MUCK
This past weekend saw the G20 ravage our city. Some say it was good to put Toronto on the map, while others say it was needless damage to an already financially strapped city. Some of the coverage was sensationalized and overblown, while some of the coverage accurately portrayed both the chaos and the peace involved in making a statement about a political cause. What, if any, impact do you think film has in the overall activism landscape? With films like Act of Dishonour and Sounds Like a Revolution open in Toronto right now, and the MUCK Festival consistently showing films...
The Movies of Uncommon Knowledge (M.U.C.K.) festival is always good for a few free tickets, rewarding diligent fans with a chance to see thought-provoking films without reaching for the wallet. This Sunday, May 16th, M.U.C.K. presents Justin Pemberton’s 2007 documentary The Nuclear Comeback. To score your free tickets, simply enter the promo code ‘ichannel’ at ticketbreak.com (or follow the buy ticket prompt through the M.U.C.K website, linked above) and print off your free tickets....
So the MUCK Film Festival wrapped it’s first year on Sunday October 4. I’m not sure what the festival directors think of it, but I’d call it a great success. The MUCK Festival (Movies of Uncommon Knowledge for the uninitiated) was a documentary film festival that was designed to spark a specific reaction in its attendees and it did a very good job of it too. You see, when I sat down in the theatre and watched the documentaries chosen by Dr. Stuart Samuels, Festival Director, I didn’t feel like I was being preached at or told how bad I...
‘The World According to Monsanto’ is a very apt name for Marie-Monique Robin’s documentary. Robin’s investigations into the dealings of Monsanto, the giant biotech corporation take her all over the world. From the comfort of her desktop computer to traditional farms in Mexico struggling with mutations in their corn to disgraced scientists in Switzerland to poisoned townsfolk in Alabama, ‘The World According to Monsanto” shows how unbelievably wide-ranging and devastating the effects of Monsanto’s operations are....
Enjoy Poverty is a deeply uncomfortable film. The movie follows the artist Renzo Martens as he travels through the Congo with a hand-held camera, seemingly focusing on issues of poverty. As I watched the documentary, there were many moments where I could feel the audience squirming around me. Some members of the audience shouted at the screen in disgust or disbelief. In my notes, I wrote ‘disturbing,’ ‘uncomfortable’, ‘invasive’, ‘crass’, at various times. It’s a hard movie to watch. Necessary? I’m not sure....
I have a confession to make: I have a deep and almost unnatural love of electronic music. Have for years. I love the way sound builds, I love the way it makes me want to move and I especially love experiencing it with other people who love it. So while I am no longer a partygoer, my interest was particularly piqued by the MUCK Festival’s offering of RIP: A Remix Manifesto. When I arrived, however, I was surprised to find such an intelligent discussion about the rights and wrongs and legals and illegals of copyrights. In fact, I discovered that...
On the surface Fuel is a movie about biofuel, specifically biodiesel. But Fuel is not about biofuel. It’s not even about sustainability as the filmmakers say. Fuel is a movie about one man’s quest to simply get through to people; to put a personal face on a growing problem that huge, ingrained industries continue to quash in favor of profits in the billions of dollars. It is a movie designed not only to show the sheer scale of the issue, to discuss the potential solutions and their ease of implementation, but it is also a movie that hopes you will...
New on the scene this year is the M.U.C.K. Film Festival or “Movies of Un-Common Knowledge” a festival, in the words of its creator Dr. Stuart Samuels, that is designed to, “enlighten, enrage, engage and change us to re-think our point of view of everyday reality,” in hopes that it will “…motivate us to take action.”...
