Great World of Sound
Craig Zobel | USA | 2007
106 min
Scams work because the people being scammed are usually idiots. It sounds mean, since the people usually fall for the scam because of their desire to better their lives or realize their dreams. It is easy to see why they fall for schemes that seem to have high rewards, but I can’t sympathize too much for such people. Their stupidity not only destroys their own capital, but also rewards scammers, and just encourages more people to get involved in the scams. So, the existence of scams can be blamed on the very person initiating the scam and benefiting from it — but why not blame the victims for being a catalyst?
I mean, why would someone fall for a Nigerian email scam? Come on, I don’t think the fucking Prince of Nigeria or whatever wants to give YOU ten million dollars. It is like pyramid schemes being made illegal. It is not illegal only because people are morons and if they spent a few minutes thinking about the plan, they’d realize it could never work. But people get duped, so the government has to make it illegal, to save people from themselves.
In The Great World of Music, a small company claims to search for new talent, sign then up, produce their records, and distribute them. They put in advertisements in papers in small cities calling for auditions. Their talent-scouts then go to these cities, listened to the auditions, and sign them up.
The people who are being auditioned are excited, they all come to try out for their dreams and maybe an opportunity will open up for them to change their lives. The talent-scouts have just been recently hired and have no prior experience in this field, and the job is a positive financial change in their lives. But there is a catch here. The company requires a “commitment” from the people who they want to sign up. This commitment is some amount of capital given to the company to help produce the record. The company claims they will bear 70% of the charges and all the distribution work, and the artist has t only pay a small amount just so they don’t pull out.
While the company still does produce the work, it is an obvious scam. They sign up everyone, irregardless of talent, and their talent scout are just sales people, promising better lives and riches, in exchange for upfront cash. We follow two sales people and their slow realization of the immorality of their action, and their own conflict with it.
The movie is about the lives of small people. The artists are so eager to believe the promises, because they work in small jobs in small towns, and the salespeople are offering them big possibilities and it is hard for them to resist. At the same time, the salespeople find the job to be an improvement over their previous jobs, and the company sells the morality of the work they do the salespeople to, so the employees do not know it is a scam. Or more accurately, they might know, but since the company has a “rational” reason for their doubts, it is easy for the salespeople to deceive themselves. A lot of people are working at jobs that rely on screwing someone. Most of these people are not bad people, so they have rationalized everything so perfectly, that they can not see the truth of their action. This should not excuse them.