Four Horsemen

I struggled to give this 4 stars or 3. The quality of the film is very good, so my rating is more based on the intellectual content.First, this movie is so much like the "Occupy Wall Street" movement: It rightly curses certain conditions, it rages against the criminals, and it calls for change. The movie even correctly identifies the problem with banking and fiat currency. However, it is calling for the wrong change and is blaming "free markets" for the current woes. It also curses capitalism throughout most of the film, then later tries to say, "no, no, we are capitalists...just not this kind of capitalist." In this way, I feel that it further confuses people. I would love to recommend this film to everyone I know, however, I would feel compelled to preemptively counter many of their conclusions and suggestions for change.They should have done a better job on the terminology. The United States is not purely capitalist, and we most certainly do not have free markets. If anything, the U.S. is, according to Mussolini's own definition, Fascist. It is more common now to say "Corporatist", but even Ralph Nader joins most free-market economists in saying that the US has a fascist economy. As such, this film is smearing free markets and improperly defining them. Any country that uses fiat currency does not have a free market.So, the film correctly identifies the problem with fiat currencies and fractional reserve banking. I discusses what happened when Nixon took us off the gold standard, and it even showed a graph of U.S. inflation going out of whack starting in 1913 (the year the Federal Reserve was established). However, several of those interviewed espoused more Keynesian type economic solutions, and Keynes was a big fan of central economic planning, such as the Fed and fiat currency. So there were contradictions within the film.Further, it seems to me that there was a political goal to place all blame on Reagan and Milton Friedman. While they definitely deserve some of the blame, the problems have been growing for more than a century. Lincoln, FDR, and others should have received blame too. Later in the film they emphasized the need for decentralized government...so why then do they praise those who strengthened the central government (e.g. Lincoln, FDR, etc)?Lastly, I think they portrayed a skewed view of individualism. Free markets, anarchocapitalism, libertarianism, whatever you want to call them, most certainly promote the idea of self-reliance, but at the same time they acknowledge the need for community. However, strong communities can only be built through individual freedom. People must be allowed to voluntarily choose whether or not to associate, then assume the consequences of that association or disassociation. In our current system (and with socialism and communism), the individuals do not have a choice; as such, because they are compelled by force and because such a system shrinks the pie, they become more selfish and less interested in helping others. Although it may seem counterintuitive, that's the way it tends to work. I bring this up because we have to be careful when using words such as "individualism", "greed", and "selfishness"; these human tendencies are what allow humans to survive. It is when they are captured and exploited by governments that they become very destructive.All-in-all, I would give this movie 3.5 stars. It was great in identifying some very critical flaws (fiat currency, corporatism, banking fraud, etc), but I took off 1.5 stars for the fact that I feel that many of their suggestions for change are based on ideology, not sound logic or a solid understanding of how humans chose to act (praxeology) under free or confined conditions. Lastly, it can't be said enough that there is a major difference between laws and government. Laws and courts can exist without government...if anything it's government that often violates the system of law.

It's horrifying how mankind just can't seem to learn from its history. Greed, self-indulgence, self-interest, concentrated wealth and power and blind stupidity are the hallmarks of all waning civilizations. America is a great great idea teetering on the brink of oblivion because we betrayed our founding fathers' hopes and ethics: equality, freedom, the sovereignty of the individual, the opportunities that may produce happiness. Now happiness is purveyed by big pharma's pills, sovereignty exists only if you can compete economically or grab the communal mike to lie your head off, freedom is an illusion and we're still misinterpreting equality to the point where some obliterate all of what others value only to replace it with nothing or nothing better. That's not equality, that's just revenge. Low culture reigns in the colliseum, and we've forfeited communal values, myths, literary and artistic expression, language, icons, spiritual drive (not religion) and shared history in favor of some ersatz notion of equality. Why? Who decided this stuff? Who allowed all this to happen? Look in the mirror...we all did, everytime we tanked to the rich and powerful, let lobbyists and corporations frame our political debates while we watched our kids become addicted or lose gender identity or sense of national pride, fell for the Pied Pipers who brokered deals with the devil to get themselves out of hot water and set up foundations as the booby prize (all robber barons try to sanitize their crimes by seizing on noblesse oblige, it's still money laundering). I yet have hope that our fundamental principles can save us. Otherwise, like the dinos who ruled for 166 million years to our paltry 250, we're doomed. A blip on the screen. Scary to think what's next. China? Aliens? Nothing?

I'm just going to quote from Richard on IMDB:*** This review may contain spoilers ***When a documentary attempts to tackle the most important issues of a generation, from financial instability, to environmental degradation and terrorism, it really needs to be backed up with a lot of solid research. Unfortunately, Four Horsemen hopelessly fails to live up to its ambitions. It touches on everything from the decline of empires, to the expansion of credit and disastrous banking deregulation.It rightfully highlights the asset bubbles, the failures of foreign aid and the counter productive nature of much of the west's foreign policy. But touch is the generous word, as most issues are addressed with little more than a talking head tied together with some slick animation and stock footage. The film is strongest when stating the obvious, highlighting the offences of the banking industry, the predatory lending and illegal foreclosures. Indeed, when describing exactly what is wrong, Four Horsemen takes few risks and lands some critical blows, a welcome reintroduction for a debate that is most conspicuous by its absence.But the first warning sign for the film is when the entire history of human economics is framed in the terms of Classical versus Neoclassical, followed by the pushing of quite extreme Libertarian pet causes proposed as the only possible solutions. It marks wholly disingenuous connections regarding the glory days of the gold standard and becomes almost comical when it praises FDR on one hand and then claims 'income tax is inherently unconstitutional' on the other.A few quotes from the US Constitution and a lecture on the decline of morality, and the whole film starts to feel like a Ron Paul 2012 direct to YouTube creation. Then when casual remarks drop like: 'perhaps global warming isn't the greatest threat to our planet, but the depletion of resources', (a statement that so comprehensively against mainstream scientific opinion which contends we cannot afford to burn even the oil we have found), and the film starts to make Zeitgeist appear the model of impartial reasoning.When this is rapidly followed by 'all foreign aid is bad', suddenly the minuscule on screen presence of the most lauded guests, such highly respected development economic Ha-Joon Chang (who appears on screen just twice for a total of about sixty seconds), and the motives behind the recurring presence of the gold and silver traders becomes a little clearer. The producers of Four Horsemen may be well meaning, and who isn't rightfully outraged at the 'heads we win, tails you lose' attitude of Goldman Sachs and their ilk, or the ridiculous disconnect between real wages and real estate prices? I also doubt the proposition that 'we need more employee owned businesses' would ever lose a show of hands outside a GOP convention.But overflowing as the film is with justified indignation, the proposed solutions have all the hallmarks of a stock Libertarian: 'tax is theft, government is bad' economic thesis, albeit cleverly packaged to sneak in front of a left leaning cinema audience.

The information and observations provided are not new, however, they have all been pretty much been brought together in this single presentation. Whilst the banking/ financial systems and corrupt political systems are of course at the core of the impending collapse the one factor alluded to, but not developed was/ is the apathy of the citizen to actually be bothered to engage in the solution, which is course is dependent on their involvement. The neo-classical economic model relies on the citizens apathy ....... the person(s) who can motivate them to action will have the power to change firstly the political system and then regulate the banking and finance systems in such a way that they cannot create wealth out of debt and ensure fair distribution of wealth which has seen the accepted income ratio rise from 10:1 in the early C20th to the current 500+ : 1...., which, as the observers state, has created a virtual new species so far removed from the reality of the everyday, the mundane and ordinary that they are unable to see the precipice 'they' are standing on!

It was stolen from you - you are presently suffering because of what this film reveals. So, EDUCATE yourself more in just an hour or so than you were done in all of your schooling. A must see if you want to understand the lies and the biggest theft in history - a heist from you!Don't let the title put you off. This is nothing to do with Biblical end-times; no eschatology nor religion here, just plain common sense education - dynamite!

This is a Marvellous film, a detour from a usual review, but this film will go with "Enron", Walmart all my Michael Moore films, I really recommend "Enron" it also shows how bad a system, going under the name of Capitalism can degenerate into a monster out of control.You can be barred from las Vegas, for card counting, but create this mess of a system and then run for president.

What everyone needs to know and understand....but what 'mainstream' broadcasters and politicians shy away from -and either can't or won't talk about......You'll never be the same again after seeing this, but will probably have a far greater degree of understanding of WHY this is such a dysfunctional time in national and international affairs.

Well - written and well - directed. Worth every penny! Truly there is something rotten in the state of world economics and the DVD goes a long way to diagnosing the disease. The experts interviewed were no mean men! What came out of it for me is that the crisis is more than an economic one, but a moral one too.