Russia [1985-1999] Traumazone

Block by block, Adam Curtis’ astonishing history uses archival footage to build a narrative of societal collapse, political opportunism, corruption and identity crisis in the USSR’s final hour. Curtis mines the mundane footage that most TV producers would fast-forward through, sharing English lessons at a beauty pageant, a young waif begging for rubles in the streets, the unrelenting churn of a toothbrush factory and scientists, wrapped in plastic and tape, trying to fix the Chernobyl reactor after meltdown. In lesser hands, the collage might seem random or diffuse. Block by block, Adam Curtis’ astonishing history uses archival footage to build a narrative of societal collapse, political opportunism, corruption and identity crisis in the USSR’s final hour. Curtis mines the mundane footage that most TV producers would fast-forward through, sharing English lessons at a beauty pageant, a young waif begging for rubles in the streets, the unrelenting churn of a toothbrush factory and scientists, wrapped in plastic and tape, trying to fix the Chernobyl reactor after meltdown. In lesser hands, the collage might seem random or diffuse. Block by block, Adam Curtis’ astonishing history uses archival footage to build a narrative of societal collapse, political opportunism, corruption and identity crisis in the USSR’s final hour. Curtis mines the mundane footage that most TV producers would fast-forward through, sharing English lessons at a beauty pageant, a young waif begging for rubles in the streets, the unrelenting churn of a toothbrush factory and scientists, wrapped in plastic and tape, trying to fix the Chernobyl reactor after meltdown. In lesser hands, the collage might seem random or diffuse. Block by block, Adam Curtis’ astonishing history uses archival footage to build a narrative of societal collapse, political opportunism, corruption and identity crisis in the USSR’s final hour. Curtis mines the mundane footage that most TV producers would fast-forward through, sharing English lessons at a beauty pageant, a young waif begging for rubles in the streets, the unrelenting churn of a toothbrush factory and scientists, wrapped in plastic and tape, trying to fix the Chernobyl reactor after meltdown. In lesser hands, the collage might seem random or diffuse.