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Why We Fight 
Actors : John McCain, Susan Eisenhower, Richard Perle, Gore Vidal, Wilton Sekzer
Director : Eugene Jarecki
Studio : Sony Pictures
by Sony Pictures
Brand : Sony
Release Date : 2006-06-27
Publisher : Sony Pictures
Availability : Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Number of Items : 1
EAN : 0043396138940
UPC : 043396138940
Avg. Customer Rating: (based on 149 reviews)
List Price : $14.94
Our Price : $8.07
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Product Description |
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Grand Jury Prize winner at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival WHY WE FIGHT offers a revealing look at how America has readied itself for battle and what compels us to so frequently wage war around the world. Produced in the midst of the second Iraq War documentary filmmaker Eugene Jarecki's WHY WE FIGHT is an unflinching examination of the forces fueling the American military machine for over half a century and their global consequences. The film opens with President Dwight D. Eisenhower's 1961 farewell speech in which he warned Americans of the growing power of the "military industrial complex." Expanding upon Eisenhower's warning Jarecki relies on interviews with American soldiers government officials military insiders defense industry personnel congressman scholars ordinary Iraqis and many others to provide personal political and economic analysis of the last 50 years of U.S. military expansion wars and interventions. What emerges is an eye-opening and often chilling portrait of how political corporate and military interests have become progressively entangled through the business of war.System Requirements:Running Time 99 Mins.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DOCUMENTARIES/MISC. Rating: TBD UPC: 043396138940 Manufacturer No: 13894 |
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Americancivilwar.com |
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Fans of Oliver Stone's J.F.K. will recognize the opening moments of writer-director Eugene Jarecki's Why We Fight, in which outgoing President Dwight Eisenhower warns of the pernicious and growing influence of what he called the "military-industrial complex." But Stone's movie, which uses the same footage, was a work of fiction. While those who disagree with the decidedly leftist point of view in this documentary will probably consider it the product of paranoid liberal fantasy as well, there's enough credible material, much of it supplied by the targets of Jarecki's criticisms, to make Eisenhower look like a prophet and everyone else uneasy about the dark confluence of politics, money, and war that controls the country's fortunes. The message here is that while there may be some who sincerely believe that America's various military engagements (in Iraq, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, and elsewhere) since World War II are the product of our God-given duty to spread freedom and halt the influence of evil ideologies around the world, the real reason we fight is that war is good business. This is hardly a bulletin; anyone who is surprised by allegations that politicians pander to defense contractors, or that Vice President Dick Cheney helped secure huge deals for Halliburton, the company he formerly headed, simply hasn't been paying attention (Politicians lie? How shocking!). In fact, the principal drawback to Jarecki's film is simply that there's nothing particularly revelatory or compelling about it. Only when he takes a personal approach does he go beyond the obvious; the story of a retired New York policeman and former Vietnam veteran whose son died in the World Trade Center, who wanted revenge, but who became seriously disillusioned when Bush admitted that the war in Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11, adds some much needed human interest. Still, Why We Fight, which includes a director's audio commentary track and a few other bonus features, serves as a grim reminder that the world's most powerful nation has strayed far from the principles of our founding fathers, a development that does not bode well for America's future. --Sam Graham |
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Worth reading |
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I have been trying to read books that might give some insight into what the candidates are like in the upcoming election. I am convinced both are flawed but McCain is our only choice. The other lacks knowledge and experience and is totally unknown. He made one good speech but has trouble answering questions he should have thought through before entering the contest. Ruby Freeman |
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Disappointing |
I had high hopes for this documentary, because it's thesis is exactly right: as President Eisenhower feared, the United States has been hijacked by a military-industrial complex that has squandered its immense wealth on weapons systems, to the detriment of a good society.
Unfortunately, the film is a disappointing mish-mash of contemporary interviews and historical footage, incoherently told. Lacking a narrarator, who might have lended context and details, the film instead lurches from interview to interview -- a conservative here, a liberal there, and, look, here's Eisenhower's actual granddaughter! -- striving for "balance" but sacrificing intelligence.
I yearned for detail: some documentary evidence of the alliance between government and industry, or a probing look at just one of the multitude of unnecessary weapons systems that the Pentagon has foisted on Congress, or even simply a chart that illustrates how our military spending drawfs our spending on the common good, such as education. Details on the Halliburton scandal, for example, would have been especially compelling and illustrative. These topics are only superficially discussed by those interviewed. There is no real insight. Perhaps fearing that they would bore with too much detail, the filmmakers aim only for effect.
To be sure, the film does have some interesting emotional turns -- primarily a profile of 9/11 victim's father who was duped by President Bush's deceptive attempt to tie Iraq to 9/11. Though revelatory in an emotional way, the profile belongs in a different documentary and illustrates the film's essential weakness: a preference for mood over intelligence, in a film that absolutely requires the latter. |
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Every School Kid Should See this Movie and Discuss it |
This movie answers the question, "Why don't the Democrats ask tough questions of the Bush Administration". The answer is one word.. Jobs. The Industrial Military Machine in the United States is a tax subsidized $750,000,000,000 enterprise, let me repeat, 750 Billion dollar a year enterprise. And they have an average 25% profit margin, WOW. The War Machine has designed it's manufacturing chain that components are built in every state. Each elected official in Congress has a duty to bring back jobs to their districts. Otherwise they will not get re-elected.
The next question, How can we move monies from the Industrial War Machine into Education, and research and development of Clean Alternative Energy Sources to make our country self-reliant and secure.
-Tom |
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Excelent movie |
It is a very well written documentary. Some of the interviewees are great minds of USA. This work not only hits Bush, as many others documentaries do, but also criticizes all of the exterior relations of USA.
The theme is one of the most important of these times: US War. Where Globalization is just a nice word for Imperialism. As with global warning, it seems that we are loosing our fight agains it. Even the presidents of USA seem to be pupets of this miltary machine.
Great audiovisual material, great interviews, great final message, great movie.
Americans have to do something. |
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Incisive and Balanced, A Must See Documentary. |
My uncle and I were discussing this documentary and a few others (like "Crude Awakening" and "Enron: The Smartest Guys in The Room") the other day over barbecue & beers, and we came to the conclusion that if we were could dictate one law, it would be that all American voters would be required to watch this masterpiece, along with say three or four others (like the two aforementioned) and participate in a discussion group prior to registering.
I realize that is a ridiculous impossibility, an absurdity, given that no one in power (Democrat or Republican) or those who shill for them would ever allow that sort of thing, but it's still a pretty idea.
This is hard hitting stuff, rife with shocking revelations (shocking, I mean, if you haven't been paying attention the last fifteen to fifty years, like apparently most of our fellow citizens..) And unlike partisan stuff like Micheal Moore's work, it is mostly a series of interviews from people actually involved in government or the intelligence establishment, interspaced with lots of archival video documenting the evolution of the "military-congressional-industrial" complex.
It's mostly straight from the horse's mouth, in other words. You get incredible stuff, starting with clips & interviews with Presidents Truman, Johnson, Reagan, both Bush H.W. & W., Clinton, and of course Eisenhower - whose famous farewell address, which echoes that of George Washington (who warned us of maintaining standing armies and foreign entanglements), and provides the conceptual hook that draws the entire piece together.
Other voices here include Eisenhower's son & granddaughter (John E. Brig Gen. Ret. USA & Susan E.), professor and former CIA analyst Chalmers Johnson, neocon pundit William Kristol, activist Charles Lewis, the historian Gwynne Dyer, Dick Cheney, Senator John McCain, Senator Robert Byrd, former Air Force intelligence officer Karen Kwiatkowski, author Gore Vidal, Bush adviser Ricard Pearle, Secretary of the Air Force James G. Roche, retired NYPD officer Wilton Sekzer, the US Airforce officers who flew the Stealth Bombers who dropped the first bombs on Baghdad in 2003, and many others.
No matter what your political orientation, no matter what you think about what is happening in Iraq, this movie is worth your time. It is not mere propaganda, not agitprop. It is a true documentary, even (I say) a work of art. It will enlighten, and give you a lot to ponder.
I've bought it to share with people, I think it's that essential.
I can't recommend it highly enough. Watch it. |
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