Zeitgeist: The Movie

Zeitgeist, the Movie is a 2007 documentary film by Peter Joseph about historical and modern conspiracies, including the origins of Christianity, the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, and the banking system. A sequel, Zeitgeist: Addendum, advocates a technology-based social system influenced by the ideas of Jacque Fresco and The Venus Project.

Part I, entitled “The Greatest Story Ever Told,” questions religions as being god-given stories, arguing that the Christian religion specifically is mainly derived from other religions, astronomical facts, astrological myths and traditions, which in turn were derived from or shared elements with others. In furtherance of the Jesus myth hypothesis, this part argues that the historical Jesus is a literary and astrological hybrid, nurtured politically in the interest of control.

Part II, entitled “All the World’s a Stage,” uses integral footage of several 9/11 conspiracy theory films to illustrate how the September 11 attacks were either orchestrated or allowed to happen by elements within the United States government in order to generate mass fear, initiate and justify the War on Terror, provide a pretext for the curtailment of civil liberties, and produce economic gain. These claims include that the US government had advance knowledge about the attacks, the response of the military deliberately let the planes reach their targets, and the World Trade Center buildings 1, 2, and 7 underwent a controlled demolition. The film claims that six of the named hijackers are still alive, that Hani Hanjour could not have flown Flight 77 into the Pentagon, that no substantial plane wreckage was found at two of the three crash sites, that the Bush administration covered up the truth in the 9/11 Commission Report, and that the mainstream media have failed to ask important questions about the official account.

Part III, entitled “Don’t Mind the Men Behind the Curtain,” argues that three wars of the United States during the twentieth century were waged purely for economic gain by what the film refers to as “international bankers”. The film alleges that certain events were engineered or were allowed to happen as excuses to enter into war including the sinking of the RMS Lusitania (a factor in the US decision to enter World War I two years later), the Attack on Pearl Harbor (which was the opening attack of the Japanese on the US in World War II), and the Gulf of Tonkin Incident (which led to the escalation of the Vietnam War).