Film Review: Punk’s Not Dead

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sex-pistols-280x200.jpgThere are three confusing things about Susan Dynner‘s new fun-to-watch documentary Punk’s Not Dead: the beginning, the middle, and the end. Here’s why: Candid, funny, and insightful interview clips with the likes of Joe Strummer, Johnny Rotten, and Johnny Ramone, are great, but why, when punk is thriving, keeping on, and having fun, start off a documentary called “Punk’s Not Dead” with three ’70s rockers, two of whom have passed away?

The middle of the film gives an accurate, entertaining, informed, and spot-on portrayal of the punk scenes that developed, thrived, hocked loogies on people, flipped people off, and destroyed amplifiers through the 80s, and then gained mainstream acceptance in the 90s.

Alas, the ending: A rushed montage/collage of young punk-ish bands from all over the world who, I’m guessing, submitted rough video clips of their bands playing, but don’t really get much screen time or real interviews.

Soooo, why is a film called “Punk’s Not Dead” centered on its expansion into mainstream blandness available for purchase at Hot Topic? I mean, it’s always interesting to hear folks like Fugazi’s Ian Mackaye talk about starting his own label, or the Circle Jerks’ Keith Morris make fun of suburban mall culture, but haven’t we seen that a few times before? Lord knows punk culture, as fascinating as it is, has hardly gone undocumented.

This film, as solid as it is, doesn’t get us inside today’s dive bars, Elks Lodges, and warehouses throughout the U.S. and abroad to feel, hear, and (whoa!) smell those fiery, new local music scenes.

Now there’s a documentary I’d love to see.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

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And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

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