Shadows of Liberty is a 2012 British documentary film directed by Canadian filmmaker Jean-Philippe Tremblay. The documentary examines the impact of corporate media and concentration of media ownership on journalism and the news. It is based on the book The Media Monopoly by Ben Bagdikian. The film's title is borrowed from a Thomas Paine quote: "When men yield up the privilege of thinking, the last shadow of liberty quits the horizon."
The film portrays the U.S. media, including the major TV networks, as controlled by fewer and larger conglomerates that exercise extraordinary political social and economic power. It is structured around 14 vignettes that allege censorship at the U.S. networks, including the 1996 TWA 800 air disaster controversy and Nike sweatshops in Asia. It also alleges how the investigation of these stories has cost the jobs and in some cases the lives of investigating journalists (as suggested by the case of Gary Webb who committed suicide in 2004). It features interviews with journalists, activists and academics including Amy Goodman, Danny Glover, Julian Assange, Dan Rather, David Simon, Norman Solomon, Robert Baer, Roberta Baskin, Robert W. McChesney, Daniel Ellsberg, Chris Hedges, Deepa Kumar, and Kristina Borjesson.
Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
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