Are You in The Union?

Rating: B+
Today I am going to go out on a limb and venture into some new territory of writing reviews. Today’s topic of discussion is going to be a documentary called The Union: The Business Behind Getting High from 2007, directed by Brett Harvey. This documentary traces the history of the illegal marijuana business in British Columbia while also offering information to those who may not be completely educated on what exactly the drug does and why it’s illegal in the first place. Before I go any further I feel I should tell you, yes this includes you mom, that I DO NOT smoke or ingest any drug whatsoever, including marijuana, cigarettes, or alcohol. I like to go into a film with as objective a point of view as possible and that goes double for documentaries.

I have to say that I really liked how persuasive this documentary was in terms of why marijuana should be legalized, which is basically its intent. I think that a quote from the film sums up its purpose; this being, “Legalize it, control it, and tax the livin’ hell out of it.” Now, The Union goes into a lot business talk that, quite honestly, confuses me because I’ve never really understood all of that stuff, which makes me wonder why I like Boiler Room so much… Anyway, what really caught my interest was the massive amount of facts about why marijuana is basically harmless. Aside from the obvious facts like, cigarettes have hundreds of chemicals that go into their production; this film brings up evidence like marijuana cannot do any harm to the body that you would not get from a night of drinking or the harm that comes from breathing in any kind of smoke. Now, I’m not here to convince you to believe the same things that I now believe but I do bring up these facts to show you how persuasive this film really is. There are many other facts that are just as convincing as these are, if not more so, but as I’ve implied, it’s not my job to give you those reasons; I’m here to help you decide whether you should see the film or not, and give reasons why to do so.

I think the best reason why you should watch this film is firstly, to see the new underground railroad (if you’ve seen this, then you know what I’m talking about) and secondly, to get a true understanding of just how far down into the pockets of big business our capitalist system is. Don’t get me wrong, I love my country and yada yada yada, but it is peculiar why cigarettes and alcohol are legal when they are known killers but marijuana, which in reality just makes people lazy, isn’t. I really like how in depth with this particular topic the documentary goes and how hopeful all of the experts in this documentary are about this country actually becoming sensible. I also like how this documentary gives legitimate scientific research and tells the truth about the research used to persuade people like that used in the political agenda of Ronald Reagan.

However, there are some things about this documentary that I didn’t like. I didn’t like how this documentary was given a “host”, I don’t really know if that would be his appropriate title or not but that’s what I’m going with. In some documentaries it would be appropriate to do this, whether it is journalistic or what have you, but this seemed to be more about changing the thinking habits of normal people. When you give a documentary like this a face to remember it with, it tends to make you think, “Oh, this guy is on a mission to find out something, good for him.” (Not necessarily me). When a persuasive argument is faceless it is also all faces and tells you that this is how everyone should see this topic, not just one person. There were some other topics that got on my nerves like the discussion of political administrations and so on, but that’s just a personal issue and has no value in weighing how good of a film this was.

In all, I would highly recommend watching this film to get a better understanding of how the drug works, its place in the American and Canadian cultures, and many other topics. Even if you still don’t agree with the stand that it takes, at least you’ll know why you believe what you believe. I have spoken.