This week on Open Sources Guelph we ask, “What day is this?” And we answer, “Why it’s Christmas Day, sir.” And since it’s Christmas Day, or there abouts, the time has come for our annual entry the political movies special. As usual at this time of year, we’ve lined up four new politically-themed movies to discuss including two comedies, a French movie in black and white and an Academy Award-winning documentary!
This Thursday, December 25, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss:
Adam’s Pick #1: Canadian Bacon (1995). “In a desperate bid to revive his abysmal peacetime approval rating, the President of the United States (Alan Alda) agrees to launch a top-secret propaganda campaign to vilify Canada. As U.S. citizens get caught up in a xenophobic hysteria, a group of residents of Niagara, N.Y., wielding machine guns, organize a vigilante invasion that could trigger a real war with America’s gentle neighbor to the north.”
Scotty’s Pick #1: Hate/La Haine (1995). “When a young Arab is arrested and beaten unconscious by police, a riot erupts in the notoriously violent suburbs outside of Paris. Three of the victim’s peers, Vinz (Vincent Cassel), Said (Said Taghmaoui) and Hubert (Hubert Koundé), wander aimlessly about their home turf in the aftermath of the violence as they try to come to grips with their outrage over the brutal incident.”
Adam’s Pick #2: Burn After Reading (2008). “The misplaced memoirs of a recently jobless CIA analyst, Osborne Cox (John Malkovich), are found by a pair of dimwitted gym employees (Frances McDormand and Brad Pitt). When they mistake the memoirs for classified government documents, they undergo a series of misadventures in an attempt to profit from their find.”
Scotty’s Pick #2: No Other Land (2025). “This film made by a Palestinian-Israeli collective shows the destruction of the occupied West Bank’s Masafer Yatta by Israeli soldiers and the alliance which develops between the Palestinian activist Basel and Israeli journalist Yuval.”
Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.
Open Sources Guelph 