Monday, September 17, 2018

Raoul Peck: 'The Young Karl Marx' (2017)

Raoul Peck's The Young Karl Marx (2017) spotlights the intellectual rise of Karl Marx and "Fred" Engels in the 1840s. It's a fun, interesting film, perfect for lively and intelligent audiences.

For a brief review of I Am Not Your Negro, Peck's powerful 2016 documentary about James Baldwin, here's a link.
Main characters in The Young Karl Marx include Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Jenny von Westphalen, Mary Burns, Lizzy Burns, Helen "Lenchen" Demeth, Pierre Proudhon and Mikhail Aleksandrovich Bakunin (the anarchists), Wilhelm Weitling, et alia. The actors are uniformly excellent. The international aspects of the film make clear the cosmopolitan nature and universalist appeal of Marx and Engels' ideas. 
"Mary from Tipperary:" her parents emigrated from Tipperary, Ireland, to Manchester (where Mary was born), for work. She becomes Engels' main paramour.

"Happiness requires rebellion." - Jenny Marx.

"Everything is subject to change. Nothing lasts." - Karl Marx.

"All social relations -- slavery, serfdom, salaried work -- are historical and transient. The truth is, current conditions must change." 

"Do we not have all history before us?" -- Pierre Proudhon. 

Today's Rune: The Mystery Rune. 

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