The animated stars of the 1968 Conspiracy Trial included Bobby Seale (voiced by Jeffrey Wright), Abbie Hoffman (voiced by Abbie Hoffman) and Jerry Rubin (voiced by Jerry Rubin) in ''Chicago 10.'' (Courtesy illustration)

By Bob Polunsky
Guest Columnist

You don’t need a crystal ball to figure out why “Chicago 10” is topical today. All the clues are in the advertising when you see bold headlines such as “a war in a foreign land was tearing people apart” and “the president’s approval rating was at an all-time low” and “the country was divided” and “America was lost without a moral compass.”

But it’s not today. Those headlines refer to the Vietnam conflict in 1968 when protesters were denied permits for demonstrations in Chicago where the Democratic 1968 convention was being held. There was so much unrest that the government held eight of the most active protesters accountable for all the violence, thereby making them scapegoats for the government.

This movie is a documentary about American unrest at a crucial time in our history, and it’s handled in part with animation. This creative process of storytelling gives the film life by resurrecting some of the most colorful personalities of the time with archival use of their actual voices for their cartoon images in most cases.

There were actually eight protesters, but two lawyers involved in the proceedings were added to the list that included civil rights activist Abbie Hoffman; conscientious objector David Dellinger who served three years in prison for refusing to join the Vietnam conflict; Jerry Rubin, an activist subpoenaed by U.S. Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s House Un-American Activities Committee; Tom Hayden a.k.a. movie star activist Jane Fonda’s husband; Bobby Seale of the Black Panthers; William Kunstler, a lawyer deeply involved with such notorious activists as Martin Luther King, Jack Ruby and Lenny Bruce; Leonard Weinglass, the lawyer who represented Jane Fonda in a suit against Richard Nixon and famed judge Julius Hoffman among others.
Their images and activities are on the front burner in a documentary that was a prelude to the harsh times and terrible tempers in the Middle East conflict because “The Chicago 10” foreshadowed the Iraq War and the politics of our time.

The style of the documentary gives it depth. Using realistic images of actual people in animated form makes the movie look like pages out of a history book. Whether you agree with the way the events were handled or not is irrelevant. It is documented history that no one can ignore.  The fact that people – and nations – repeat their follies and mistakes is another reason to see how the “Chicago 10” were involved in some of the most catastrophic events of the 20th century.

Actors Nick Nolte, Hank Azaria, Roy Scheider and Mark Ruffalo provide the voices for some of the characters, but where was at all possible, actual archival voices of the Chicago 10 and their adversaries are used.

It’s a history lesson. It’s also a character study of Americans during a troubled time, and its release during a presidential election year is noteworthy.
 
Studio rating: PG-13
Bob says: “Don’t miss this one!”
4 Stars