venezuela — cy kuckenbaker, cysfilm, cysfilms, cykuck, blog, filmmaking, video, vimeo, staff pick, calarts

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The man with the sugarcane is in an area called Los Llanos in the SW of Venezuela. It’s an expansive plain veined with wetlands, there are giant rodents called capybaras, snakes, piranha, fresh water dolphins, cayman and birds birds birds. The dog is in Caracas, poor devil, that’s a tough town even if you have teeth. The flowers are on the road going from Los Llanos toward the Andes. Three weeks and at least a thousand miles by car around Venezuela and we didn’t bump into Hugo Chavez once. I would have liked to.

The Revolution Will Not be Televised is a documentary film about Chavez and the coup that temporarily took him out of office in 2002. It captures his overthrow from inside the president’s mansion, which is an incredible filmmaking feat. But the most important part concerns the Venezuelan people’s reaction to his removal, which is stunningly democratic. Less directly, it’s a comment on the American popular narrative of Venezuela and the willful misinformation campaign(s) that shape it. Man we get some whack information here. I actually thought he was a dictator until I went. That said, don’t listen to Oliver Stone or Sean Penn either.

Unfortunately it’s not available on Netflix or available on Amazon but you can watch the whole thing free here.

And here’s a YouTube clip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Id--ZFtjR5c