people need work, when really they assume workers who are desperate should be grateful for unfair wages and dangerous working conditions. They treat workers like externalities all while ‘benefiting the community.’ It is ludicrous to think that corporations really care whether they contribute to the community or not; all that matters is that they are ‘seen as attributing members of society.’ - Corporations do not see and/or care about the environmental/sustainability impacts of the trades they influence; they see in dollar signs and nothing else. The perfect example of this is the interview with the former broker and the positive economic impact the September 11th attacks had on the price of gold. Welfare of society is not a factor for most of them, and that perspective will prevent nations from progressing.
 * 3.** **What sustainability problems does the film draw out?**

- The candid interviews with corporation executives, former news anchors, brokers, laborers, etc. were the most compelling by far. These people know firsthand what corporations are capable of and the dangerous amounts of power and influence they have over government. - I also enjoyed the psychiatric evaluation of corporations that determined they are of the psychopath personality. The film treated corporations as what they are legally (‘people’) and developed an evaluation as to the type of person it would be in our society. The resulting personality type implies that corporations are clinically insane, must be kept under control, and are a danger to others (i.e. society). - An analogy provided in the film is that of “flight versus free-fall” which basically states that a craft (corporation) that does not obey the laws of aerodynamics (government) will not fly and is destined to crash, but while the ground is a far way off, it feels like flight instead of the free-fall that it really is. Thus, corporations think they are succeeding when they are truly falling to their demise.
 * 4.** **What parts of the film did you find most persuasive and compelling? Why?**

- Although the story of the Bolivians fighting for free water was interesting, it did not speak to the rest of the film as to the corruption of corporations. I felt that it dealt more with the unfair commoditization of a vital good and was on a different level of corporate corruption not equal to that of, say, the Monsanto/Posilac controversy.
 * 5.** **What parts of the film were you not compelled or convinced by?**

- I was most astonished by the verdicts in the FOX/Monsanto case where it was deemed legal to falsify news, and the case that ruled it was legal to patent living things (with the exception of a human). It makes me wonder what kind of society I live in that would allow these types of unethical, immoral decisions to be made. I cannot comprehend how judges could ever come to such verdicts and urges to me decipher their justifications for them.
 * 6.** **What additional information does this film compel you to seek out? Where do you want to dig deeper and what connections do you want to make with other issues, factors, problems, etc.?**

- I would strongly suggest that corporation CEOs watch this film, although chances are they already know what their corporation is up to. However, I would like to know why corporation executives feel no remorse for those they impact negatively; or, even, why instead of changing the way they do things, they would rather pay penalties, fees, and lawsuit settlements countless times over. I would hope that this film could impact corporate decisions and practices.
 * 7.** **What audiences does the film best address? What kind of imagination is fostered in viewers? Do you think the film is likely to change the way viewers think about and act on environmental problems?**

- I like that this film attacks the issue of corporate influence and calls for a revolt of sorts, one that pressures the government to take control of corporations and treat them, if not like normal people who must obey the law or suffer the consequences, as objects (which are easily destroyed and replaced).
 * 8.** **What kinds of action or points of intervention are suggested by the film?**

- This film could have added in the effect of different economic systems. It focused primarily on capitalist corporations, which are the ugliest of the group, but a look at the effects of other economic systems (positive or negative) on corporations would have been educational.
 * 9.** **What could have been added to this film to enhance its environmental educational value?**

[Posted March 15, 2010]