"What Barry says"
What Barry Says won in the Best Animation category of the Brooklyn International film festival. Created by Simon Robson, a commercial designer and animator.
Synopsis
An un-apologetic criticism of US foreign policy and The Project for the New American Century. Animation follows the dialogue, giving visual poignancy and weight to Barry's words. The propoganda-esque style of the motion graphics further re-inforces the message. Is this a conspiracy theory? Far from it.
Via Boing Boing.
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posted by Ronnie at Friday, October 08, 2004
5 Comments:
Interesting Ronnie. But incredible and frightening IMHO.
Frightening that someone believes this conglomeration of leftist propoganda enough to expend the energy required to make that whole slick film. Or is it a satire--maybe I missed the joke?
Could this possibly be meant to be taken seriously by any thinking person? I mean where do you start...
More to the point, I didn't hear any mention of all the hundreds of thousands of previously-supremely-oppressed women the USA has saved recently, is giving the vote and education to, the human beings no longer being fed into paper shredders or having their fingers or limbs and God knows what else chopped off at the whim of dictators, or murdered and tortured in countless other ways.
Those things aren't mentioned nor are all the other good works the US has done. It hasn't just done evil, contrary to the bleating of leftists. Korea was UN sanctioned--not just a US action as implied in the film. As South Koreans who were around in those days what they think--I've spoken to some and they know what the USA did. In WW2 Macarthur DID return, and liberate the Philippines from the brutal Japanese occupation. You could go on and on, they touch erroneously on so many things. To paint the USA as warmongerers isn't even worthy of any more of a response.
Fah.
*********
But lest you get the wrong impression from my own "tirade", I love your blog and the work you've posted.
God Bless the freedom-loving people of the USA, and the soldiers through all the years who have died giving me the freedom to sit and draw little pictures all day.
Paul R.
2:20 PM
Paul,
Thanks for that post. I do think it is comical, intended or not, that such a litany of evil agenda can be mounted in one great gob. Pieces such as these are meant to incite and raise hackles and only hardens positions on either side of any question.
On purely the aesthetic, I was impressed with the work and that's why I posted it. I do not, however, agree with the current climate of discourse that has escalated into smears and name-calling. Nothing sane can be discussed in this mire.
And a discussion is desperately needed to arrive at a position that serves the most common good, not hidden agendas or party idealogies--so we can all get behind our country and our leaders regardless of who it is who we'll call president. Winning isn't everything.
You're right, extreme left harangues are idiotic to the point that they seem to be waving pitchforks and torches; conversely the rabid right have their own version with equal props in hand, and the sad thing is that these noisiest of factions drown out any other voices.
I come from the country that McArthur returned to liberate and whole generations are eternally grateful, though that generation forgets that we were deemed property and was sold by the Spaniards to the U.S. after its fleet was sunk in Manila bay. The U.S. has two faces in the world for us: friend and liberator but also opportunistic would be landlords and puppetmasters. For years the Marcos regime thrived under Washington's favor in exchange for bases and access to resources--looking the other way as their boy, Marcos, had his way with the country and it's people--an early Saddam, just no WMD's.
How about this, let's not forget the good that America stands for and continues to do but love it enough to criticize it when it strays and make those who would lead us accountable for the good and the ill they effect.
Thanks for this, really. I hardly ever discuss politics because it tends to be messy and labels get thrown about. I believe in ideas and ideals, a healthy discussion is invigorating and keeps one from becoming one of the rabid rabble.
R.
4:58 PM
Hey Ronnie,
Absolutely. I agree with you 100%. Healthy discourse is rare. I guess that's why I responded to that film so strongly---it's so extreme and one sided. Agree that some right wingers can be as extreme too. In fact I hate all those labels even though they are necessary as a means of identification.
I usually don't talk politics much either because--well usually it doesn't go well. Frankly the vast vast majority of artists I've met are extremely reflexively left wing in their views---so why bother ending up in an argument. Glad we didn't--my post was aimed at the makers of that propaganda.
But I agree that things are not so simple---the USA isn't perfect and I hear what you're saying about the Philippines. There was a long and complicated relationship between the two countries and certainly a lot of mistakes were made. I've been reading about the guerilla war there in WW2, fall of Corregidor etc, Bataan, trying to catch up and educate myself. Amazing and heartbreaking and inspiring all at once. How people back then got through it all--I have no idea really. How much from the past doesn't enter into common discourse!
I would never sanction tyranny or the kind of situation you mention about Marcosor any other of the wrong or misguided things the US has done. But the grand thing about our countries--democracies--they are self-correcting. They try to be. They strive upwards despite all. Tyrannies are not and do not. They are just murder machines. That part of it is simple. I hope I don't sound preachy because that's not my intent of course. I just feel all this strongly because my grandfather was murdered in cold blood by the Bolsheviks in Russia in 1920. That's the closest I was ever directly touched by evil---but it was enough, hearing about it, to affect me a lot.
So I can imagine the cries of oppressed Iraqis or Philipinos or Koreans and countless others with a human face. I have daughters and they could have been born as suffocated Afghani girls under the Taliban, deprived of light and learning and culture. The US helped them all! And soldiers from other countries too, my own included.
So sure, let's have a grand accounting---good and bad. But when the jury votes let's not forget all the good on one side of the ledger.
That's my plea, that's all I'm saying and I think we agree on that.
all the best, Paul
5:54 PM
We as AMERICANS Kickass, everyone comes to us for help and we foolishly give. It is time to take care of AMERICA first and screw the rest of You. Go get someone else to Liberate, Rescue,Aid, whatever it is that you need. Close our borders NOW. And above all KILL TERRORISTS!!!!!!~!
6:00 AM
"We as AMERICANS Kickass, everyone comes to us for help and we foolishly give. It is time to take care of AMERICA first and screw the rest of You. Go get someone else to Liberate, Rescue,Aid, whatever it is that you need. Close our borders NOW. And above all KILL TERRORISTS!!!!!!~!"
This is the type of blinkered USA! USA! rhetoric that fuels the hatred of our country worldwide. The more your type sits down and shuts the hell up, the more the good and decent side of our nation will come to the fore.
'What Barry Says" in one word has more merit than what you'll say in a lifetime.
8:54 PM
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