everything you have heard about this movie is true.

A brilliant film that helped define a genre

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

The basic tenants of The Yes Men are things you need to either accept or reject. Their beliefs are decidedly anti-corporate and feel that much more government regulation is needed. A rather simplistic answer to complex problems if you ask me.The film consists of two anti-corporate jokesters pulling off hoax after hoax to expose the evils of corporations. The track record of Mike Bonanno and Andy Bichlbaum in this film is mixed--some of their hoaxes seem to work and make their points better than others.Their best hoax and strongest case is their first, as they pose as executives from Dow Chemical/Union-Carbide. In an interview with the BBC, they announced that ALL the assets of Union-Carbide are being liquidated to FINALLY pay off the victims of the Bhopal disaster in India--decades after thousands were killed. It appears that thanks to complicit government officials, the company had paid a pittance to the victims and survivors--and the mess was STILL just sitting there waiting to be cleaned up!! And, according to these pranksters, this was immoral and liquidation was the only solution. This was picked up in the media throughout the world and actually caused Dow Chemical stock to drop temporarily.Others, such as their attacks on Exxon and Halliburton, while funny, were also a lot less clear. Bonanno and Bichlbaum didn't seem to think they needed to prove these corporate entities were bad or how they were bad--they just were BECAUSE they were huge corporations. But, despite this HUGE problem, their stunts were quite funny--such as the so-called 'Surviva-ball' and candles made out of humans in order to combat the energy crisis! Overall, while I often disagreed with the film, it was clever and took LOTS of effort to pull off these many stunts. This film surely has contributed to the recent Occupy Movement. But what none of these people ever do is point out WHAT needs to be done and HOW. Communism didn't work and Socialist Europe is about to go bankrupt. So what are the solutions? Killing off the corporations certainly isn't the solution and despite decades of government regulation, things are far from perfect. So what do we do next? By the way, these crazy things you see from the film are available from their website--even the Surviva-ball!

"The Yes Men" and "The Yes Men Fix The World" are a pair of documentary comedies which follow the exploits of the Yes Men, a group of "culture jammers" who impersonate the identities of those they dislike and engage in "identity correction", a process in which they either behave as the entity really would behave were it not socially bound to maintain some modicum of civility, or behave as the entity would behave were it ethically responsible. In other words, the Yes Men are a group of socially conscious activists who engage in pranks. They con their way into various situations and satirically pretend to be various corporate heads, politicians, bureaucrats and world shakers. Most of their satire flies over the heads of their audiences.And so the two films find the Yes Men pointing out the unethical practises of Dow Chemical, BP, ExxonMobile, Milton Friedman cultists, the world trade organisation, the New York Times, the US Chamber of Commerce, various environmental bodies, various bastions of commerce, various media corporations, and various bodies responsible for the post hurricane Katrina clean up.Most of their pranks start with a fake website, such as their mock website of the World Trade Organisation, which despite being ridiculously blunt about the WTO's unethical practises garnered the Yes Men an invitation to speak at an official occasion. Once in, the Yes Men's representatives then caused havoc before unsuspecting audiences. Thanks to global media, their actions were carried out in full public glare. Other Yes Men stunts involve delineating the principles of free trade by taking such principles to their logical conclusions. Elsewhere they put forward arguments for selling votes to the highest corporate bidder, making the poor eat feces to cure endemic hunger and allowing countries to commit human rights abuses with a system of "justice vouchers" modelled after pollution vouchers. Yet, shockingly, the Yes Men's audiences often show little difficulty in accepting the legitimacy of such ideas. At a CPA meeting (a group of accountants), for instance, the Yes Men exploited the credulity of their audiences by recruiting them into the elaborate fiction of a trade organisation governed by grotesque principles. The two films highlight not only how willingly the public accepts unethical behaviour, but how such behaviour, as it is intimately bound with concepts of success, has long been seen as an ideal to be pursued.Because the Yes Men's cons are difficult to set up and execute, the two documentaries spend most of their time focusing on preparatory work. The actual pranks are few and far between, which will irk those looking for incessant humour. Compared to, say, "Punked", "Borat" or the "Jacka** Movies", these are slow films. Both films also fail to properly/intelligently explore that which the Yes Men rally against. Interestingly, the Yes Men are shown without familial or romantic relationships. Their private personalities are not delved into and they seem androgynous and almost ascetic. Their first two pranks, we learn, involved inserting homosexual activity into a computer game and inserting masculine, warrior voices into female dolls. Their gender-bending, a kind of monastic selflessness coupled to chameleon like amorphousness, echoes the impersonal flux of global capitalism. In theory, they're a parasite which can permeate any situation and counter-bend as readily as capitalism can. In practise, this is perhaps impossible. Even detrimental to their health.While some view the Yes Men as a needed, new breed of activism - of spirituality even - most view them as a mild annoyance engaging in futile efforts. For some theorists, culture and counter-culture are barely distinguishable in an all-pervasive, global culture too ready to incorporate the anti-gesture. Culture jamming, some believe, is rapidly losing political force and the capacity to generate new cultural images and values. On the flip side, the force of the Yes Men's prank comedy lies in the fact that it rises above the abstemious moment of critique and the seemingly noble aim of "enlightening people" and in so doing takes us onto another register. In a time in which global capitalism has such a monopoly on what can be thought, their task seems to be that of enabling something genuinely new to be thought. Their whole image is based on a recognition that affirmation, rather than refusal, is a novel political strategy.8/10 – Worth one viewing.

Despite the fact that some people seem to feel that it is cruel to state that Dow Chemical accepts full responsibility for the Bhopal catastrophe, or that HUD (the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development) wants to give former inhabitants of houses in New Orleans back their apartments, the affected people don't seem to think so. They're happy that people bring attention to their problem, and doing so by adding humor to it is often what is needed in a dour political climate such as these examples show, when multi-national corporations rule international business and - indeed - politics for most part.Much like Bill Hicks showed us, adding humor as spice often brings attention to the facts. The Yes Men were sharper in their previous film, but this one is still very valid as they continue to show the dangers of a free market taking over interests only to make as much money for their shareholders as is possible, not existing in the interest for the state at all.

It has been many years since I have laughed so hard and for so long to the point where I risked sending myself into cardiac arrest. Let me say up front I'm a strong conservative and I realize these guys are about as liberal as they come - but at least I give them credit for realizing that humor is the best tool to attack the opposition.Having been involved in many political campaigns as an analyst, I've often criticized liberals for having an angry and bitter disposition to anyone who thinks differently. I didn't see that in Andy and Mike. They come across as good natured, which as a conservative I can then always respect their opinion - even if I disagree.Their pranks demonstrate just how gullible many in government and the media are - not to mention plain stupid. Being from Louisiana I can tell you it wasn't a difficult challenge to dupe the likes of a Ray Nagin (mayor of New Orleans) and Kathleen Blanco (at the time governor of Louisiana). But then, the scene where they get a respected businessman into a terrorist protective suit that looks like an obese cockroach with Halliburton stamped on the side takes "pranking" to a new level. Absolutely priceless! Andy and Mike, I might not agree with your politics, but I love your methodology of promoting your position. I can't wait to see the next pranks you pull.