Influence (2020)
(On TV, January 2021) I strongly suspect that once we take a sober second look at the 2016–2020 decade of disastrous events and dubious decisions, we’re going to find a lot of underreported stories beyond the flaming incompetence of the Trump administration, the compounded stupidity of Brexit or the nightmare of the COVID-19 pandemic. We’re going to end up rediscovering events and people who didn’t get any media oxygen during that time, and we’re not going to like the crimes and horrors that went undetected. While Influence is a broad decade-spanning documentary tracking the multiple tangents left behind noted public opinion manipulator Tim Bell, the part of the film that interested me the most was the description of the 2016–2017 Bell Pottinger scandal that led to the end of that company, fuelled by dirty tricks played in South Africa. It’s a huge story, and I was aghast to realize that I had either never known or about it or hadn’t seen it fit to be interesting—but there was plenty going on in 2016–2017 and I strongly suspect that any reporting of it in North America was measured in micro-fractions of the coverage given to more pressing events. Much of Influence is a clear, detailed and depressing exploration of the role that Public Relations firms play in shaping public opinion in underhanded ways, with plenty of cozy ties between those companies and political clients. Writers-directors Diana Neille and Richard Poplak mention but don’t dwell overmuch of better-known stories in that area—Brexit and the Trump victory being the two obvious ones, amply described elsewhere. The narrative through-line between all the events that the film tries to touch upon is not always clear, especially when some pieces look more interesting than others. The South African scandal segment, for instance, has the added advantage of being narrated by engaging subject matter experts—Phumzile van Damme easily outclasses most of the film’s other talking heads in terms of sheer charisma, for instance. Still, the film pokes at underappreciated parts of today’s political landscape, and while the film is focused on its British subject, there are plenty of applicable lessons for other western countries. Oh boy, I wonder what crucial stories we’ll uncover in the next few years?