The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED - Length, 74 minutes Daily: 7:00, 9:00 / Saturday, Sunday & Wednesday: 1:00, 3:00, 5:00, 7:00, 9:00 Documentary filmmakers sometimes get lucky. You begin making a film about one thing and, all of a sudden, you’re in the middle of something quite different. It takes more than proximity to make a great documentary though. You have to have the vision and talent to tell the story in a compelling and intelligent fashion. Kim Bartley and Donnacha O’Briain are both lucky and good. They were four months into shooting a film about Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez when they found themselves in the middle of history. Venezuela in early 2002 was a chaotic place. A former general, Chavez had been elected in a landslide and had set out to reform the country’s corrupt oil industry—to redirect the profits of the world’s third-largest oil producing country back to the people of Venezuela. Chavez also made alliances with Fidel Castro and denounced American foreign policy and intervention in other countries. These acts did not endear him to the Venezuelan oligarchy and their cronies in Washington. The opposition controlled five television stations to the government’s one and the media drumbeat against Chavez was steady. After the opposition leader flew to Washington and met with Bush and other administration officials, the opposition media called for demonstrations against Chavez. The people reacted by surrounding the presidential palace to protect him. Snipers opened fire on the crowd, and members of the crowd returned fire. However, the footage shown to the world was edited to eliminate the snipers and give the impression that Chavez’s supporters had shot at themselves. It was the world’s first attempted media coup produced and abetted by the US government. Bartley and O’Briain capture what really happened and how the coup was defeated (including the pitter-patter of little feet scurrying about in DC). The film is by no means propaganda; Bartley and O’Briain had almost unlimited access to all the players in this drama: Chavez, the opposition, and the people of Venezuela. (2003) 74m. www.chavezthefilm.com