The Challenge of Manufacturing

Meditation on psychlogical warfare, shopping and paramilitary death squads.

A kaleidoscopic history of the American heartland, nuclear weapons and the Native American genocide.

A group of flower arrangers practice their art in this second silent early short from Joshua Oppenheimer.

An early silent short by Joshua Oppenheimer in which a figure reflects light at the camera.

They say that when the Earth is destroyed beyond habitation, the only survivors will be the cockroaches. Filmmaker Joshua Oppenheimer gives the indomitable insects the floor in this perversely comic commentary on affluence and self-destruction. Leashed with thin ribbons, a small intrusion of cockroaches scramble over magazine spreads of the good life while a schizophrenic pest voice-over mutters like an asylum inmate recalling the good old days, when food was plentiful and the roach traps were the enemy. It is consumption and consumerism as empty activity and madness, played-out as a natural history documentary in the guise of an invasion picture, all set to the theme song from LOVE STORY.

Joshua Oppenheimer reimagines a sixty-second stock market update as maniacal monologue by a mumbling madman giving a bizarre play-by-play of floor traders and urban pedestrians as the trading day comes to an end. Created while in the midst of production on the feature-length GLOBALIZATION TAPES, this brief film is Oppenheimer's most concentrated piece of socio-political commentary: a quick, colorful political cartoon of capitalism plucked out-of-context and set to a soundtrack that is both comic and somewhat sinister. The upbeat musical accompaniment only enhances the empty celebration of meaningless activity.

Hugh is an elderly man keeping himself active in retirement. His hobbies include teaching children to play the piano, carpentry and driving into town to preach sermons on the evils of homosexuality.

A musical about the last human family on Earth.

For eighty cents an hour, prisoners in a New Mexico prison answer telephones for the state tourism hotline. Co-directed by Christine Cynn.

Filmed by Indonesian workers during their working hours on rubber and palm oil plantations, this film exposes the devastating role of militarism and repression in building the “global economy”. Through chilling first hand accounts, hilarious improvised interventions, collective debate and archival footage, the film explores the relationships between trade, Third World debt, and international institutions like the IMF and World Bank.