The Anarchist Cookbook (film)

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The Anarchist Cookbook
DVD Cover Artwork
Directed by	Jordan Susman
Produced by	Clay Bakker
Written by	Jordan Susman
Starring	Devon Gummersall Dylan Bruno
Music by	Josh Kramon
Cinematography	Brown Cooper
Editing by	Alan Edward Bell
Distributed by	Innovation Film Group
Release date(s)	June 6, 2002 (Seattle International Film Festival)
Running time	101 min
Country	Dallas, Texas USA
Language	English
Budget	$2,000,000
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

The Anarchist Cookbook is a 2002 black comedy film directed by Jordan Susman. The plot of the movie is about a young honors student-gone-anarchist, Puck (Devon Gummersall) and his group of anarchist friends living peacefully in a Dallas commune until the nihilist Johnny Black (Dylan Bruno) shows up with The Anarchist Cookbook and completely destroys their way of life.

Using The Anarchist Cookbook as a key to the plot, the movie was heavily criticized by anarchists for its poor presentation of anarchist theory, philosophy, and ethics, which they felt amounted to anti-anarchist propaganda.^{[citation needed]}

This film has an indepth look at human nature and is actually used at some colleges as a piece on human studies.^{[citation needed]}

Contents 1 Plot Summary 2 Cast 3 Anarchism and the film 4 Production notes 5 See also 6 External links

[edit] Plot Summary

The first group of 'anarchists' have certain features that may or may not be realistic as far as flop house rebellious youths go. For example, they have a strict no-drugs policy, which is quite different from many real life live-in-poverty rebellious communal house type of folks who are into all kinds of drugs, especially alcohol, and have a laissez-faire attitude towards drug dealing. The 'family' in the movie, however, definitely leans towards the hippy veganish straightedge side of the rebellious philosophy. They do have rules, such as no drugs, no use of violence, and no 'Anarchist Cookbook' in their little communal bookstore.

Johnny Black shares much of the rebellious philosophy of 'the family' when he shows up. However, he 'takes over' the control of the commune by breaking the few rules they do have. He learns secrets of other people and uses those secrets against them. He reads "Johnny Red's" private diary, in which he describes fantasizing about young boys, and then shows this diary to the man's girlfriend, which breaks up their relationship. He uses drugs in order to control people, by getting them addicted and by dealing for money, a crux of the latter part of the film, in fact the entire tone of the film transforms almost completely. He then starts advocating the use of explosives and so forth in order to 'really make a difference'. Then he starts inviting neo Nazis, skinheads, white power types, militiamen, and so forth to his organization.

Eventually Puck is 'saved' by his kinky republican Reagan-worshipping girlfriend, and he 'saves the day' by whimsical methods left over from the spirit of the old commune, when 'we had fun'. He also narcs and snitches; but then again he had no choice; he had a death sentence put on him from Black. In the end, Puck goes to the FBI to turn in Black and all his fellow domestic terrorists and finds out that there were rewards for information leading to their arrest. Puck takes the money and leaves Dallas. The final sequence of the movie has a narrator decrying the idea of 'freedom without responsibility'.

[edit] Cast

Actor	Role
Devon Gummersall	Puck
Dylan Bruno	Johnny Black
Gina Philips	Karla
Johnny Whitworth	Sweeney
Katharine Towne	Jody
Steve Van Wormer	Double D
John Savage	Johnny Red

[edit] Anarchism and the film

The movie was heavily criticized by anarchists for its poor presentation of anarchist theory, philosophy, and ethics, which they felt amounted to anti-anarchist propaganda.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Production notes

The film's budget and schedule are used extensively (and reproduced) in Robert Latham Brown's book Planning the Low-Budget Film. It was shot in Dallas, Texas, during the summer of 2001 for just under $2,000,000.

[edit] See also

Anti-anarchism

[edit] External links

• The Anarchist Cookbook at the Internet Movie Database
• Anarchist Cookbook The Movie.com, official website of the film.
• Anarchy in the U.S.A., an article by Larry Carroll, about the film and director Jordan Susman.