by Dan Berman (Guest Critic)

The Corporation is a fascinating, powerful and no-holds barred film that targets the major brand name businesses of corporate America. It’s focus and motivations are relentless, and it mercilessly critiques major marketers.

No wonder it features none other than today’s contemporary guru of the left, Michael Moore of Fahrenheit 9/11 and Bowling for Columbine fame, plus the bete noires of corporate America, Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky, each of whom makes a guest appearance in the movie recently aired at The Coolidge Corner Theatre, Brookline.

On July 13th, 2004 the advanced screening of the award-winning documentary The Corporation was shown. The film documents the rise and fall of the corporate empire and how brand name companies have become everyday household items. The corporate world can make an individual a very wealthy and successful businessman, the film shows, raking in possibly millions of U.S. dollars. The Corporation attempts to disclose the historical beginnings of modern day capitalism. According to the film, the word ?corporate? gained currency back in World War I at the start of the Twentieth Century, giving birth to the term, ?the corporate world". Who knew then what it would do during the next 100 years of growth? The meaning of the word ?corporate? in everyday business lingo would certainly surprise the industrial barons of that day today.

The film goes through the creation and development of some of our most respected companies. How well do we know what is happening in the background, the film asks? According to the critique, the people who buy, work, or even sell products feel that the powers to be within that company have become money hungry. It’s to the point, says the filmmaker, to where the corporation feels that corporate power often is a license to do as it sees fit. Certainly, corporate scandals have been front-page news in the last few years. But The Corporation goes beyond accounting scandals and tries to bring to light a disturbing look into the belittling of people and what happens when a company becomes heartless in their actions. The corporation itself becomes destructive even to the point of what might be called a psychopathic personality, argues the filmmaker. This power, it says, has lead to numerous scandals and ruin. It’s truly a look at the dark side of corporate giants, which too often seemingly have no regard for the harmful consequences of their actions.

Dan Berman