Review of The Trial of the Chicago 7 (2020) by Thewaffle — 29 Nov 2020

It's a good retelling of an important story about how America's war in Vietnam turned the country against itself. And it's a potent reminder of the rampant thuggery among U.S. police forces, which have been abusing citizens for a long time before 2020.

But this film falls into the common courtroom film trap of obsessing over legal maneuvering and mostly forgetting the real goals of the protagonists. While the protagonists talk a lot about the war and the soldiers sent to fight and die there, the film doesn't actually show any of that war's violence.

There isn't a single line of dialogue from a draftee or a vet as far as I can recall. It's one thing to read a list of names of the fallen, but it's quite another to see a 19-year-old bleeding out in a ditch on the far side of the world in the service of a war waged for domestic politics.