• Home
  • News
  • Top Picks
    • Movies & Films: Top 25
    • Documentaries: Top 25
    • Films For Students: Top 10
    • Music Videos: Top 10
  • Categories
    • Film
    • Documentary
    • Shorts
    • Blog
    • Calendar
    • Links
    • About

Miss Liberty's Film & Documentary World

Libertarian Movies, Films & Documentaries

Kurt Vonnegut’s Harrison Bergeron (1995)

Tagged: Equality & law, Individualism

WINNER: TOP 25 LIBERTARIAN FILMS
In a future America, all exceptional human intelligence and achievement is stamped out in order to eliminate the destructive consequences of envy. [ Kurt Vonnegut’s Harrison Bergeron credits: Dir: Bruce Pittman/ Sean Astin, Miranda De Pencier, Christopher Plummer/ 99 min/ Drama, SciFi-Fantasy/ Equality & Envy, Individualism]

“For a cinematic attack on enforced equality, you could hardly do better than this wonderful film…This is a moving and stimulating experience, and one of the most dead-on libertarian films ever made.”

Teacher: “What is the first article of the new American Constitution?” Student: “That all men are not created equal. It’s the responsibility of the government to render them so.” Based on that law, the population here is subjected to a variety of dumbing-down measures, including: electronic implants, brain surgery, and even boring television. Few would defend such a projected world, and that is what makes this film so useful. It shows in the extreme the undesirability of what is currently being done on a smaller scale.

In particular, how different is the effect of deliberately discouraging exceptional thought from the effect of imposing on the population a one-intellectual-size-fits-all public school system? How different is it from the effect of “progressive” taxation, which financially straps the successful to subsidize the less successful?

Of course, the motivations of those who set up this ultra-egalitarian society are well intended—to eliminate from human relations the tendency toward aggression based on envy. But ironically, it takes even more extreme aggression to eliminate the inequality that gives rise to envy in the first place. This is seen early on, with the televised execution of tax evaders, and police raids on houses of “intellectual repute” where deep conversations and mind-stimulating games take place.

For a cinematic attack on enforced equality, you could hardly do better than this wonderful film. Harrison Bergeron fully articulates the price of enforced equality, in terms of both lost liberty and of those accomplishments that inequitably great people make possible. Based on a Kurt Vonnegut story, it has an imaginative and thought-provoking quality. This is a moving and stimulating experience, and one of the most dead-on libertarian films ever made.

External Reviews

“Harrison Bergeron is a real gem.”
–Sci-Fi Movie Page

“A well-scripted, well-designed adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut’s science fiction story…Your attention will be gripped as the story follows a perilous path through a web of romance and sinister politics to its dramatic conclusion.”
–Sky Movies

How to See It

Online Video Search

Links

IMDB
Wikipedia
Related Film: 2081
Book (Includes Harrison Bergeron): Welcome to the Monkey House: Stories

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)

Related

Featured Post

weird

Things Are Weird. Is It Time To Watch Wild Palms?

For years, the most outrageous conspiracy theory that had any popularity was the claim that a corrupt cabal of pedophiles and pervs were somehow calling the shots behind the scenes, protected by governments. This was considered tin-hat stuff. Then the world learned that there actually was a pedophile island … Continue Reading

obsolete industries

All Obsolete Industries Deserve A Bailout

This hilarious video put out by The Coalition for Obsolete Industries takes a (tongue in cheek) stand against progress in order to save jobs. You can learn more about the coalition on their Facebook page. … Continue Reading

the stranger

The Stranger (1946)

A post-WWII war crimes official hunts down a little-known escaped Nazi: the man who secretly planned and managed the Holocaust. [ The Stranger credits: Dir: Orson Welles/ Orson Welles, Edward G. Robinson, Loretta Young/ 95 min/ Drama, Thriller/ Democide] “I will not spoil this tightly-crafted cat and … Continue Reading

Themes

Abuse of power American revolution Anti-draft Anti-regulation Anti-slavery Anti-socialism Anti-taxation Anti-war Ayn Rand Corrupt government Creator as hero Democide Econ 101 Eminent domain Equality & law Escape from socialism Freedom of speech Free press as hero Government as bigot Government as torturer Government enforced morality Government healthcare Government schools Incompetent government Individualism John Stossel Law & liberty Legalize Drugs Libertarian heroes Libertarianism 101 Power corrupts Power worship Pro-capitalism Pro-immigration Propaganda Psychiatric coercion Resistance to tyranny Right to secede Search & seizure Second amendment Sexual liberty Social tolerance Unions & monopolies Voluntarism Working for government

Genres/Categories

Action-Adventure Animated Biography Blog Comedy Documentary Drama Family Featured Film Foreign History Horror Music-Dance Netflix News Romance SciFi-Fantasy Shorts Thriller Upcoming Western

About Miss Liberty

This site is a collection of films and documentaries of particular interest to libertarians (and those interested in libertarianism). It began as a book, Miss Liberty’s Guide to Film: Movies for the Libertarian Millennium, where many of the recommended films were first reviewed. The current collection has grown to now more than double the number in that original list, and it’s growing still.

  • RSS

© 2023 Miss Liberty's Film & Documentary World. All Rights Reserved