Paul Mawhinney has the world’s greatest music collection. In it, every genre of American music is represented: rock, country, R&B, blues, jazz, new age, Broadway and Hollywood, bluegrass, folk, children’s, comedy, and more. It contains approximately 1 million albums and 1.5 million singles. It is estimated that only 17% of the music he owns is available on CD.
Every recording in this amazing collection has been purchased by its owner, Paul Mawhinney, over a period of a half century, and stored in a 16,000 square foot climate - controlled warehouse. Many millions of dollars have been invested in the acquisition and storage of the collection, the estimated value of which is now greater than fifty million dollars.
Documentary maker Sean Dunne recently met the man behind the incredible music collection. Watch as Paul Mawhinney explains his archive and his efforts to find a proper home for his life’s work.
This documentary, The Qur’an, portreys Islam and its many forms, cultures, and backgrounds. The director, Antony Thomas, made waves in the Muslim world nearly 30 years ago with his documentary, Death of a Princess, a program based on the beheading of a Saudi princess and her adulterous lover, which, when broadcast by an ITV company in 1980, caused canceled contracts and threats of retribution from the Saudi rulers. It has never been re-broadcast.
Within “The Qur’an”, we see highly educated people bearing witness greater richness of their lives once they had allowed the message of the Koran into their hearts. We also see how multiple interpretations of the holy book coupled with violent extremism clashes not only with the non-Muslim world, but also within Islam itself.
Aired: July 14, 2008 on Channel 4 A ground-breaking, feature-length documentary by award-winning filmmaker Antony Thomas, The Qur’an asks what Islam’s holiest book actually says about issues such as equality, punishment, peace, other faiths and suicide bombing. The film is part of a special week of powerful and thoughtful programmes that aim to de-mystify, as well as celebrate, the world’s most talked-about religion and offer an insight into the lives and beliefs of Muslims across the globe. Warning: “The Program contains footage of executions, the aftermath of bombing and female genital mutilations which may upset some viewers”.
Running time of 1:41:32.
Hit play or watch The Qur’an fullscreen at Google Video.
After several setbacks (including the Writer’s Strike) comedian Bill Maher’s new documentary, Religulous, will be released in theatres October 3rd, 2008. Known for his stance against religion, Bill Maher’s views on the various world religions are explored as he travels to numerous religious destinations, such as Jerusalem, the Vatican, and even Salt Lake City. He interviews believers from a variety of backgrounds and groups, including Jews for Jesus, Muslims, polygamists, Satanists, Hasidic scholars and even Rael of the Raelian Movement.
Explaining his impetus to make the film, Maher said: “I wanted to make a documentary, and I wanted it to be funny. In fact, since there is nothing more ridiculous than the ancient mythological stories that live on as today’s religions, this movie would try to be a real knee-slapper. Unless, of course, you’re religious; then you might not like it.”
I just finished watching “The Hippies”, a made for TV documentary about the Hippie culture of the 60’s and 70’s that aired on the History Channel. Though flawed with its overarching, borderline ridiculous right-wing condemnations of hippie culture, it offers a fascinating glimpse at the drug-fueled, youth-driven counterculture of the era.
Too much time, unfortunately, is wasted on sensationalist, irrelevant side-stories and not enough is spent on the substantive contributions of the hippie aesthetic to the culture at large. There are also a few glaring historical accuracies; for example, one could easily conclude from the film that the Vietnam War ended after 1969 — which would certainly come as a surprise to the soldiers who served there from 1970-1973. But at least the film, at its end, correctly, if only briefly, touches upon some of the many lasting contributions of the hippie ethos to the culture at large; these include the consciousness movement, the environmental movement, and the computer/technological revolution which led to the democratization of information by the Internet.
Hit play or watch The Hippies fullscreen on Google Video.
The mention of famed “satanist” Aleister Crowley caught my ear, especially when the narrator explained how his image was “featured” on the cover of The Beatles Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album. Truth be told, Crowley is merely one of the 85 people and objects featured on the cover.
The commentary also claims Sgt. Pepper’s was “the greatest masterpiece of the psychedelic era”. As any Beatles fan will tell you Sgt Pepper’s was Paul’s baby and while Lennon’s Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds* or George’s Within You Without You have that psychedelic sound, Paul didn’t embrace the drug scene in the same way that the others did and while it may truly be a masterpiece of musical genius, I’d venture to say that later albums like Magical Mystery Tour are more psychedelic.
*Fun fact: Lennon denied Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds was about LSD until the day he died.
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On the fifth anniversary of the United States invasion into Iraq, PBS and Frontline present the full saga of the war in a two-part definitive series.
Watch part 1 and 2 of the full length documentary, Bush’s War at PBS.
I just finished watching it. No matter which side of the political fence you find yourself on, I highly recommend this captivating review of the lies, blunders, and pride that created the war in Iraq.
Make sure you have some time to kill. The online version is divided into 27 chapters, each about 10 minutes.
Control Room is a documentary on the perception of the United States’s war with Iraq, with an emphasis on Al Jazeera’s coverage. It makes it clear that the endeavor for unbiased reporting is a difficult, almost impossible task.
Control Room running time is 1 hours and 26 minutes.
I just finished watching the conspiracy theorist documentary, “Zeitgeist”.
Much like the show Conspiracy Theory: Did We Land on the Moon? by Fox Television, Zeitgeist makes you feel like the lines between truth and fiction are not so black and white, and even though many of the claims made are far-fetched, or even beyond belief, it still makes for extremely compelling viewing.
Zeitgeist, produced by Peter Joseph, was created as a nonprofit filmiac [sic] expression to inspire people to start looking at the world from a more critical perspective and to understand that very often things are not what the population at large think they are. The information in Zeitgeist was established over a year long period of research and the current Source page on this site lists the basic sources used / referenced and the Interactive Transcript includes exact source references and further information.
Now, it’s important to point out that there is a tendency to simply disbelieve things that are counter to our understanding, without the necessary research performed. For example, some information contained in Part 1 and Part 3, specifically, is not obtained by simple keyword searches on the Internet. You have to dig deeper. For instance, very often people who look up “Horus” or “The Federal Reserve” on the Internet draw their conclusions from very general or biased sources. Online encyclopedias or text book Encyclopedias often do not contain the information contained in Zeitgeist. However, if one takes
the time to read the sources provided, they will find that what is being presented is based on documented evidence. Any corrections, clarifications & further points regarding the film are found on the Clarifications page. Non-Profit DVDs / Free Video Downloads are available through the Downloads page.
That being said, it is my hope that people will not take what is said in the film as the truth, but find out for themselves, for truth is not told, it is realized.
From the origins of Christianity to the US government’s involvement in the September 11th attacks to the Rothchild’s attempt to take over the world, this documentary spans most of the conspiracy theories I’ve ever heard about. It even has a take on JFK’s assassination. Surprisingly enough, the moon landing as a hoax didn’t make the final cut.
Last January Mike Wesch, an assistant professor of cultural anthropology at Kansas State University, brought us Web 2.0 … The Machine is Us/ing Us.
Last month he released this follow-up video focusing on the information, technology, taxonomy theme. It’s called Information R/evolution (runtime 5:28).
The latest iteration of the world’s biggest physics experiment, the Large Hadron Collider, will be switched on in May 2008 (though the BBC documentary below says November, the time line has been updated).
It’s big, REALLY big, and expensive—costing over 6 billion dollars and crossing between the borders of France and Switzerland at four points. The LHC is being funded and built in collaboration with over two thousand physicists from thirty-four countries, universities and laboratories.
As a side note, CERN has had some impressive byproducts, including the web itself.
The BBC created a great documentary about it called The Six Billion Dollar Experiment. Enjoy.
A few years ago a jukebox owned by John Lennon was discovered. On it were 40 of the famous musician’s favorite tunes. This is a documentary about the songs on that Jukebox and the influence they had on the Beatles.
Richard Dawkins takes a stab at why we’re here, using science and reason to back up his answer. It’s an interesting and inspiring perspective on an old question.
Maxed Out is a fascinating documentary about our “credit” culture.
Maxed Out takes viewers on a journey deep inside the American style of debt, where things seem fine as long as the minimum monthly payment arrives on time.
With coverage that spans from small American towns all the way to the White House, the film shows how the modern financial industry really works, explains the true definition of “preferred customer” and tells us why the poor are getting poorer while the rich keep getting richer.
Hilarious, shocking and incisive, Maxed Out paints a picture of a national nightmare which is all too real for most of us.
More people choose to end their lives at the Golden Gate bridge than other other place in the world. A couple of years ago I read an article about this fact in the New Yorker titled, Jumpers by Tad Friend.
The article inspired director Eric Steel to film the Golden Gate Bridge for a year. His film crew caught 23 suicides, missed one and also recorded a man saving a girl from jumping by grabbing her jacket and physically pulling her off the edge of the bridge. They also captured a failed attempt when a boy survived his jump and was kept afloat by a Bay Area seal until the coast guard arrived to rescue him.
The camera crew vigilantly called the bridge authorities when they observed clear signs of someone about to jump. In doing so, they foiled six near suicides.
I just finished watching Michael Moore’s new movie, SiCKO.
A lady in Utah once broke into conversation about the differences in superiority between the health care system in the United States and the one in Canada. It took me a moment to process her argument that the United States system was far superior because it allowed anyone to pay for any treatment they needed without delay.
I asked her, well isn’t it better that people in Canada who couldn’t afford health care in the States can go to a hospital and not be refused treatment? Her rebuttal, though with no apparent reason for saying so, was that, “no, the American system is much better.”
And now you can make your own decision as Michael Moore takes a look at health care around the world, and in the good ol’ US of A.
Hit play or watch SiCKO fullscreen at Google Video. The video is down, but you can still see it in theatres when it comes out June 29th.
Universal health care, just one more reason I’m glad to be a Canadian.
Oh and for you conspiracy theorists out there, check out what appears to be a secret handshake 38 minutes and 04 seconds into the movie.
As a follow-up to the recent Malcolm Gladwell speech at the New Yorker 2012 conference, here is a documentary all about Fermat’s Last Theorem (wikipedia) and its proof by Andrew Wiles in 1994.
Even if math isn’t your thing, there is something intriguing about following Wiles’ seven year struggle to solve the mystery. In general I get a bit of a rush out of the beauty of mathematics but watching Wiles create a proof for Fermat’s Last Theorem was just magical.
