The Fear That Has 1000 Eyes: Cities in the Age of Terrorism 2013
Distributed by Janson Media, 88 Semmons Road, Harrington Park, NJ 07640; 201-784-8488
Produced by Suissimage, SRF, A Film by Dagmar Brendecke and Walter Brun
Directed by Dagmar Brendecke and Walter Brun
DVD, color, 52 mn.
Sr. High - General Adult
National Security, Privacy, Urban Areas, Sociology
Date Entered: 02/14/2014
Reviewed by Michael Fein, Coordinator of Library Services, Central Virginia Community College, Lynchburg, VAThis thought-provoking production looks at how the trend towards urbanization has given boom to a security fixation in the city. Stephen Graham of Newcastle University in the United Kingdom and others describe along with an unnamed and unseen narrator how the events of 9/11 merely gave added impetus to the trend of ever-increasing surveillance on an industrial scale. We see that there can be more than a dozen surveillance cameras, manned by both government and private security, in a one or two block area in London. Architecture along roads, planters and poles for example, is meant to specifically impede car bombs. With all of these “watching eyes” what has happened to our notions of privacy? All of these are discussed and portrayed in this production. The production’s sound and picture are flawless. Subtitles are used when German is spoken and they are quite readable and do not distract from the production. This production will make a nice springboard for discussing/investigating the contemporary security-obsessed state.