Let's Make Money

Although its title suggests a get-rich-fast instructional DVD, Let's Make Money is actually a disturbing exploration of the “new” global capitalism, in which public and personal investment dollars travel through the worldwide financial system and end up lining the pockets of the well-to-do, with unforeseen costs in the form of mass migrations, ecological degradation, and even war. Director Erwin Wagenhofer journeys to various locales to reveal the wicked ways in which profligate spending exacerbates the chasm between the haves and have-nots, as assorted talking heads explain the inner workings of international finance and government policy in an environment of market deregulation, relaxed credit, and privatization of public facilities. A segment about the African cotton industry, for instance, illustrates the coercive nature of the largely U.S.-controlled World Bank, while another reports that a gold mine in Ghana relies on grueling local labor, although 97 percent of the profits go to Western interests. Also on display are German companies exploiting cheap workers and public tax money in India, and privately owned, publicly funded resort hotels in Spain that are largely vacant but harbor enough unused golf courses to suck up water that would supply 20,000 people. One of the most disturbing interviews in the film is with a former CIA “economic hit man” who divulges the real reasons why the U.S. used military force to depose Saddam Hussein. In the subtly sinister tradition of anti–big business “scare” documentaries such as The Corporation (VL-11/04), this economic horror film is both shocking and revelatory. Highly recommended. Aud: C, P. (M. Sandlin)