52:52The Light Bulb Conspiracy investigates the history of Planned Obsolescence--the deliberate shortening of product life span to guarantee consumer demand--by charting its beginnings in the 1920s with a cartel set up expressly to limit the life span of light bulbs, right up to present-day products involving cutting edge electronics such as the iPod. The film travels to France, Germany, Spain and the US to find witnesses of a business practice which has become the basis of the modern economy, and brings back graphic pictures from Ghana where discarded electronics are piling up in huge cemeteries for electronic waste, causing intense environmental destruction and health problems.
At the time of making this film, the year 2000, computer games represented a $6 billion a year industry, and one out of every ten households in the United States owned a Sony Playstation—numbers that have no-doubt since skyrocketed. Back then, children played an average of ten hours per week—a stat also since to have increased today—and yet, despite capturing the attention of millions of these kids, video games remain one of the least scrutinized cultural industries. Game Over seeks to address this fastest growing segment of the media, through engaging questions of gender, race and violence. Game Over offers a much needed dialogue about the complex and controversial topic of video game violence, and is designed to encourage viewers to think critically about the games they play.
1:25:09Mirage Men examines evidence of a conspiracy by the United States military to fabricate UFO folklore over decades in order to deflect attention away from classified military projects. The film profiles a retired Special Agent, Richard Doty, who worked for the United States Department of the Air Force Office of Special Investigations, and the United States Air Force Office of Special Investigation, and speaks about his role in special operations that targeted both individual people, and the public at large for many years. The film also weaves in the viewpoints of others, either in the sphere of the myths, or working to uncover their origins.