Shut Up, Little Man!

There is a documentary that I highly recommend called “Shut Up, Little Man!”, it’s currently on the ABC iView and watch it before it expires in approximately 9 days.

Well if that’s not enough to tempt ya then he’s the documentary in a nutshell *cue Austin Powers in a nutshell*. It’s about these two young adults who record their loud, obnoxious, borderline homicidal and hilarious neighbours as they verbally abuse each other on a nightly basis. It slowly become a viral underground hit back in the 80s, originally circulated via mix-tapes back when they were actually tapes... kids ask your parents, then ask them why the hell you’re reading this.

I’m going to try and not spoil the documentary but that notions about intellectual property and privacy are some of the most compelling, as well as the most important, arguments that are probably more important today than they were back in the 80s; especially with all the anti-piracy debates and the notion of creative commons being a big deal in modern net culture. It’s an interesting dialogue that occurs between those who become deeply connected with this, especially when money becomes involved, and getting their views on the situation is a big part of why I liked this as a filmmaker and (hopefully) future documentarian. The only real disappointment is there were a couple of questions that remained unanswered, but that’s mostly because I’m curious as to some of the legal ramifications as a content producer.

Ultimately it is an interesting story which leads to some thought provoking, and that’s probably one of the best ways to present these events.