Bitter Lake

Mandatory viewing. Curtis knows how to make films.

As before, Curtis unravels the tapestry of cause and effect, politics and finances, power and corruption that has led to an increase of misery and confusion in the world. In this case, the destabilization of the Middle East and its consequences. Like most Curtis docs it will make you feel powerless, angry and emotionally exhausted. The combination of footage, narration and music is still effective, though it will feel very familiar to his previous work. I can't get enough of this stuff though.

Not my favorite Curtis film by any stretch, but at the same time i can't really imagine anyone doing a better job with this subject (to be fair, maybe a little less interesting to me on a personal level than some of his others). I've seen enough of his work that i can see when he falls into a few trademark ticks that always seem to have the intended Curtis effect (a particular combination of evocative imagery, music, and skillful editing always seems to do the trick).

Retreads the same ground explored in Power of Nightmares/The Trap/All Watched Over, but more specific to Wahhabism & the rise of IS. It feels somewhat tired with the "neoliberal politicians are dishonestly simplifying a complex world" mantra (not that it isn't true), I would've preferred a more detailed exploration of the situation of post-Arab Spring Iraq & Syria plus the inner workings/thinking of IS.

I like it when new Curtis film arbitrarily arises. There's little to no fanfare prior & always good content to mull over. Bitter Lake acts like a to the minute history book on the situation unravelling in the western Middle East. Curtis firmly points his cane at the underlying religious driver that seemingly mutated & birthed ISIS, Wahhabism. Other than that, it's a high level look at how great a seat is on the Saudi throne. If you throw your weight around up there, the effect ripples globally.

excited by part of what he's trying to do here, but it's diluted by a less radical agenda. this is expert filmmaking fuelled by vital ideas, teasing out the hidden complexities of modern reality in ways that must at least partially invest the disillusioned/desensitised public intellectually/emotionally... but the narration is needless & seemingly reductive/unsubstantiated/just plain false (or so i gather from some admittedly cursory research), which is especially self-defeating in this context.

God, how we messed up Afghanistan. Such incompetence. A documentary which goes to the core of issues to explain to the ignorant westerner why we haven't create peace in the troubled political chess piece that is Afghanistan. Okay, if one has followed closely this isn't really anything new, but it's an eyeopener to have it pieces together like this to understand in hindsight all the historic malfunction.

I absolutely adore Adam Curtis documentaries and this is probably his best one. It has an amazing aesthetic to it, great music and for a "documentary" is actually gripping.

There's not a lot new here if you've seen a couple of Curtis's others and read a big newspaper in the last 20 years but, I quite like nine inch nails and stock footage.

Adam Curtis is obviously a documentarian gangster, but probably 20-30 minutes could've been cut out from random, completely nonsensical scenes and weird editing. The great weaving of history concerning international involvement in the Middle East is engaging and informative though.

Adam Curtis: "Increasingly, we live in a world where nothing makes any sense."

Jesus fuck. Just kill me now, I'm way too stupid for this.

Takes a while to get going, but wraps up very neatly and presents a fair perspective on the situation.

While it still has all the polemical hallmarks of Curtis' excellent previous films, this one just seemed to drag on much more. It felt like it took forever to get going, and there's so much waiting around watching grainy, badly framed footage that wasn't really making much of a point. When it does make a point, it's fucking terrifying, I just wish the film spent more time doing that instead of waiting for the penny to drop.

Seeing this after the US retreat from Kabul makes it even more compelling. I found the chaotic atmosphere of the editing and the script to be a perfect mirror of the entire political situation in a county constantly in war. The choice of Burial for the credits was just the icing on the cake.

A complex amd eye opening tale about Middle East politics.

Available on BBC iPlayer http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p02gyz6b/adam-curtis-bitter-lake

not quite the overarching parallel vision of THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES, but still a nice documentary. perhaps words such as "imperialism" could have been used more.

Could be so much more radical, thought-provoking and compelling given the subject matter. I know Adam Curtis is associated with leftist documentaries / leftists are said to adore him (I feel almost crazy being a socialist and being highly suspicious of him) but from what I have seen he is closer to centrism than one might think?