The Real Game of Missing Money: Movies and Documentaries
“You do not actually think they spend $20,000 on a hammer or $30,000 on a toilet seat, Mr. President?” ~ Independence Day scene at Area 51
Movies
Independence Day (1997)
Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
Roman Polanski’s horror masterpiece predates most of the other devil possession movies. The titular Rosemary is going through a difficult pregnancy while slowly realizing that her friends and neighbors are not exactly what they seem to be. The supernatural in this story can easily be replaced by a human invigilation and politically motivated deceit.
The Parallax View (1974)
Warren Beatty stars as an investigative reporter who looks into an assassination of a U.S. senator, only to discover a vast conspiracy involving a major international corporation that is responsible for many shocking world headlines. This is one of the early, good Deep State movies, long before the subject became so ubiquitous.
Wall Street (1987)
When a U.S. president goes into a coma, his double, Dave, takes over the official duties, only to wreak havoc on the ruthless way the governmental business is normally run. Dave is a gentle everyman who brings humanity and common sense to the White House, much to the dismay of his presidential staff and the amusement of audiences.
Contact (1997)
Jodie Foster stars as an astronomer seeking contact with extraterrestrial intelligence via a SETI-like program. Her scientific approach is on a collision course with a famous pastor’s search for truth in religion. Their beliefs get upended when a message from deep space provides a blueprint for a machine that enables contact with the other civilization. A very intelligent story (based on Carl Sagan’s novel), in which—for once—aliens are not horrifying creatures but a higher intelligence that wants to communicate rather than to destroy.
Scene on how the government spends our money:
Wag the Dog (1997)
To cover a presidential sex scandal just before an election, a White House spin doctor (Robert de Niro) hires a Hollywood producer (Dustin Hoffman) to fabricate a war with Albania by creating a convincing footage. The movie was released in December, 1997—one month before Bill Clinton’s Lewinsky scandal broke.
Scene on “how to go to war”:
Rogue Trader (1999)
The film tells one of the most shocking stories in the history of finance, which is by now a classic example taught in any finance course. It’s the tale of a trader from Barings Bank’s branch in Singapore, who single-handedly brought down a venerated British bank through his unsupervised trades in options and futures, losing $50 million in one day.
Eyes Wide Shut (1999)
Trailer:
A masked initiation scene:
Stanley Kubrick’s last masterpiece with Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman as a couple who embark on sexual and moral discovery. The doctor’s one-night odyssey takes him into the world of secret societies, which he did not even suspect of existing in modern-day New York. The movie’s release was a 1999 scandal due to overt sexual scenes that were only available in the international version of the movie.
Erin Brockovich (2000)
The movie that earned Julia Roberts an Oscar also resonated with audiences in its portrayal of Ms. Brockovich, a real-life crusader against corporate greed and moral indifference. The film tells the story of an uneducated mother who takes on litigation against an ecological disaster caused by a big corporation.
Watch the iconic scene of an attempted settlement:
Traffic (2000)
The anatomy of drug trafficking in 1990s America. A conservative judge who has a presidential mission to lead a war against drugs discovers that his own daughter is a crack addict. A wife of a drug boss tries to continue the family business while he is in jail. DEA agents are protecting their informant. Nothing is black and white in this story, and lawmen are as tainted as the criminals.
Taken (2002, 1 season)
https://youtube.com/watch?v=rSBQ_61H4_4
Produced by Steven Spielberg, this miniseries spans four generations in the life of several families. A WWII soldier is abducted by aliens during the war; the Roswell incident transforms another man from an Air Force captain into an evil conspirator; another woman is impregnated by an alien visitor. As the decades go by, the heirs of each of these people are affected by aliens’ plans and manipulation.
The Day After Tomorrow (2004)
A series of climate disasters plunge the world into a new Ice Age. While the world is slowly freezing to death, corporations and governments fight for access to information and the means to escape south.
Syriana (2005)
A very personal project for George Clooney, the 2005 cinematic bombshell of a movie was based on a memoir, “See No Evil,” written by former CIA operative Robert Baer. Clooney, who executive-produced the film, made no secret of his political fist-shaking in this fearless story that tackles global oil corruption, roots of fundamentalism, and governmental collusion.
The Good Shepherd (2006)
Matt Damon stars as a man who only wants to do good but eventually finds that honor and discretion are not enough when his employment follows from OSS to the CIA. The film portrays the intelligence organization through the life vicissitudes of one man. There is an iconic scene of Joe Pesci’s character talking to the quiet CIA man (Damon) who actually runs things here.
Michael Clayton (2007)
George Clooney stars here as a fixer, brought in by a law firm when one of their own has a suspicious breakdown during a negotiation involving a chemical company. With billions at stake, bodies soon follow.
The International (2009)
An Interpol agent attempts to expose a major bank’s role in international arms dealing. We get to watch war, arms dealing, a corrupt global banking system, and Clive Owen.
In the Loop (2009)
A political satire about a group of skeptical American and British operatives attempting to prevent a war between two countries. An idealistic staffer for a new presidential candidate gets a crash course on dirty politics during his stint on the campaign trail.
2012 (2009)
Another helping of a disaster scenario from Independence Day director Roland Emmerich. The scenario: shifting poles cause massive floods. The chosen few: government leaders, the world’s billionaires, military brass from superpower countries, and some service workers. They will get spots on modern arks while the world perishes. There is a great scene of some Saudi princes, Russian oligarchs, and the Queen of England with her corgis all boarding the ship together. The rich and mighty will always be saved.
Margin Call (2011)
The official description—“the story follows key people at an investment bank, over a 24-hour period, during the early stages of the 2008 financial crisis”—could not be duller, but Margin Call actually offers fascinating insight into the Lehman Brothers collapse and the 2008 bank wipeout.
Too Big to Fail (2011)
This HBO movie chronicles the 2008 financial meltdown, with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson as the focus of the story.
The Ides of March (2011)
An idealistic staffer for a new presidential candidate gets a crash course on dirty politics during his stint on the campaign trail. This star-studded political drama featured George Clooney, Ryan Gosling, Paul Giamatti, and Philip Seymour Hoffman.
Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
A tour-de-force satirical tale of the rise and fall of a penny stockbroker who rises to the top of the Wall Street food chain. An explosive cocktail of corruption, drugs, and sex, portrayed fearlessly by Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill, Margot Robbie, and Matthew McConaughey.
The Big Short (2015)
Scenes from the movie:
A group of investors bet against the U.S. mortgage market two years before the crash. Director Adam McKay (who in 2018 made the brilliant Dick Cheney exposé Vice—see below) uses comedy, direct-to-audience explainers by Margot Robbie and Selena Gomez, and a plethora of stars—from Brad Pitt to Ryan Gosling—to explain to the American public the great real estate scam of 2008.
Equity (2016)
This movie is unusual in putting the female characters front and center in the story of a central banker (Anna Gunn) who has to climb back to the top after a failed IPO, and who has to untangle a corruption scandal that threatens to take her down again.
Eye in the Sky (2015)
Helen Mirren stars as a British army colonel who commands a drone operation to capture terrorists in Kenya, but at the price of harming civilians, triggering a US-UK dispute over the implications of modern warfare.
Vice (2018)
The political movie of the year in 2018. Christian Bale outdoes himself in this chilling portrayal of Dick Cheney’s rise from an unassuming, laid-back bureaucrat to the real power behind George W. Bush for the eight years that irreparably changed both the U.S. and global politics. Sam Rockwell, Steve Carell, and Amy Adams round up the cast of this comedy-drama from director Adam McKay (The Big Short).
Designated Survivor (2016- )
If you want to see the latest film version of the White House’s underground tunnels and the secret command center, watch the opening episode of a popular TV series that has a low-grade official suddenly become the new U.S. president when the entire American government gets wiped out in a terrorist attack.
Billions (2016- )
A new TV show that mixes power and finance in the hub of it all—New York. The conflict between a smart U.S. attorney and an ambitious hedge fund king provides the axis of this saga of money and influence.
Honorable mentions:
GoldenEye (1995)
Bond has to stop a villain from using a satellite weapon system that could fire an electromagnetic pulse toward Earth.
Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
The villain uses satellites to sow discord between China and Britain.
DOCUMENTARIES and VIDEOS
Disclosure Project—National Press Club (2001)
https://youtube.com/watch?v=cKDQ_dpdOjE
The Disclosure Project is a research project aiming to fully disclose the facts about UFOs, extraterrestrial intelligence, and classified advanced energy. The first public Sirius Disclosure event in 2001 included Dr. Greer’s introductory remarks at a gathering of military, police, FAA, CIA, and NSA professionals sharing their UFO experiences.
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (2005)
One of the most famous financial documentaries, the movie examines the downfall of Enron—an energy trading company that was built on corrupt business practices, brought an energy crisis to the state of California, and left 20,000 people jobless overnight.
No End in Sight (2007)
Talking heads in this documentary on the Iraq invasion include some Bush administration insiders and military personnel on the ground in Baghdad—all of them relating the arrogance and ineptitude of the decision-makers.
The Ascent of Money (2008)
This six-part PBS documentary series explains the official financial history of the world.
Capitalism: A Love Story (2009)
This Michael Moore documentary looks into the price a society (meaning us) pays for the pursuit of happiness by corporations.
Inside Job (2010)
Interviews with bankers, political figures, insiders, analysts, and journalists provide an in-depth analysis of the 2008 financial meltdown.
Top Secret America (2011)
A conversation with former FBI agent and whistleblower Coleen Rowley concerning “Why Top Secret America Misfires.” The Washington Post’s in-depth story on “Top Secret America” examines post-9/11 secret intelligence projects and the fact that major corporations are moving away from production to providing services and staffing for military projects.
ESF video series (2011)
https://youtube.com/watch?v=qTEFVwCNYfc
This is Eric deCarbonnel’s five-video series on the U.S. Treasury’s Exchange Stabilization Fund (ESF)—the government agency that controls the Federal Reserve, runs the CIA’s black budget, and is the architect of the world’s monetary system (IMF, World Bank, etc.). DeCarbonnel charts ESF involvement in virtually every major U.S. scandal since the ESF’s creation in 1934: the London gold pool, the Kennedy assassinations, the Iran-Contra affair, CIA drug trafficking, HIV, and others.
Mirage Men (2013)
Mirage Men describes how the U.S. government created a UFO myth as a powerful weapon of mass deception to cover up clandestine technologies and operations. People who manufactured this mythology and those who fell a victim to these deceptions tell their stories about this shadow world.
Global Financial Meltdown (2013)
https://youtube.com/watch?v=VQzEWeGJLP0
An independent documentary on the cause of the 2008 financial crisis.
Der Banker: Master of the Universe (2013)
A 2013 documentary where a German banker is chillingly straightforward when he shares his knowledge of modern banking’s power to prop or topple entire national economies.
Conference presentations include issues of interstellar travel, UFO encounters with the world’s militaries, the black budget, cosmic war, the secret space program, and others.
2014 Presentations:
Catherine Austin Fitts: “The Black Budget—What Does It Mean to U.S. Federal Budget, the Economy, and You?”
Joseph P. Farrell: “Bullion, Brains, and Bonds”
Joseph P. Farrell: “UFO, the Tower of Babel Moment, and Space Collateralization”
Richard Dolan: “UFO Encounters with the World Militaries: Implications”
Jon Rappoport: ”Mind Control, the Space Program, and the Secret Theater of Reality”
2015 Presentations:
Joseph P. Farrell: “Cosmic War, Cosmic Versailles”
Joseph P. Farrell: “Cosmic Versailles, Cosmic Tribute, and Cosmic War”
A documentary on Great Britain’s inner circle of power through a web of offshore tax havens that help the rich and powerful across the world to amass wealth, control political and financial outcomes, and build up more wealth through offshore companies in ex-British colonies and islands like Jersey.
In her position as treasurer of the city of Dixon, Illinois, Rita Crundwell forced cuts to the police budget and made staff reductions, all while defrauding the city of $50 million to fund her lavish parties, world travel, and a hobby of horse breeding. A landmark 2012 court case throws light on the total negligence of overseers who allowed the largest municipal fraud in U.S. history.
Dirty Money (2018)
Documentary stories exposing corporate greed, corruption, and other crimes of global capitalism.
