With a few notable exceptions, documentaries are not big business at the box office. This is unfortunate because a lot of them are really good. Sometimes, as with The Yes Men Fix The World, they manage to put across important points and be highly entertaining at the same time. The Yes Men are a group of people who have taken it upon themselves to impersonate senior corporate figures in order to draw attention to corporate wrongdoing. Their notorious hoaxes have gained worldwide attention, and Mike Bonanno, who co-directs and appears in their latest film, agreed to talk with me about how it all happened.
"Initially The Yes Men were just me and Andy [Bichlbaum]," he says. "It was in 1999, just before the Seattle protests, and Andy made a fake WTO website, on a whim really, to see what would happen. We thought people would laugh at it and see that it was satirical but that didn't happen at all. Instead people started emailing us, asking us questions as if we were the WTO. We were really shocked."
The Yes Men have previously been the subject of a self-titled documentary. "It was just an observational documentary," Mike explains. I ask him how the idea for the new film came about and he says that they really just carried on with their activisim and kept filming. When it came to editing, they chose to focus on "the most egregious examples of corporate wrongdoing. The Bhopal disaster, for instance, was the largest industrial accident in history and has never been satisfactorily resolved, so that's obviously a flashpoint. Then we went on to deal with the likes of ExxonMobil because they're at the forefront of funding climate change denial and that's basically mortaging the future of the whole planet."
So how does Mike feel about the press coverage The Yes Men's hoaxes have received? The Bhopal hoax involved his associate pretending to represent DOW Chemical and going on the BBC to announce that victims of the chemical leak which killed dozens of people and left hundreds more sick would finally be compensated. Critics said that this had cruelly given the victims false hope.
"We're not in it to make friends," Mike says confidently. "But I have no hard feelings. The thing is, it generated more publicity for the victims, and I think that was worth it. As the film shows, we've had universal support from the victims and their campaigners. They feel it was worth it because it brought them so much attention."
He also acknowledges that they weren't sure this would be the case, and that they thought long and hard about that particular stunt before they went ahead. In the end, he feels that the real victim of collateral damage was the BBC, which broadcast the fake story worldwide before it wised up. "But in a way that's to their credit," he stresses. "They were vulnerable to that because they were trying harder than anybody to find a representative of DOW to speak on the 20th anniversary of the disaster."
So how do he and his associates get away with their impersonations? Is it all about being low key and fitting in to what's expected of a conference delegate?
"Some of it's that, yes," he agrees. "But I think it's also about the natural human tendency to obey authority figures and believe what they have to say. Of course, one of the lessons we learned as we went along is that that's also why they obey captains of industry - in a way, this is happening on a worldwide scale."
And will those hoaxes be harder to pull off now that this film has drawn attention to them?
"Yeah, probably. People will be more on the alert, but I think that's good overall, that their bullshit meters should be on high."
The film, he says, is more than just a documentary - it's something of a call to arms. And he's not worried that it will just be preaching to the converted.
"I think film can have a big influence. We've had a lot of press coverage, you know, in newspapers and on the TV news, but that's all rather fleeting. A film can take on a life of its own. Already this one is being taken up by advocacy groups."
It was no doubt easy to rally people to the cause when so many of them were unhappy about the Bush regime in America. Is it harder now that Obama's in charge? And is he optimistic that positive changes really can be made?
"A lot of people were really relieved when Obama got in," he says. "But obviously there's still a long way to go. There's been a lot of damage done - and before Bush, too, Clinton did a lot of damage to the idea of a more humane culture. We're hoping we can be part of a massive movement to change the way we view growth and money, because if we can't do that then, well, we're all doomed. I don't mean to be melodramatic but we are. Like with climate change - we all know where that road leads. But if we weren't optimistic then we wouldn't be doing all this. I think it's within reach. With climate change, it's like telling a smoker to quit - they may want to, but will they? But overall I think it's good because we can still make that choice. We can still change."
To find out more about The Yes Men Fix The World, the people behind it, and what you can do if you'd like to get involved, go to www.theyesmen.org. The film will open in UK cinemas this Friday.
