Tag: documentaries

Sandro Botticelli, “St. Augustine in his Cell,” circa 1490 to 1494, Uffizi, Florence

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Confessional literature is nothing new. Saint Augustine wrote one of the groundbreaking works in the genre, describing the long process of his conversion from Manicheism to Catholicism. When he’s not denouncing the odd doctrines of his former belief system, he’s bemoaning his sinful past. He really beats himself up over stealing some pears as a teenager, for waiting until the end of the semester to quit his professorship to become a monk, and even for being fascinated by a spider without acknowledging the work of the Creator. Hey, at least Saint Augustine wasn’t responsible for The Force Awakens. . . (more…)

A reed warbler raising a cuckoo. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

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Brood parasitism describes a fascinating behavioral pattern in the animal kingdom in which a parasite species manipulates a host species into raising and feeding its young. As an evolutionary strategy, it’s highly effective since it relieves the parasite from having to expend resources doing it themselves. In one case, various species of cuckoo will lay eggs in the nests of, say, warblers or magpies, so their chicks will be hatched and fed alongside the host chicks despite differences in egg size and color. (more…)

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The tale of one of the most shameful anti-white hoaxes of the last twenty years has finally come to a close. Crystal Mangum, a black woman who is now serving a lengthy prison sentence for the 2011 murder of her boyfriend, finally admitted that she falsely accused three Duke University lacrosse players of raping her at an off-campus party in 2006. The three students she accused, David Evans, Collin Finnerty, and Reade Seligmann, underwent an ordeal of persecution by the legal system, their school, and much of the media before all charges against them were ultimately dropped. Since then, the innocence of the three has been common knowledge, but until this month, Mangum had never acknowledged her own dishonesty. (more…)

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It’s high praise indeed when a documentary calls the least possible attention to itself and still conveys the maximum emotional impact to its viewers. Of course, it helps when the subject matter is both riveting and timely. We have both and then some in Liz Collin and J. C. Chaix’s documentary The Fall of Minneapolis (also reviewed for Counter-Currents by Morris van de Camp). (more…)

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Something that I see being referenced a lot on the dissident Right is the attack on the USS Liberty during the Six-Day War in June 1967 as an ironic statement on the “greatest ally” myth. It’s usually merely a mention: the Liberty. Everybody is simply expected to know what it is all about.

I find that there are a number of misconceptions floating around, stemming from outdated information and speculation on the part of the survivors themselves. “Israel attacked our ship, and then Lyndon Johnson hushed it up.” Well, that’s the very basic of basics. (more…)

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Urban myths are insidious enough when they are false. But when they assume universality in the broader culture — while reflecting negatively on that culture — then they can cause people to lose faith in themselves. This is one way in which civilizations begin to decline.

For the last 60 years, one such myth is that of Kitty Genovese.

Thanks to the New York Times reporting of her grisly 1964 murder in the Kew Gardens neighborhood of Queens — during which 38 people supposedly watched and did nothing while she was stabbed to death — her name has become synonymous with bystander apathy. (more…)

The Duggar family in 2021, from their official Facebook page.

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Shiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets (2023)
Directed by Olivia Crist & Julia Willoughby Nason

Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate. — Psalm 127:3-5 KJV (more…)

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Part 1 of 2 (Part 1 here)

Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, a number of stories appeared which alleged Israeli involvement. Personally, I haven’t paid much attention, since thus far I’ve heard little along those lines that passes the Occam’s Razor test.[1] Although I can’t deny that Jews have a regrettably high trouble-per-capita ratio, I’m not in the habit of assuming everything bad in the world was something they did. (more…)

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South Korea has taken the classical music world by storm over the past few decades. Koreans are increasingly overrepresented among high-level classical musicians. Hundreds of Koreans have been finalists and prizewinners in prestigious international music competitions. The Korean Musical Mystery (2012) is a documentary by Belgian filmmaker Thierry Loreau that seeks to understand this fascinating phenomenon. (more…)

2920 كلمة

English original here

سبينسر جاي كوين

في الفيلم الوثائقي “ما هي المرأة؟”، قدم معلق ديلي واير مات والش والمخرج جاستن فولك تقييماً لا بد منه لحركة المتحولين جنسياً. يجب أن ينظر إلى هذا البرنامجبإلحاح كبير من قبل أي شخص مهتم بمزيد من تفكك الحضارة الغربية.

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Arabic version here

In the documentary What is a Woman?, Daily Wire commentator Matt Walsh and director Justin Folk have delivered a must-watch assessment of the transgender movement. This program should be viewed with great urgency by anyone concerned about the further disintegration of Western Civilization.

Over the past several years, transgenderism has opened up a new front in the ongoing war upon the traditional understanding of the human condition which had informed much of the public policy in the West until just over 50 years ago. (more…)

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The poets and dreamers wove their magic webs, and a world apart from the world of actual experience came to life. But it was not all myth, nor all fantasy; there was a basis of truth and reality at the foundation of the mystic growth . . . — Jessie Weston, From Ritual to Romance

My friend said, what are you doing these days? I said, I’m working for Killing Joke. He said, Killing Joke? Are you mad? They’re evil. They’re devil-worshippers. — Chris Kimsey, music producer (more…)

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Louis Theroux has made a career as a documentarian by going out into the “bush”—basically, anywhere outside the urban and online bubbles where his kind dwell. There he meets weird and marginal people. He is nice to them in order to get them on film. Then he displays them—like so many Hottentot Venuses—for the amusement of condescending liberal urbanites like himself. (more…)