Cause-marketing campaigns blunt the very critique their films make

Evidence

Among other criticisms, Ortner demonstrates how four films were politically compromised: An Inconvenient Truth offered no structural, critical analysis of climate change and, instead of blaming the fossil fuel industries, blamed the American public; Promised Land (Gus Van Sant, 2012), a film about the dangers of fracking, completely avoided the politically heated issue of fracking in its social campaign, focusing on community development instead; A Place at the Table (Lori Silverbush and Kristi Jacobson, 2012), a film about hunger, partnered with an NGO funded by Walmart, whose low wages contribute to poverty and hunger; and Last Call at the Oasis (Jessica Yu, 2011), a film about the freshwater crisis, partnered with an NGO funded by Coca-Cola, one of the biggest producers of bottled water. The social action campaigns that Participant operates alongside each of its releases, designed to “amplify the impact” of each film, are of particular concern to Ortner, as they merely offer low-level, technocratic fixes, never challenging the status quo. — Andrew deWaard, Derivative Media, 293

Categorization

• XREF: Direct material support for the reader’s causal vs. correlation question: the ownership structure of Participant (billionaire-funded, partnered with Walmart/Coca-Cola NGOs) leaves fingerprints on the social campaigns attached to its films.
• ADDENDUM: Parallels the moral-panic/class-signaling dynamics of the immodesty article: campaign messaging is shaped by who funds it, not by the film’s ostensible message.