Bitter Lake (2015)

Politicians used to have the confidence to tell us stories that made sense of the chaos of world events. But now there are no big stories and politicians react randomly to every new crisis - leaving us bewildered and disorientated.

Bitter Lake is an adventurous and epic film by Adam Curtis that explains why the big stories that politicians tell us have become so simplified that we can’t really see the world any longer.

The narrative goes all over the world, America, Britain, Russia and Saudi Arabia - but the country at the heart of it is Afghanistan. Because Afghanistan is the place that has confronted our politicians with the terrible truth - that they cannot understand what is going on any longer.

The film reveals the forces that over the past thirty years rose up and undermined the confidence of politics to understand the world. And it shows the strange, dark role that Saudi Arabia has played in this.

But Bitter Lake is also experimental. Curtis has taken the unedited rushes of everything that the BBC has ever shot in Afghanistan - and used them in new and radical ways.

He has tried to build a different and more emotional way of depicting what really happened in Afghanistan. A counterpoint to the thin, narrow and increasingly destructive stories told by those in power today.

www.bbc.co.uk
Media Literacy   War & Peace
Rate this video 
War & Peace
Trending Videos
Louis Theroux: The Settlers (2025)
62 min - Fourteen years after his first visit and 2011 film The Ultra Zionists, Louis Theroux meets some of the growing community of religious-nationalist Israelis who have settled in the West Bank.Louis...
Chicago 10 (2008)
98 min - Protesters and activists in the face of an oppressive and armed government speak out and take a stand, and after being denied permits for demonstrations they repeatedly clashed with the Chicago...
Food Inc. (2008) ($3)
93 min - For most Americans, the ideal meal is fast, cheap, and tasty. Food, Inc. examines the costs of putting value and convenience over nutrition and environmental impact.Director Robert Kenner explores...
Hey Corporate America, THIS Is What Happens When You Piss Off a Rapper And His Friends
6 min - Food Fight is the story of a kid who lives in a world where the food at the local corner store is killing his neighborhood -- literally. SHARE IT? Accompanying FREE CURRICULUM, LYRICS & SONG...
Media Finally Admits: Israel Is Committing Genocide In Gaza, As US Corporations Profit
29 min - The New York Times finally admitted Israel is carrying out a genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza, in an article by an Israeli scholar who studies the Holocaust. A United Nations report...
Exposing a Global Economy of Genocide | Francesca Albanese
59 min - Just two days after we sat down with Francesca Albanese, the Trump Administration placed her under sanctions. They accuse the UN Special Rapporteur of waging economic warfare on the United States...
Trending Articles
Climate Change Documentaries
Subscribe for $5/mo to Watch over 50 Patron-Exclusive Films
Subscribe $5/mo View All Patron Films

 

Your support keeps us ad-free and financially independent

Our 10,000+ video & article library is 99% free, ad-free, and entirely community-funded thanks to our patron subscribers!


Want to double your impact? You can subscribe for $10/mo or more as an extra show of support.