The BEST episodes directed by Eugene Jarecki
#1 - Bus 174
Storyville - Season 2006 - Episode 14
A chilling Storyville documentary using vivid TV-news footage to recount the hijacking of a bus in Rio de Janeiro by a lone gunman, whose brutal life story of grinding poverty, drugs and random violence is also explored.
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#3 - American Idol: Reagan
Storyville - Season 2011 - Episode 5
To mark the centenary of the birth of one of the most iconic figures in recent American politics, a documentary which examines the enigmatic career of screen star and two-term US president Ronald Reagan. He has been heralded as one of the architects of the modern world and since his death many Americans have been working to cement his legacy, but some critics argue that the aftershocks of Reaganomics continue to crumble economies the world over and that the hubris of Reagan's foreign policy continues to propel America into a cycle of overseas ventures. To such critics Reagan is an ominous figure who did more harm than good. But who was Ronald Reagan, and how did he come to shape world politics in the way he did? Featuring in-depth interviews with those who worked with him and knew him best, this film provides a definitive and penetrating look at Reaganism, whose grip on the public mind has been rekindled by recent events in Republican politics.
#4 - The House I Live In
Storyville - Season 2013 - Episode 1
As America remains embroiled in overseas conflict, a less visible war is taking place at home, costing countless lives, destroying families and inflicting untold damage on future generations of Americans. For over forty years, the War on Drugs has accounted for 45 million arrests, made America the world's largest jailer and damaged poor communities at home and abroad. Yet for all that, drugs are more available today than ever before. Filmed in more than twenty states, this film captures a definitive and heart-wrenching portrait of individuals at all levels of America's War on Drugs. From the dealer to the grieving mother, the narcotics officer to the senator, the inmate to the federal judge, the film offers a penetrating look inside America's longest war, revealing its profound human rights implications. While recognising the seriousness of drug abuse as a matter of public health, the film investigates the tragic errors and shortcomings that have instead treated it as a matter for law enforcement, creating a vast political and economic machine that feeds largely on America's poor, especially minority communities. Yet beyond simple misguided policy, the film investigates how political and economic corruption have fuelled the war for forty years, despite persistent evidence of its moral, economic and practical failures. Ultimately, the documentary seeks, through compassionate inquiry, to promote public awareness of the history and contemporary mechanics of this human rights crisis and to begin a national conversation about its reform.
#5 - Why we Fight
Storyville - Season 2005 - Episode 16
Is American foreign policy dominated by the idea of military supremacy? Has the military become too important in American life? Jarecki's shrewd and intelligent polemic would seem to give an affirmative answer to each of these questions.