System Error

A very flimsy documentary, which is effectively all assertion with very little evidence to back it up. It's watchable, but you won't learn anything. Probably not worth your time.

The presentation is pretty good despite some natural clunkiness expected when German filmmakers decide to make a movie in English.

Don't believe the other reviews if they say "been there done that" or "nothing new here" - In fact, as stated above, it does present its arguments in a novel way and is thorough in breaking things down.

The fact of the matter is that current day (post?) capitalism relies almost exclusively on growth and profit for only growth and profit's sake. The other fact is that the Earth is a finite environment and will not be capable of providing infinite resources or letting us do so in a manner that doesn't further damage it, which is one way that capitalism externalizes losses onto the public commons. The growth has to stop sometime or something else will give.

Sadly, I think the natural progression of things as laid out by this film has us living in one of the many dystopian sci-fi scenarios involving the billionaire class escaping to off-world satellite colonies or Mars while the rest of us are turned into batteries like in The Matrix. OK, that last part is a bit hyperbolic, but the rest of us already are and will continue to suffer the consequences of unfettered growth, the financialization of everything and the resulting damage to our environment leading to danger to all of our lives.

Excellent documentary I found browsing through Amazon Prime (ironically enough) about how the belief in the possibility of endless economic growth is destroying the planet featuring interviews with one German, Chinese and Brazilian businessman who is creepier than the last one. It's filled with a thoroughly Germanic but extremely well-warranted pessimism. It's interesting to learn that the notion of economic growth which is central to every government's policy is such a recent concept but terrifying to realise the damage it has done to the Earth in such a small time frame.