Jay, a veteran producer and co-founder of the Hot Docs International Documentary Festival, directed Hitman Hart: Wrestling With Shadows. He will helm How to Stop Nuclear War, while Earl Katz (Hacking Democracy) and Rob Johnson (Taxi to the Dark Side) will executive produce.
Daniel Ellsberg
“The hidden reality I aim to expose is that for over fifty years, all out thermonuclear war has been a catastrophe waiting to happen. No policies in human history have more deserved to be recognize as immoral. Whether Americans, Russians and other humans can rise to the challenge of reversing these policies and eliminating the danger of near-term extinction remains to be seen. I choose to join with others in acting as if that is still possible.”
“How to Stop a Nuclear War” comes at a time when the peril of deliberate or accidental nuclear war are as great as during the height of the Cold War. The difference is that in the ’80s, there was a massive movement demanding the reduction and eventual elimination of nuclear weapons. Today it’s barely on the radar as climate change understandably dominates the discourse.
Nuclear war and climate change are both existential threats and are inextricably related because nuclear winter would occur soon after nuclear war. Nuclear Winter would be a period that scientists believe would follow a large nuclear explosion, when there would be very little light or heat and nothing would grow in the world.
The documentary “How to Stop a Nuclear War”, based on Ellsberg’s powerful book, takes it to the next step. What can be done to reduce the risk?
We weave Dan’s personal story of disillusionment and horror during his days as a nuclear war planner at Rand, with his history of the “institutional madness” and profit making that was and is at the root of U.S. nuclear war strategy. This creates the context for an overall structure that will explore concrete steps that if implemented, would reduce the risk of nuclear annihilation. The history is directly linked to what urgently needs to be done now.
Dan is at the center of the piece, and we will include interviews and scenes shot in all the nuclear powers (including Russia and China), with both experts and ordinary people, many of whom live near ICBM silos. Defenders of American nuclear war plans will be included to flesh out the fullness of the debate.
We plan to create a buzz about the film at festivals and screenings at the U.N., Capitol Hill and Wall St. We will organize similar screenings in capitals in other countries. A global grass roots campaign will use the film to help facilitate a rational debate about nuclear weapons. The film will be a theatrical feature and a three hour series for a streamer.
Acclaimed actor Emma Thompson will narrate the film
I was terrified of nuclear weapons when I was in my teens – I protested and marched and argued about the insanity of Mutual Assured Destruction for years, until some cloud came over my eyes and I stopped being frightened in the same way.
Perhaps it was the spectre of climate crisis that made it more difficult to perceive the ever-present, cataclysmic threat of the nuclear apocalypse. But that fear is back now and the clearer I am helped to understand it by Daniel Ellsberg and Paul Jay, the greater it becomes.
The only thing you can do with fear is be active in some way.
Making the connection between the climate crisis movement and the anti-nuclear movement has never been more essential. Between us, we can – to quote Ellsberg – prevent this from happening.
We have to start now, today and never stop until these weapons have been outlawed for the murderous evil that they are
Noam Chomsky wrote about “How to Stop Nuclear War”:
Incredibly, there is now casual discussion of nuclear war as a policy option to be contemplated, and there are even actions underway that may enhance this unthinkable prospect.
No one is better placed to rescue us from this folly than Daniel Ellsberg. Bringing his classic “Doomsday Machine” to a broader audience will be a major step towards averting catastrophe before it is too late.
Larry Wilkerson, former Chief of Staff to Colin Powell:
“How to Stop a Nuclear War”, from noted filmmaker Paul Jay, whom I’ve known for many years, is a thunderclap amidst the dark clouds of an impending nuclear holocaust. Needs to be seen by Members of Congress and their staffs, by the principals of the NSC, and by every American citizen.
Stripped as the world is now of all hard-won, Cold War nuclear weapons treaties, confronted again with military leaders who believe there is usefulness to these heinous weapons — indeed, with nations even spending billions to ensure and enhance their devastating killing power — we stand on the brink of extinction. The climate crisis will be an anti-climax with no human soul left to endure it because nuclear weapons will have beat it to the punch.
About Paul Jay
The director of the film is Paul Jay, an award winning journalist and filmmaker. He is past chair of the Documentary Organization of Canada and was the founding chair of Hot Docs! Canadian International Documentary Festival. He is the host of theAnalysis.news.
Paul was the co-creator and co-executive producer of Face Off and counterSpin, nightly prime time debate programs that ran for ten years on CBC Newsworld.
Paul’s feature docs include “Lost in Las Vegas” (A&E), “Return to Kandahar” (CBC) and “Never-Endum-Referendum” (CTV, RadioCanada). Paul is best known for his feature documentary “Hitman Hart, wrestling with shadows” (A&E, BBC, ARTE, TVO).
Greg Quill
By far the most eloquent essay on the topic of cultural divisiveness in this country ever produced for television. It’s hear-wrenching stuff.
It’s ok to suspend disbelief at a wrestling show.
— Paul Jay
It’s not ok in a real world facing the twin threats of climate crisis and nuclear war.
Film Reviews for HITMAN HART
HART TO HEART By Steve Johnson
Tribune Television Critic December 18, 1998
“The temptation is to hail “Hitman Hart: Wrestling with Shadows” as one of the best and most surprisingly resonant documentaries you will see, no matter whether you savor or savage pro wrestling and its garish, testosterone-fueled morality plays.
But first you have to consider whether the film is merely an elaborate crock.
As it builds artfully toward a climax that has been labeled “the biggest double cross in the history of pro wrestling,” “Wrestling with Shadows” is, then, what it purports to be. Yes, it is a detailed portrait of an entertainment juggernaut, especially in the backstage places where the course of matches and careers is determined, but more broadly, it is an examination of the tortured psyche of an aging showman as the spectacle changes around him.
Perhaps, but the movie about all of this — so effective that in its finale it manages to make a wrestling-ring result poignant — turns it into art.”
Peter Plagens, art critic for Newsweek
“One of the best films of 1998. Hall-of-mirrors trifles like This Is Spinal Tap, Natural Born Killers, The Truman Show, and The Matrix pale in comparison.
Someday, in the middle of the 21st century, when they talk about the film that took today’s nearly unanimous intellectual assumption-that “reality” (whatever that means, dude) is nothing but a series of socially constructed misidentities-and made it into a work of art, they’ll have to start with Wrestling With Shadows.”
Tony Atherton
“A tale as bizarre as Kafka and as tragic as Shakespeare . . . riveting”
An improbably enthralling portrait of Bret “Hitman” Hart . . . arguably the most deftly constructed work here [at the New York Documentary Festival] . . . a phenomenon beyond fiction. Director Paul Jay alternately underplays the Hitman’s borderline-surreal dilemmas and exploits them for maximum drama. The result is fascinating, affording access to an existence so fake it’s real.
(Lim was director of programming at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, serves on the selection committee for the New York Film Festival. He was the film editor of The Village Voice from 2000 to 2006 and a frequent contributor to The New York Times from 2006 to 2013.)
Ian Brown, journalist, author and host of TVOntario’s The View From Here
“This film is so brilliant…so complex and so watchable and funny and profound at the same time… it could be the best documentary I’ve ever seen. . . it’s Hamlet, transposed to our day and age, right down to the play within a play. Except it’s real. Sort of.”
By Barbara D. Phillips
“I was pinned to the living-room couch for the entire length of Hitman Hart, Wrestling With Shadows.
This is truly a knockout film.”
Charles R. Lyons for the New York Times
(Professor of drama and comparative literature at Stanford University)
“Brilliant . . .”
Greg Wood
“It was a thought-provoking end to a story beautifully told . . . enthralling.”
Paul Sherman
“phenomenal . . . As gripping a documentary as you’ll see.”
Martin James
“Paul Jay’s extraordinary documentary takes viewers into the weird world of North American televised professional wrestling.”
A wonderful film, full of suspense, dramatic tension and, given the subject, a strange kind of melancholy . . . If there’s one film in the festival [Nashville Independent Festival] not to miss, it’s this one. Highly recommended. [won best documentary]
Mark Naglazas
I sat mesmerized . . . a mind-boggling examination of middle America’s desperate need for heroes and villains . . . art and life become deliciously confused, transforming what is nothing more than a bit of white-trash Americana into something akin to the kind of dizzying post-modernist spectacle you’d expect to see at the Perth International Arts Festival.
Tomatometer-approved critic
Ten Best Films of the Year
“The year’s best documentary happened to debut on television (the A&E network), but that doesn’t diminish its achievement one iota . . . kept me enthralled sitting at home on my couch, and that’s even more impressive than keeping me enthralled in a theater seat . . . a tale of capitalism and personal integrity, and the extent to which one has anything to do with the other. It’s a human drama, a social satire and a thrilling adventure. And it is not, repeat, not “just about wrestling.”
[Renshaw Top Ten Lists picked #3 for year after Truman Show and Shakespeare in Love – ahead of Saving Private Ryan]
Ciara Moloney, June 2021
“Transcends the genre it pioneered . . . One of the best documentaries about anything ever”
Jason Anderson, Eye Magazine
“classic tragedy of a modern hero … wildly entertaining and surprisingly thought-provoking . . . one of the most riveting and highly acclaimed Canadian films in years.”
Grant McIntyre
“artfully trenchant . . . revealing.”
( Rated ‘A’ and pick of the week)
Entertainment Weekly – “What to Watch”
Diane Werts
“Why does any of this matter? It matters if integrity and ideals matter. This is one whale of a tale. I was glued to the tube.”
Antonia Zerbisias
“Had me surprisingly pinned to the sofa for 90 minutes . . . great entertainment”
Mike Boone, Montreal Gazette
“An insightful and poignant portrait of a man’s struggle to reconcile self-respect with the demands of show business . . . Viewers are taken on a great ride.”
Jonathan McDonald, Vancouver Province
“Not a dull moment in 93 gruelling minutes of film”
Marc Glassman
“Jay captured the ferocity and comedy of wrestling as performed by Hart even during the infamous “Montreal screwjob” in which McMahon betrayed the “Hitman,” exposing the sport for what it is: venal, cheap and incredibly watchable. “
Noel Holston
“Jay’s documentary is constructed like a dramatic film. The documentary’s finale, centring on Hart’s final WWF match, is as dramatic as that of most movies you’ll see this year . . . terrific”
