Miss Liberty's Film & Documentary World

Nestor Almendros — born October 30, 1930 — is best known for his cinematography. He was indeed the favorite cameraman for directors Eric Rohmer and Francois Truffaut and was nominated for four Academy Awards for cinematography (Sophie’s Choice, The Blue Lagoon, Kramer vs. Kramer, and Days of Heaven). However, he also directed two powerful documentaries that together blew a hole in the side of the left’s tidy pro-Castro narrative, revealing the horrors of Cuba’s socialist revolution and the country’s shocking abuse of its gay community. One of these films — Improper Conduct — is included in the top 25 list of Best Libertarian Documentaries.

Almendros released Improper Conduct in 1984. This brilliant documentary ripped the lid off of Cuba’s until-then hidden anti-gay atrocities in such an exhaustive and credible way as to command respect from all corners of the political spectrum. Even the New York Times had to reluctantly admit “The movie’s tone is civilized, but the testimony is as savage as it’s convincing.” Improper Conduct won the Grand Prize at the 12th annual International Human Rights Festival.

The particular genius of the film is that it used the testimony of actual Cuban refugees, dozens of them, to gradually build a damning and irrefutable picture of what it’s like to live in a “worker’s paradise.” Through their stories, the viewer learns something of recent Cuban history: the revolution gone bad, the implementation of socialism, the exodus of a full ten percent of the population, the concentration camps, the Orwellian way of life.

Note: the full documentary can typically be found online via YouTube, Online, or Vimeo search.

This film was followed three years later in 1987 with Nobody Listened, a second documentary about the untold horrors Castro had inflicted on the Cuban people. The title reflects Almendros’ dismay that media elites in the West seemed to have no interest in covering what he was reporting.

Nestor Almendros unfortunately died in 1992, at age 61, before he could see that he had won after all. In the years following his two films, more stories gradually came out backing up his claims, including that of Cuban writer Reinaldo Arenas, whose experience under the Castro regime was retold in the Johnny Depp film Before Night Falls. Finally, in 2010, before Castro died, he was forced to admit it was all true.

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Cameron Hawley — born September 19, 1905 — was an American fiction writer. Although he published only a few books, two of them were turned into films: Cash McCall and Executive Suite. Both films are unusual for their Randian tone and strongly pro-capitalism character. Cash McCall, the better of the two, took the top prize of Best Libertarian Picture at the First International Libertarian Film Festival.

In 1954, Hawley’s book Executive Suite was released as a film, and with an all star cast: William Holden, June Allyson, and Barbara Stanwyck.

Executive Suite opens with the sudden death of a furniture company’s president. His unexpected demise creates a power vacuum within the company’s management. The firm’s head accountant, a calculating, politically astute man, moves quickly to fill the void. But his policy of making short-term profits at the expense of the company’s long-term prospects, and his general lack of vision, have already been causing damage.

Among the few who understand this is a research scientist, who enters the fray to oppose him. In the scientist’s decisive speech at the end of the film, he argues, as Rand would, that people are not motivated simply by money but by pride; that both money and pride are the product of genuine accomplishment; and that to try to take short cuts to money (by producing shoddy merchandise, as had been advocated by the head accountant) would in the end produce neither the pride needed to motivate the company’s workers nor maximum profitability.

The implied maxim — that doing your best is the correct path to self-benefit — will appeal to libertarians, and amounts to the moral flip side of Adam Smith’s observation that people intending only their own self-interest tend to benefit others “as though led by an invisible hand.”

This was followed five years later with Cash McCall, probably one of the most Randian films ever made and a film that remains popular with libertarians now more than half a century later. It’s a genuine capitalist morality story and a pointed attack on envy. The film stars James Garner and Natalie Wood.

The hero here is Cash McCall, an ingenious businessman who creates value by buying and reorganizing troubled companies. His success has made him the object of envy, and his willingness to sometimes shut down and liquidate hopelessly unprofitable firms, with all the attendant social costs, has made him the object of hate. But he makes no apologies, frequently saying things like: “I don’t belong in the ‘better circles.’ I’m a thoroughly vulgar character. I enjoy making money.”

Most of the story surrounds McCall’s purchase of a small, troubled plastics molding company. McCall quickly solves the company’s problems and is set to reap the associated gain. News of the quick profit gets back to the company’s former owner, Grant Austen, who in turn feels McCall cheated him by paying him less than his company was really worth, and who therefore threatens to sue. (Woven into all this is a secondary story of a romance between McCall and Austen’s daughter.) McCall is a very ethical person and this turns out to be decisive in his ultimate triumph, a resolution in which all ends well with everyone making lots of money.

Cameron Hawley died in 1969, at age 64. Hawley was unusual for a writer in that he worked in business for decades before writing about business. He was writing what he knew, unlike so many who write about business what they imagine. The Atlas Society wrote a very thorough tribute to him: “Cameron Hawley made the life-and-death drama of business palpable. Sharing the fears, frustrations, and achievements of executives and factory workers alike, readers come away from his works experiencing the importance and romance of business.” The same could be said of his two films recommended above.

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On September 15, 1787, George Mason identified a serious oversight in the nearly-completed Constitution. As Article V had originally been drafted, it only allowed Congress to propose Constitutional amendments. But what if one day Congress were to become corrupt? The people would need another way to rein in its power. So the framers added an option to Article V allowing the states to call a Convention of States if they chose to do so.

“The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments…”

The framers didn’t want such a convention to be called on light cause, so they didn’t make it easy; indeed, there has never been a Convention of States. Thirty-four disparate states would need to agree in order to trigger such a convention. It would be even harder to actually amend the Constitution — thirty-eight states would need to ratify any amendment proposed by such a convention.

Such a convention is now just fifteen states away from being called, with rapid progress toward a call expected in many of these remaining states. It’s very likely that within two years, such a convention will have reached its critical mass.

Why? Few Americans at this point think the central government isn’t out of control. The federal debt is a on an unrelenting and accelerating path to insolvency. Congress and its appointed agencies generate endless new laws and regulations, repealing few; the total body of law has more than doubled since just 1970. Not surprisingly, the US has the world’s highest ratio of prisoners per capita. As the saying goes, “the more laws, the more offenders.” But isn’t this what voting Americans want? After all, they elected Congress. No, only 21% of the US population approves the job that their elected Congresspeople are doing. Just vote them out, you say? Thanks to corruption of the political process, many Congresspeople are essentially elected for life, with incumbents typically reelected 80% of the time. As the federal government takes over more of our lives, forcing one-size-fits-all decisions on the country, right and left are increasingly divided. All this is unsustainable, and the most likely outcome, without root and branch reform, is disaster.

Is there risk in a Convention of States? Here are five short videos that explain how such a convention would work, and why it’s safer than you think.

To get the basics, you could hardly do better than this lucid explanation by Rob Kelly, Counsel for the Convention of States Action. It’s just a 9-minute speech, but he nails the key points in a rapid-fire opening statement.

Think it’s too risky? Listen to this intelligent discussion led by political commentator Tim Poole.

President Dwight Eisenhower, in the waning days of his administration, saw that the federal government was getting out of control. He warned of what he called The Military Industrial Complex, that is a confluence of corporate and military interest pushing for unnecessary wars. He also saw that the day might come when the people would need to invoke Article V and call a Convention of States to regain control of the federal government. His message: when the time comes, do it, call the convention.

Milton Friedman correctly observed that without a cap on federal spending and taxation, both would rise inexorably, taking financial control of more and more of ordinary Americans’ lives. The only solution, he said, is to amend the Constitution. Of course, Congress isn’t about to limit its own spending, so that cap must be imposed from the outside.

Lastly, here’s an inspiring pitch for the Convention of States.