Review of Chicago 10 (2008) by Garry W — 24 Jan 2009

Bad times may not produce good contemporary documentaries, but they do bring out the best in political art. And let's face it: cinema was never an art form to benefit from hindsight. The best stuff is always restless, contradictory and a little too close to the bone.

So it is with "Chicago 10". It's not so much a document of the Chicago Seven as an electrifying Battle Hymn of the Republic. The film doesn't do much to illuminate the Yippie movement or the 1969 trials, but that's all right, because every ten minutes or so, it gives you a shot of pure adrenaline as it covers the Chicago riots. During these sequences the film transforms from a courtroom drama into a hellish kamikaze ride on the wing of a doomed attempt at protest, never mind "revolution". Sure, it evokes false nostalgia, but it also makes you want to run to the streets and start something. If that's not good shit, I don't know what is.