VICE

James Franco's pre production test reel for Blood Meridian. Originally selected to direct a feature length adaptation, James Franco filmed a 32 minute test scene of Tobin telling The Kid about how the Glanton Gang first met Judge Holden in the desert.

A former actor-turned-self-help guru holds a motivational workshop in a skating rink, lives in a mansion and rides BMX bikes with his girlfriend.

Vice travels to West Africa to rummage through the messy remains of a country ravaged by 14 years of civil war. Despite the United Nation’s eventual intervention, most of Liberia’s young people continue to live in abject poverty, surrounded by filth, drug addiction, and teenage prostitution. The former child soldiers who were forced into war have been left to fend for themselves, the murderous warlords who once led them in cannibalistic rampages have taken up as so-called community leaders, and new militias are lying in wait for the opportunity to reclaim their country from a government they rightly mistrust. America’s one and only foray into African colonialism is keeping a very uneasy peace indeed.

For decades, NFL owners marginalize Black quarterbacks; however, the success of Black quarterbacks and calls for racial equality, led by Colin Kaepernick, lead to positive changes.

Harmony Korine has spent his life disrupting traditional cinema with his provocative films. What most people don’t know is that first and foremost he's a skater.

An investigative deep dive into the corporate news media’s coverage of Bernie Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign that asks: who actually gets a say in American politics?

"Director Martin Scorsese looks at the importance of three films by Italian director Roberto Rossellini, all starring Rossellini's then-wife Ingrid Bergman. "In the late 40s, Ingrid Bergman was the coolest, hottest, and most talented lady around Hollywood. She saw some Italian neo-realist films by Roberto Rossellini, wrote him a letter, starred in a number of his movies, and proceeded to have a scandalous affair and marriage with him. In each film, Bergman experiences some sort of deep existential crises in the midst of political and social upheaval. Since every major player who worked on those films is dead, Martin Scorsese (who was heavily influenced by the films) gives us the 4-1-1 on the three movies in this short doc and it’s fucking fascinating" (Vice).

Since the advent of acid house in the late 80s, British techno music has been in a long, baffling search for some sort of universal lowest common denominator. Breakbeat, digital hardcore, and gabber all made strong efforts in the race for the bottom, but none of them holds a candle to Donk. Combining the 150bpm madness of happy hardcore with indecipherable North English rap and then overlaying the whole mess with a single, infuriating "donk" sound, Donk may well be the apotheosis of all ridiculous dance music to date. It is also the only local thing going for an entire population of working-class kids with dwindling outside prospects. We meet up with Black Out Crew, commonly referred to as the Beatles of the Donk scene. Their video "Put a Donk On It!" has almost 4 million views on YouTube. So come along for some ecstasy fueled all nighters into the bizarre scene that is Donk.

"Sneaking into North Korea was one of the hardest and weirdest processes VICE has ever dealt with. In North Korea, if you get caught being a journalist when you're supposed to be a tourist, you go to jail, or worse. Our rare footage is some of the craziest ever captured, providing an honest look inside the hermit nation."

"The black plague has broke out in Madagascar. In late 2013, a deadly outbreak of the plague hit small villages around the country killing dozens of people. Rumored to have taken root in overcrowded prisons, the disease has flourished amid Madagascar’s increasing poverty and poor waste management. Antibiotics to treat the disease have been developed and are available in most countries, but Madagascar’s rudimentary healthcare system has left a number of people stranded without care."

Adam Pitluk, journalist and author of Damned to Eternity, returns to Quincy, IL to further investigate how James may have been scapegoated by local community and law enforcement officials whose tunnel vision firmly placed the blame on James, a crime which he maintains to this day that he didn't do.

"The dry and arid Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region – home to the mighty black scorpion – has emerged as the epicentre of a rare drug culture. People in Pakistan’s borderlands are no strangers to narcotics; the Soviet-Afghan war in the ‘80s made sure of that. But scorpion venom is a wildcard drug ripping through communities that no one knows what to do with. People who have smoked it say the high is powerful and can last for days. Its side effects, however, seem too heavy a cost to bear. VICE travelled across Peshawar, Mattani and Dir to speak to users, researchers, a former narcotics-control officer and a journalist to understand why people smoke scorpion venom and how it’s changed their lives."

Aside from literally sleeping in feces, these people are dodging rats, flash floods and drug addicts. What's worse, the sewer dwellers are constantly under attack by local "death squads," who fire open rounds and pour gasoline into their underground homes, then set them ablaze.

The rivalry between football clubs Rangers and Celtic goes past typical name calling and dives into violence, racial slurs and pure hatred. The rivalry between Glasgow's "Old Firm" sides is the most famous in world football. It's the game's flagship loathing, proof of the power of the sport to inspire profound levels of tribal loyalty and a near-Pavlovian revulsion at anything to do with a rival. We examine the situation and try to get a handle on the political, religious, and national identity clashes that have shaped the rivalry, speak to fanzine editors on both sides of the divide and travel with the Bhoys' away support to a match at Tannadice.

"There is an Amazonian frog called Phyllomedusa Bicolor or the Sapo which I have been reading about for years. It is totally different from the psychedelic toads found in North America. The Sapo's venom produces an effect much closer to morphine than LSD, but really it's not like either of those things. It's a distinctly vomitous dissociative experience unlike anything else I've ever encountered. I had to find out what this frog really does, but supposedly it cannot produce its venom in captivity. The only way to experience its unique trip is to travel down the Amazon River and catch one yourself, which is exactly what I did." - Hamilton Morris, Vice correspondent

"Despite the spooky overtones, modern Satanism actually has a lot in common with self-help, the green movement, and spunky American individualism. We traveled to Cleveland with Thomas Morton to meet Eric Freeman, authority on the duality of evil, to learn about altering reality through the power of the mind."

"The global black market for organs is thriving. We go inside this vile criminal trade to meet the unscrupulous surgeons and traffickers butchering people for profit."

In the lead up to the next great Kiddy Smile concert, diverse and passionate members of Paris’ glamorous ballroom community break down issues of race, immigrant culture, queer visibility, and free expression in a diverse but also deeply divided contemporary France.

"Every August, while Europe's bankers, lawyers, and other desk jockeys shut off their phones and head to the beach, the junkies of Prague set up camp in the poppy fields outside the city for a vacation of their own" (Vice).

"Throughout June and July of 2020 large displays of fireworks were illegally being set off daily around many US cities. New York City specifically saw large scale nightly displays. "Each night residents of New York City would be jolted by the booming sounds of firework explosions, for hours at a time. Record breaking numbers of complaints were received for nights on end. "Many were unsure of the inspiration and motivation behind the displays, sparking conspiracy theories to circulate online regarding the supply of these fireworks and the reasons behind it. "We went out to Canarsie, Brooklyn to join members of the community and attend a display while attempting to understand the supposed mystery behind it all."