Robert Greenwald and the Rudy Giuliani Films

By Norm Schrager at October 15, 2007 | 10:04 pm | Print

If you didn’t see the 2004 documentary Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism, you surely saw its director, Robert Greenwald, as he hit countless talk shows stating his case against Fox News. Well, Greenwald’s been producing a series of short online films skewering Rudy Giuliani and his handling of the 9/11 NYC terrorist attacks. His latest, The REAL Rudy: Radios – you can watch it below – is getting some serious attention.

THE REAL RUDY: RADIOS

According to the film, lives could have been saved if Giuliani and the city had provided proper radios to the FDNY, which they desperately needed following the 1993 World Trade Center attack. Greenwald’s Brave New Films implores viewers to demand an investigation into a questionable city contract and a lack of radio testing.

If you wanna really dig in to Greenwald’s mission, check out Brave New Films’ site. You can catch earlier films The REAL Rudy: Command Center and The REAL Rudy: Mistakes in 30 Seconds. Man, Greenwald may have a political axe to grind, but you have to appreciate anyone that asks this many questions about an attack made on the people of this country. Or you can do as, say, Karl Rove and continue attending black-tie dinners with the press while pretending nothing ever happened.

WHO IS ROBERT GREENWALD?
Good question movie fan. He’s a former Hollywood filmmaker who grew a massively enormous consicence after the 2004 voting debacle known as the Presidential Election.

But before that, his directing career began infamously with a fantasy feature called Xanadu. What?! Yes, that Xanadu! Olivia Newton-John and Gene Kelly (god help him) in a beautiful piece of 1980s cornball summer musical fluff.

From there, Greenwald gained multiple award nominations for directing the abused-wife chronicle The Burning Bed (starring Farrah Fawcett before she went batty) — just four years after Xanadu won him the Razzie. As a producer, he spent most of the ’80s working on what we’d now call “Lifetime” movies, most of them concerned with rights and freedoms. And yes, Valerie Bertinelli even starred in one.

After directing the Abbie Hoffman story Steal This Movie! (believe it or not, here’s my review), Greenwald transitioned to his investigative brand of documentary. He’s directed Uncovered: The War on Iraq (2004), Outfoxed (2004), Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price (2005) and Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers (2006).

QUESTION: What do you think of Robert Greenwald’s documentaries? TELL US

Greenwald doesn’t just holler for his own sake. He wants his viewers to as well, on a portion of Brave New Films’ site called “Do Something!” There, you can start campaigns, support activist groups or do stuff like sign that Giuliani petition. Whether you love his work, hate it, or don’t care, you must give Robert Greenwald credit: He’s given his entire livelihood to a cause.

And making Rudy Giuliani look bad is a hell of a lot more important than making Olivia Newton-John look bad. Even if Robert Greenwald didn’t mean it. 

Documentaries Independent Film