Part 9. On Cinema as a Catalyst for Change

I think Dr. Alex Juhasz said it best, that visibility alone is a neutral condition. For it “to have meaning, impact, or power (beyond the indisputable pleasures of self-recognition), it needs to be connected to specific social change goals and to a real community, it needs to do more than provide information or images.” What Dreamers Adrift do is create movies to serve as catalysts for change. They make them to be shared, to spur action, education and consciousness raising. This brings to mind Octavio Getino and Fernando Solanas’s call for “Third Cinema” which argued that film should be used to inspire aggressive revolutionary activity. Dr. Juhasz attests that just as there is “Third Cinema” that there is “Third Tube.” I argue that Dreamers Adrift find themselves in this category as Third World people in the US creating cinema of revolution. I realize that they are calling for liberal rather than radical change in this project, but the dream does not die if the DREAM Act passes, it would just provide more inspiration and FUEL.