Join us this Thursday April 26th in Solidarity Books for a screening of “All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace, Director Adam Curtis” . The latest documentary from Adam Curtis. We will show all three parts with a short interval for tea and cake !

Film description below.
Start time is 8pm.

All welcome, entry is Free and donations are appreciated.

“All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace: How we have been colonised by the machines we have built, Director Adam Curtis

Part 1 Love and Power
Explores the dream that evolved in the 60’s that computers could create a new kind of stable world. The film tells the story of two attempts, one a small group of disciples of novelist / philosopher Ayn Rand in the 1950’s who elevated the ideal of totally selfish desire, the second the Utopian vision attempted by entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley many influenced by Ayn Rand. Ultimately it shows how these ideas lead ruthless capitalists like Alan Greenspan to take control of the financial world and result in our present situation.

Part 2 The Use and Abuse of Vegetational Concepts
This film examines how the idea of self regulating eco systems held dear by modern science is actually a machine fantasy based on cybernetic ideas projected onto nature in the 1950s, and taken up by hippy communities and counter culture computer scientists in the 1960’s and 1970’s.

Part 3 The Monkey in the Machine and the Machine in the Monkey
The final film looks at why we find this machine vision so beguiling by telling the story of Bill Hamilton who pioneered the idea that human beings are machines programmed to pass on genes. In typical Adam Curtis style it weaves together many seemingly disparate characters and elements set against the background of political upheaval in the Congo to show how our disillusionment and loss of hope in political change has lead to choosing to believe we have no control over our destiny.  ”

If you have not seen the work of Adam Curtis before you are in for a treat !

trailer:
http://vimeo.com/27393748

related links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Watched_Over_by_Machines_of_Loving_Grace_(TV_series)