Film
The Yes Men
The Yes Men documents a pair of prankster activists who infiltrate WTO press conferences and business forums by posing as officials, broadcasting fake announcements to expose corporate hypocrisy. It's wickedly funny, audaciously risky, and operates in that rare space where comedy becomes genuine activism. Essential viewing for anyone who believes absurdity is sometimes the only honest response to power.
Should you watch it?
Watch it if you enjoy mischievous activism where the joke is the point, and you like watching earnest people stage a bluff in front of powerful audiences and see how far it goes.
Skip it if you want a measured, evidence-heavy look at trade policy, since this is more stunt and spectacle than explainer and its politics arrive wrapped in jokes.
What it asks of you: Eighty minutes of brisk, restless editing that hops between conference stages, staged presentations and sly interviews, asking you to track the bluff while judging what is real.
Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.
If you liked this
The Corporation2003
A scathing, smartly structured documentary that anatomises how corporations legally function as sociopaths. Pairs perfectly with Yes Men as companion pieces on exposing institutional wrongness.
But Relentless in tone. There's no lightness, no pranks—just accumulating dread about how the system actually works.
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room2005
Forensic documentary about corporate fraud that's as gripping as a thriller. Shows how charming, intelligent people can become architects of massive deception.
But Heavy subject matter. The financial mechanics get dense, and the ending is grim rather than cathartic.
Inside Job2010
Crisp, furious documentary on the 2008 financial crisis that names names and follows money. Perfect if you want righteous anger delivered with cold clarity.
But Can feel like watching a system fail to punish itself. The powerlessness doesn't resolve neatly.
Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from The Yes Men
The wildcard
Something you would not have found on your own.
The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters2007
Both films weaponise specificity and apparent absurdity—Yes Men's WTO pranks, Kong's arcade beef—to expose deeper truths about power, access, and who gets to write the story.
Documentary about a Donkey Kong championship dispute that becomes a meditation on obsession, class, and the narratives we construct around competition. Treats arcade gaming with the gravity of opera, and it works.
But Fixates on people and conflicts that only matter within a niche community. You will be bored if you don't care about arcade culture.
More like this (7)
F is for Family2015
Frank Flannery's animated series about a blue-collar Boston salesman navigating corporate absurdity in the 1970s. Anarchic, profane, structurally brilliant. Comedy as social critique.
But Relentlessly bleak and mean-spirited, even when funny. Some will find it too nihilistic to be fun.
Thank You for Smoking2005
Slick satire about a tobacco lobbyist that understands how charm and rhetoric grease institutional malfeasance. Smart, cynical, entertaining without preaching.
But Moral ambiguity might feel like the film is actually endorsing its villain rather than critiquing the system.
Network1976
Prophetic satire about ratings-obsessed news networks willing to sell anything for eyeballs. Aged like wine. Every line feels ripped from today's news.
But Screaming performances and hammered satire. If subtlety is your thing, this swings for the fences and never takes it down.
The Whitest Kids U'Know2007
Canadian sketch comedy that deploys absurdist humor to dismantle American corporate culture and political theatre. Same spirit of prankish disruption as Yes Men, different method.
But Sketch shows are uneven by design. You'll sit through duds to get to brilliant pieces.
Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media1992
Documentary about how media operates as a consent-manufacturing machine. Dense but accessible, and feels urgent given how its predictions have aged.
But Chomsky's voice is nasal and droning. The film is deliberately unsexy about a deeply important subject.
13th2016
Ava DuVernay's examination of mass incarceration as the continuation of slavery by other means. Visually powerful, historically rigorous, politically essential.
But Punishing to watch. The system's injustice compounds across ninety minutes without relief or resolution.
Bicycle Thieves1948
Where Yes Men use comedy and spectacle to expose systemic indifference, Bicycle Thieves uses quiet realism to show the same indifference crushing an ordinary person. Both ask: what happens when the machine doesn't care?
Italian neorealist masterpiece about a man searching for his stolen bicycle in postwar Rome. No plot, just accumulating desperation. One of cinema's greatest achievements in making the everyday unbearably real.
But Glacially paced by modern standards. Nothing happens. The emotional devastation arrives through patience, not incident.
People
Cast
- Mike BonannoHimself
Andy BichlbaumHimself
Michael MooreHimself- Patrick LichtyHimself
- Sal SalamoneHimself
- Phil BaylyChicago Newreporter
- Andy BichlbaumDr. Andreas Bichlbauer
- Philip De LorenzoHimself
Greg PalastHimself
Directing
- Chris SmithDirector
- Dan OllmanDirector
- Sarah PriceDirector
Production
- Chris SmithProducer
- Sarah PriceProducer