Societies Under the Influence
1998 · 52m · Canada
Directed by Germán Gutiérrez
Genres: documentary, essay film
Tones: contemplative, provocative
Governments spend billions and fill prisons, yet drug trafficking grows as enforcement drives prices higher and fuels crime, prompting observers to question prohibition and discuss legalization as an alternative.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
A 1998 essay film about drug policy that probably plays it straighter than you'd hope—the provocation is in the *argument*, not the form, which feels like a missed opportunity for real subversion.
Gutiérrez positions this firmly in the lineage of structural essay cinema, where montage and voiceover architecture become the syntax for policy critique; the film's restraint and intellectual rigor situate it alongside the essay-doc tradition that demands active viewing.
The decision to let economic data and enforcement statistics speak through observational footage—rather than bury them in talking heads—is what gives this modest documentary its weight and strange, accumulating power.