Ethos (2011)

Expected more

An Exercise In Nonsense

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

I recently viewed ETHOS and it just increased my lack of trust in big business and government practices.Not too long ago some friends and I were discussing many topics and politics came up. We were looking for a brief but accurate description of politics.We didn't find one.I went to sleep still thinking about this.I woke up three hours later with an acronym: Persons Of Low Integrity Talking In CircleSDoes this work?

Ethos is what happens when an individual has a great idea or concept and decides to completely disregard the delivery of that thought well. Based on research the film had a $500,000 budget and yet I have seen hand-held video cameras present and edit a concept better than the garbage (no matter how true) before me.As an open minded individual I do my best to lower my expectations for the sake of the overall message, but when the editor decides to have constant moving distractions behind EVERY single speaker as a means to hide an awful green screen set up, it literally takes away from ones ability to fully digest what they are saying. And this is ignoring the fact that their use of a "fade to black" transition during interviews was taken advantage of more so than a rapist at a nudist colony.At the end of the end I give a thumbs up to Woody Harrelson assuming that he actually put up with the lacking quality that went into this production, fully knowing it was sub par. Call it my own personal ego, but I am proud of the fact that I know what my weaknesses are, and although the director may be good at coming up with great concepts for documentaries, he is horribly bad at choosing editors and cameramen. Although, it is entirely possible that he pocketed the budget obtained thus making him a true Romney, political businessman whose whole purpose behind this mess was to continue the legacy of immoral visual corruption.Congratulations, you just made a well known movie star look like a nobody from an after school special.

After about 20 minutes of watching, I realize I've seen much of this stuff before. If you've seen "The Corporation" or "Zeitgeist" or other documentaries, then this film seems like a hodge-podge of them. I was disappointed and shut it off 60% through because I honestly thought I had seen it before. Then I come to IMDb and others are saying the same thing: it's an important, yet unoriginal and incomplete documentary. The part about the Federal Reserve and the central bank does enough to just pique your interest, but doesn't tell us who these guys are (Woody himself says "we don't know who these guys are" and we don't find out in the film, either). It just leaves us at the Great Depression, how the Warburgs, JPMorgan, Rothschilds, and Rockefellers had a hand in creating an international debt system. Yet there was no modern-day examples. I didn't get to the part where they talk about how we can change society, however, in a "simple yet effective way". I wonder what they proposed?

I stumbled across this documentary online because it was free to watch on their official site, as well as on youtube. I would say my knowledge on the US political system is basic, but I'm interested in building upon it, more than what the big media corporations feed us. Because of that reason, Ethos was a delight seeing. It captivated my interest right away, especially when Woody Harrelson started narrating lol. I knew that he's a good actor but seeing him in this docu made me separate the actor from the "White Men Can't Jump" character.It touched on a few subjects like the environment, capitalism influencing our gov't, role of big businesses in politics, Sept 11, propaganda, apathy in the public, among other juicy topics. With a running time of 52 mins (Director's Cut is 72 mins), it piqued and kept my interest with a non-sluggish pace. More importantly, after seeing the movie, Ethos motivated me to learn more so I checked out the official Ethos website which had some helpful links and recommendations.It had several good messages, and one that I remember most vividly is that consumers have power/voice/influence in how businesses conduct their business. Choosing to buy from a socially-conscious business versus a company that isn't sends a message to both companies, one of support, the other of disapproval.I rated this 9/10 because it was one of my favorite documentaries, I don't regret seeing it, and I recommended it to friends.