Audiovisual Resources in Houston Area

This catalogue is a work in progress. You can help by sending in information about AV holdings in your possession that you are willing to lend out, or about other sources (in-town or out-of-town) of AV resources of interest to peace and justice activists. Please use the entries below as a model for creating your entries. Send them to hpjc@ev1.net.

• Economic Justice/ Global Economics
• Environment
• Militarism/U.S. Foreign Policy
• Nonviolence/Peacemaking
• Miscellaneous
• Key to abbreviations indicating where the materials may be accessed
• Online sources of AV materials

Economic Justice/ Global Economics

The New Rulers of the World (Bullfrog Films, 2001), 53 mins. VHS Award-winning journalist John Pilger turns the spotlight on Indonesia, a country described by the World Bank as a model pupil until its globalized economy collapsed in 1998. The film examines the use of sweatshop factories by famous brand names, and asks some penetrating questions. Who are the real beneficiaries of the globalized economy? Pilger also travels to Washington, asking challenging questions and exposing the scandal of globalization, including revealing interviews with top officials of the World Bank and the IMF. Who really rules the world now? Is it governments or a handful of huge companies? HIC
The Global Banquet: Politics of Food (Maryknoll World Productions, 2001), 2 parts, 25 mins. each. VHS How global food corporations use free trade policies to control food production in the Third World. VHS. MH

Global Village or Global Pillage (1999), 28 mins. Narrated by Ed Asner. VHS How elite economic globalization creates a "race to the bottom" in which countries compete for jobs by paying exploiting labor, weakening health and safety regulations, and destroying the environment. Features well-known labor, consumer, and human rights activists. MH, BH

Who’s Counting?: Marilyn Waring on Sex, Lies & Global Economics (Bullfrog Films, 1996), 52 mins. VHS Emphasizes what’s omitted from the benefits of the global economy, including the unpaid labor of women. MH, HIC

Argentina: Hope in Hard Times (Moving Images Video Project, 2004), 74 mins. VHS After neo-liberalism and the IMF threw Argentina into a severe depression, the people picked up the pieces of their devastated economy and creating new possibilities for the future. The filmmakers joined in the processions and protests, attended street-corner neighborhood assemblies, visited workers' cooperatives and urban gardens, capturing the heartache and hard times, then a resurgence of grassroots democracy and the spirit of community. A hopeful example for the rest of us. HIC
Pavements of Gold (Television Trust for the Environment , 2002), 27 mins. VHS Urban poverty is one of the biggest challenges facing the world in the 21st century. In 1950, three hundred million people were living in urban areas; by 2001 that figure had increased to 2.85 billion, or almost half the world's population. And the flow of rural migrants arriving in the world's mega cities shows no signs of slowing down. With the backdrop of Lima, Peru, this film examines the enduring magnetism of big cities and asks whether the migrants who have moved here now feel that city life is the answer to their dreams. HIC

Thirst (Alan Snitow and Deborah Kaufman, 2004), 62 mins. Population growth, pollution, and scarcity are turning water into "blue gold," the oil of the 21st century. Global corporations are rushing to gain control of this dwindling natural resource, producing intense conflict in the US and worldwide where people are dying in battles over control of water. The film examines struggles in three communities: Bolivia’s Cochabamba, India's Rajasthan state, and Stockton, California. HIC
This Land is Our Land: The struggle for land in Brazil (Educational Media Collection, 1990 ), 28 mins. VHS Some family farmers are displaced by huge dams; others face bank foreclosures; still others camp out for years in plastic tents to pressure the government to release unused land owned by a small minority. Corporate and agribusiness interests are forcing farmers off their land, often with violence resulting in bloodshed. MH Also in DVD. BH

Something to Hide (National Labor Committee, 1999), 25 mins. VHS The way corporations hide the reality of their production facilities, including the gross abuse of the workers. This documentary focuses on a 1998 visit to El Salvador's maquila apparel factories by a group of university students and Charles Kernaghan of the National Labor Committee, one of the sponsors of this video. The students find a host of contradictions awaiting them, among them the so-called "free trade" manufacturing zones festooned with razor wire and ringed by rifle-toting guards. BH
The Hidden Face of Globalization: What Corporations Don’t Want Us to Know (National Labor Committee, 2003), 34 mins. VHS This is a documentary on the lives & working conditions of Walt Disney's Bangladeshi factory workers and the economic conditions of corporate globalization. BH
Banking on Life and Debt (Maryknoll World Productions, 1995), 28 mins. Narrated by Martin Sheen. VHS How international debt allows First World financial and corporate powers to control developing nations’ land, labor, and resources for the benefit of multinational elites. Three nations are used as examples: Ghana, Brazil, and the Philippines. MH, BH

Cancel the Debt Now! (Jubilee 2000), 22 mins. Narrated by Julie Harris. VHS From a review by Margaret Doyle in Yes! Magazine: "Cancel the Debt Now! shows how the desperate living conditions and environmental degradation of poor countries are magnified by the debts they owe to the rich, industrial nations. It explains the origins of the debt and delivers an emphatic message calling for its cancellation." MH, BH

The Human Cost Behind Bargain Shopping (NBC Dateline, 2005), 32 mins. VHS A hidden camera investigation into working conditions in Bangladesh reveals how the cheap goods Americans buy at their discount stores are paid for by the suffering of exploited Third World workers. BH

Wal-Mart: The high cost of low price (Robert Greenwald for Brave New Films, 2005), 97 mins. DVD Uses personal stories to explain how the world’s biggest employer uses people and destroys communities. BH

Trade Secrets: The Hidden Costs of the FTAA (John F. Henning Center for International Labor Relations, 2002 ), 16 mins. VHS Narrated by Mike Farrell. VHS The Free Trade of the Americas Agreement would extend NAFTA to the rest of the Western Hemisphere (except for Cuba). It would be the most far-reaching free trade agreement ever negotiated. This documentary examines how NAFTA does, and FTAA would, impact workers' rights, the environment, and our democracy. MH
The Other Side (2002), 27 mins. VHS Immigration and free trade issues. HIC

Environment

Arctic Quest: Our Search for Truth, (Jeff Barrie, 2000). 56 mins. VHS Five high school students go to Alaska to learn the truth about oil exploration in the Arctic and its environmental toll. Many Alaskan resident interviewed support the destruction because of the jobs. Includes an interview with energy conservation expert Amory Lovins. BH

Kilowatt Ours: A Plan to Re-energize America (Jeff Barrie, 2005), 38 mins. VHS The documentary follows the quest of filmmaker Barrie as he documents the negative effects of coal and nuclear energy production while he teaches consumers about renewable power and how conservation will cut their personal costs. MH

Affluenza (John de Graaf and Vivia Boe, 1997), 56 mins. VHS Diagnoses the "disease" of materialism and prescribes its antidote, simple living. The film uses personal stories, expert commentary, hilarious old film clips, and "uncommercial" breaks to illuminate the nature and extent of the disease. HIC

Drumbeat for Mother Earth (Produced by Joseph Di Gangi et al. for Indigenous Environmental Network and Greenpeace, 2000), 54 mins. VHS Many scientists and tribal people consider persistent toxic chemicals to be the greatest threat to the long-term survival of Indigenous Peoples. "Drumbeat for Mother Earth" explores how these chemicals contaminate the traditional food web, violate treaty rights, travel long distances, and are passed from one generation to the next during pregnancy causing cancer, learning disabilities, and other serious health problems. HIC

Hopi Land (Bullfrog Films, 2001), 29 mins. VHS Across the USA, Native Americans are struggling to protect their sacred places. In Black Mesa, the Peabody Coal Company strip-mine pumps three million gallons per day of drinking-quality underground water for a coal slurry line, threatening precious desert springs. For the Hopi, their covenant with God to protect the land of their forefathers, ceremony and water are the central elements of their sense of the sacred. From the Hopi point of view, their culture and livelihood are being sacrificed for Peabody's coal. HIC

Militarism/U.S. Foreign Policy

The Long Road to War (a PBS Frontline special), 2003. 2 hrs. VHS How the U.S. went to war in Iraq. BH

Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear, and the Selling of American Empire (The Media Education Foundation, 2004). VHS 64 mins. Narrated by Julian Bond. An explanation of modern American empire, neo-conservatism as a driving force for the current Bush administration, and an economic analysis of what is driving our current "global war on terror." Covers the curtailment of civil liberties and other items on the Bush social agenda that the "crisis" allowed him to push through. Includes interviews with Scott Ritter, Daniel Ellsberg, Noam Chomsky, and others. BH

Breaking the Silence: Truth and Lies in the War on Terror (Bullfrog Films, 2003), 52 mins. VHS Award-winning journalist John Pilger investigates the discrepancies between American and British claims for the 'war on terror' and the facts on the ground as he finds them in Afghanistan and Washington, DC. While President Bush refers to the US attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq as two 'great victories', Pilger asks the question - victories over whom, and for what purpose? Pilger describes Afghanistan as a country "more devastated than anything I have seen since Pol Pot's Cambodia." He finds that Al-Qaida has not been defeated and that the Taliban is re-emerging. And of the "victory" in Iraq, he asks: "Is this Bush's Vietnam?" HIC

What I’ve Learned About U.S. Foreign Policy: The War Against the Third World, 2hrs. DVD Covert and overt interventions in Third World nations. Based on interviews with leading activists such as Coretta Scott King and Ramsey Clark. BH

The Trials of Henry Kissinger (First Run Features, 2002), 80 mins. Documents the war crimes of the architect of Richard Nixon’s foreign policy. VHS BH

School of Assassins (Maryknoll World Productions, 1995), 18 mins. Narrated by Susan Sarandon. VHS Introduction to the notorious U.S. Army training school of Latin American officers, originally called School of the Americas, renamed Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. Dedicated to repressing all movements toward social and economic justice and participatory democracy, the SOA/WHINSEC’s graduates are a virtual roll call of Latin American dictators and their murderous henchmen. Features Roy Bourgeois MM, founder of School of the Americas Watch. MH

Hidden in Plain Sight (Maryknoll World Productions, 2003), 71 mins. Narrated by Martin Sheen. VHS This updated and expanded version of the original documentary presents different points of view which illuminate the turbulent reality of Latin America, demystify the policy-making process, and shed light on some of the most complex and urgent problems facing us today. Noted scholars Noam Chomsky, Eduardo Galeano, Christopher Hitchens, and Michael Parenti broaden the debate about the SOA/WHISC to include such subjects as militarism, corporate globalization, national security, and international terrorism. Included are personal accounts from victims of the U.S.-abetted violence and repression in Latin America. MH

Nonviolence/Peacemaking

A Force More Powerful (PBS, 2000), 3 hours in 6 parts. VHS Narrated by Ben Kingsley. Explores the effectiveness of nonviolent resistance to oppression. The six case studies are Gandhi’s campaign to free India from British rule, the Nashville sit-in movement to end racial segregation, the South African campaign against apartheid, the Danish resistance to the Nazi occupation, the Solidarity movement in Poland, and the nonviolent overthrow of the Pinochet tyranny in Chile. , it premiered on PBS in September 2000. BH

Approach of Dawn: Portraits of Mayan Women Forging Peace in Guatemala (1997), 52 mins. VHS Stirring portraits of three Mayan women and their efforts on behalf of peace during the 36-year civil war in which the Guatemalan government, with support of the U.S. and CIA, sought to eradicate guerilla resistance using murder, persecution, rape, and torture on a Mayan majority rural population. Adela, a widow, bravely sustains her refugee family. Justina tirelessly travels the countryside explaining the human rights movement to fellow villagers. Francesca, a Mayan priestess, reaffirms the cultural identity of her people. MH

Where There is Hatred (1990), 57 mins. VHS The impact of nonviolent strategies in Chile, the Philippines, Palestine, and Eastern Europe. MH

Miscellaneous

From One Blood: The Story of Gernt Wolfaart (2003) 45 mins. DVD The story of an Afrikaaner who moves from hatred to healing, from apartheid to love. BH

Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism (a Robert Greenwald film, 2004), 77 mins. DVD Explores the way the owner of Fox News subverted the profession. Includes interviews with former Fox News Channel employees and the inter-office memos they provided. BH

Peace Propaganda and the Promised Land: U.S. Media and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (2004), 2 parts, 80 mins. and 66 mins. DVD Clips from U.S. and British news media plus interviews with Noam Chomsky, Robert Fisk, Bob Jensen and others. BH

Precarious Place: God and Guatemala (Gateway Films, 2003), 2 parts, 72 mins. total. DVD "A case study of violence and hope", as the jacket of the video states. Guatemala has been a land of violence and injustice for at least 500 years. The first part of this documentary details the sad story of violence in Guatemala. The second part of the video discusses the role of the churches in Guatemala - both as contributors to the violence and as signs of hope for a better future. MH

Key to abbreviations indicating where the materials may be accessed

HIC = Houston Institute for Culture, 713.521.3686, info@houstonculture.org
MH = Maryknoll House, 2360 Rice Blvd., 713.529.1912
BH = Brenda Hardt, 979.830.0136, bbhardt@academicplanet.com