While a documentary examining the rise of the multinationals, up to their modern day monolith proportions, might not sound like the most rewarding proposition, The Corporation is an engrossing and insightful exercise. Written by Joel Bakan and based on his own book, The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power, this densely populated and complex documentary attempts to ascertain the motivations of corporations for behaving the way that they do.
Money and power may be the root of all evil, but for the most part, the directors sensibly avoid a knee-jerk moral reaction to all companies, allowing the facts to speak for themselves. They cast their unflinching gaze to some of the worst examples of corporate behaviour, highlighting the collusion between American companies and Nazi Germany, as well as the on-going rape of Third World natural resources by Western companies. Contributions from heavyweight thinkers like Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky give the film an intellectual edge, with Michael Moore turning up to give things a more popularist slant. As the subject matter is so vast, The Corporation inevitably loses focus over the course of its two hour plus running time, but a wry sense of humour helps to offset the overbearing feeling of helplessness that documentaries like this often provoke.
