THE YES MEN FIX THE WORLD
Year: 2009
UK: Dogwoof Pictures
Cast: Andy Bichlbaum, Mike Bonanno (The Yes Men)
Directors: Andy Bichlbaum; Mike Bonanno; Kurt Engfehr
Countries: France / USA
UK: 87 mins
UK Certificate: 12A contains one use of strong language
UK Release Date: 7 August 2009 (Limited Release - London. West End)
UK Distributor
Synopsis
THE YES MEN FIX THE WORLD is a screwball true story that follows a couple of gonzo political activists as they infiltrate the world of big business and pull off outrageous pranks that highlight the ways that corporate greed is destroying the planet. Along the way the duo discover the culprits behind the cult of greed, and in a wildly uplifting ending, they find a way for everyone to defeat the cult and save civilization from its own worst excesses.
(Wes Merchant email 1.7.09)
Directed by the 'Yes Men' (Andy Bichlbaum and Mike Bonanno) in collaboration with BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE and FAHRENHEIT 9/11 editor Kurt Engfehr, who co-directs, THE YES MEN FIX THE WORLD is an hilariously shocking documentary that leads us through the daring political pranks of two gonzo activists as they take on the fake identity of corporate executives in a bid to highlight the greed and brutal selfishness of some of the world's biggest and most powerful multi-national corporations.
THE YES MEN FIX THE WORLD (THE YES MEN, 2009) is a screwball true story that follows a couple of gonzo political activists as they infiltrate the world of big business and pull off outrageous pranks that highlight the ways that corporate greed is destroying the planet. Along the way the duo discover the culprits behind the cult of greed, and in a wildly uplifting ending, they find a way for everyone to defeat the cult and save civilization from its own worst excesses.
After years of doing their thing, the Yes Men pull off a stunt that opens their eyes to exactly how much danger we all face. Andy, purporting to be a Dow Chemical spokesperson, gets on the biggest TV news program in the world and announces that after 20 years of denial, Dow will finally clean up the site of the Bhopal Catastrophe, the largest industrial accident in history. The result: as people worldwide celebrate, Dow's stock value loses two billion dollars. People want Dow to do the right thing, but the market decides that it can't. The reality hits Andy and Mike like a ton of bricks: we have created a market system that makes doing the right thing impossible, and the people who appear to be leading are actually following its pathological dictates. If we keep putting the market in the driver's seat, it could happily drive the whole planet off a cliff.