
Directing
Adam Curtis
Born 1955-05-26 · Dartford, Kent, England, UK
Adam Curtis (born 1955) is an award-winning British documentarian and writer. He has also worked as a television producer, director and narrator. He works for BBC Current Affairs. His programmes express a clear, albeit sometimes controversial, opinion about their subject.
Acting credits
7.4We live in a world where the powerful deceive us. We know they lie. They know we know they lie. They do not care. We say we care, but we do nothing, and nothing ever changes. It is normal. Welcome to the post-truth world. How we got to where we are now…
HyperNormalisation
2016
7.6An experimental documentary that explores Saudi Arabia's relationship with the U.S. and the role this has played in the war in Afghanistan.
Bitter Lake
2015
6.8As we wait to see whether Rupert Murdoch will fall from power and lose control of News International, Every Day is Like Sunday tells the forgotten story of the dramatic downfall of Cecil King—the newspaper mogul who used to dominate British media in the 1960s, before Rupert Murdoch arrived.
Every Day Is Like Sunday
2011
6.0In 1951, a woman died in Baltimore, U.S.A. She was called Henrietta Lacks. These are cells from her body. They were taken from her just before she died. They have been growing and multiplying ever since. There are now billions of these cells in laboratories around the world. If massed together, they would weigh 400 times her original weight. These cells have transformed modern medicine, but they also became caught up in the politics of our age.
Modern Times: The Way of All Flesh
1997
7.2Short film examining the global events of 2014 to reveal a chaotic morass, the reporting of which is increasingly difficult to comprehend in the context of the 24-hour news cycle and the internet. Screened during Charlie Brooker's 2014 Wipe special.
"Oh Dear"-ism II & Non-Linear War
2014
6.0Short film using the paranoia of Richard Nixon to explore how a similar outlook on life has been propagated on a larger social scale in the new media age and the resulting moral panics and immobilisation of politics. Screen during the fourth episode of the second series of Charlie Brooker's Newswipe.
Paranoia
2010
10.0The Rosie Kay Dance Company present a piece about the strange history and pop-cultural aftermath of CIA mind control experiments during the Cold War, with documentary segments by Adam Curtis.
MK Ultra
2020
8.0Short film about how mainstream media simplify complex events and present them as "scattered terrible things happening everywhere, Oh Dear", leaving the public feeling powerless to do anything about them. Screened in the third episode of the first series of Charlie Brooker's Newswipe.
The Rise of “Oh Dear”-ism
2009
Behind the camera
7.4We live in a world where the powerful deceive us. We know they lie. They know we know they lie. They do not care. We say we care, but we do nothing, and nothing ever changes. It is normal. Welcome to the post-truth world. How we got to where we are now…
HyperNormalisation
2016
7.4We live in a world where the powerful deceive us. We know they lie. They know we know they lie. They do not care. We say we care, but we do nothing, and nothing ever changes. It is normal. Welcome to the post-truth world. How we got to where we are now…
HyperNormalisation
2016
NRDocumentary about the town of Walton-on-the-Naze, directed by Adam Curtis
The Seaside
1983
1.0In 1949, at the height of the Cold War, the British and American Governments decided to fight back at the growing Soviet Empire with a secret plan, the Albanian Subversion, in which the CIA and MI6 attempted to overthrow the Albanian government and to weaken the Soviet Union and the role of double agent Kim Philby.
The Cost of Treachery
1984
1.0In 1949, at the height of the Cold War, the British and American Governments decided to fight back at the growing Soviet Empire with a secret plan, the Albanian Subversion, in which the CIA and MI6 attempted to overthrow the Albanian government and to weaken the Soviet Union and the role of double agent Kim Philby.
The Cost of Treachery
1984
1.0In 1949, at the height of the Cold War, the British and American Governments decided to fight back at the growing Soviet Empire with a secret plan, the Albanian Subversion, in which the CIA and MI6 attempted to overthrow the Albanian government and to weaken the Soviet Union and the role of double agent Kim Philby.
The Cost of Treachery
1984
7.6An experimental documentary that explores Saudi Arabia's relationship with the U.S. and the role this has played in the war in Afghanistan.
Bitter Lake
2015
7.6An experimental documentary that explores Saudi Arabia's relationship with the U.S. and the role this has played in the war in Afghanistan.
Bitter Lake
2015
NRThis short film uses the history and figure of the Murdoch media empire as a vast invasive machine, to draw parallels to new media machines such as Google that are not only more invasive, but more pervasive than anything the Murdoch media empire has managed. Why are we not more concerned about this?
Murdoch's Revolution
2010
NRThe largest leisure and shopping complex in Europe, the Metro Centre in Tynemouth, and its creator John Hall.
The Kingdom of Fun
1989
NRThe largest leisure and shopping complex in Europe, the Metro Centre in Tynemouth, and its creator John Hall.
The Kingdom of Fun
1989
NRThe history of war correspondents.
Trumpets and Typewriters: A History of War Reporting
1983
Music video directed by Adam Curtis, featuring Gerard Murphy. Taken from the Gang of Four 1995 album “Shrinkwrapped”.
Tattoo
1995
A film about of a cross-section of the various characters that came to Charles and Diana's wedding.
Wedding Day - Not only Charles and Diana...
1982
6.8As we wait to see whether Rupert Murdoch will fall from power and lose control of News International, Every Day is Like Sunday tells the forgotten story of the dramatic downfall of Cecil King—the newspaper mogul who used to dominate British media in the 1960s, before Rupert Murdoch arrived.
Every Day Is Like Sunday
2011
6.8As we wait to see whether Rupert Murdoch will fall from power and lose control of News International, Every Day is Like Sunday tells the forgotten story of the dramatic downfall of Cecil King—the newspaper mogul who used to dominate British media in the 1960s, before Rupert Murdoch arrived.
Every Day Is Like Sunday
2011
7.0In The Road to Terror, revolutionaries tell how their dream descended into a nightmare of terror and execution. They speak as exiles in Paris, a city that is preparing to celebrate the glories of the first mass revolution of 1978. Behind its strange images, the struggle for power in the Iranian revolution has followed a pattern uncannily similar to many of the great revolutions of the past: just as 200 years ago in France, the Iranian revolution has gone down the old road from liberation to repression, the road to terror.
The Road to Terror
1989
5.0Dino Labriola runs the small town of Montemilone in the deep south. He was elected the first Communist mayor. Now he faces the problems of a town dying on its feet. There are no jobs, the young emigrate, the old have given up hope and government aid often goes astray. While Dino is determined to fight for his town, his wife Angela sometimes feels that the struggle is not worth it. A massive dam is being built just outside Montemilone. It's a new threat to the town and to Dino's position as mayor.
The Mayor of Montemilone
1984
5.0Dino Labriola runs the small town of Montemilone in the deep south. He was elected the first Communist mayor. Now he faces the problems of a town dying on its feet. There are no jobs, the young emigrate, the old have given up hope and government aid often goes astray. While Dino is determined to fight for his town, his wife Angela sometimes feels that the struggle is not worth it. A massive dam is being built just outside Montemilone. It's a new threat to the town and to Dino's position as mayor.
The Mayor of Montemilone
1984
6.6David Jones investigates how 1960s council housing came to be built so poorly that thousands later needed to be demolished.
Inquiry: The Great British Housing Disaster
1984
6.6David Jones investigates how 1960s council housing came to be built so poorly that thousands later needed to be demolished.
Inquiry: The Great British Housing Disaster
1984
6.5The story of America's rise to power starting with 1959, using archival footage and US pop music to highlight the consequences to the rest of the world and in the peoples' minds.
It Felt Like a Kiss
2009
6.5The story of America's rise to power starting with 1959, using archival footage and US pop music to highlight the consequences to the rest of the world and in the peoples' minds.
It Felt Like a Kiss
2009
6.5The story of America's rise to power starting with 1959, using archival footage and US pop music to highlight the consequences to the rest of the world and in the peoples' minds.
It Felt Like a Kiss
2009