Beyond the Multiplex

Seeing this epochal event of the '60s rendered as a trippy, sci-fi-flavored cartoon will undoubtedly rub some viewers the wrong way. But I suspect those are not the viewers Morgen is concerned with. He has remarked, somewhat cryptically, that his film employs elements of the '60s but is actually set today. I can tell you this: When we see Lyndon B. Johnson, early in the film, give a speech telling the American people that an additional 25,000 troops will be needed to stabilize the situation in Vietnam, an audible gasp rippled through the press-screening audience.

In its best moments, and they are considerable, "Chicago 10" makes you see 1968, that near-apocalyptic year, with fresh eyes, as an extraordinary turning point in history now at least partly set free from boomer nostalgia and regret. Rubin, Kunstler and, especially, the cynical, clownish and wise Abbie Hoffman come alive as real people, not just marijuana-flavored avatars. (My favorite Hoffman one-liner: When asked by a reporter what he thinks of the trial, he cackles and says, "Well, I've got a great seat.")

As with the LBJ speech, the similarities between 1968 and 2006 are evident: an unpopular overseas war, a presidential administration foundering on the rocks, a sharply divided populace. But so are the differences, and they are striking too. If anything, the antiwar movement of the past four years has been larger and better organized than anything the Vietnam era produced, at least at a comparable stage. Since 2003, the movement against the Iraq war has repeatedly turned out protesters by the hundreds of thousands. Feb. 15, 2003 (a few weeks before the war began) was the largest coordinated day of international protest in history. The Vietnam protest movement never accomplished anything on that scale; the Chicago convention protests involved fewer than 20,000 people all told.

But for a complicated set of historical, generational and ideological reasons, the narrative we have inherited goes like this: The '60s protests were huge, idealistic and earth-shattering; all subsequent protest is a lame imitation. One principal reason for this is that latter-day protest movements have not produced charismatic, media-friendly, middle-class leaders like Hayden, Hoffman and Rubin. As has often been argued, those figures have not emerged recently because middle-class college kids are in no danger, at least so far, of being drafted.

Also, recent protest movements have clashed with cops only in local, relatively contained and theatrical situations. It's difficult, although perhaps not impossible, to imagine anything like the vicious mob mentality of the Chicago Police Department in 1968 happening again. Watching Morgen's movie makes you understand, with pungent force, that anyone who claims America has never been closer to fascism than it is today is simply wrong.

Morgen clearly wants his movie to carry a galvanizing message to the Youth of Today. And who knows? Maybe it will. That's not for a passel of parka-clad showbiz insiders trapped in an overpriced ski resort to decide (suckers for social relevance that we are). Even as the thermometer dropped below 10 degrees Fahrenheit on Thursday night, everywhere you went in Park City people clustered in little groups, murmuring over "Chicago 10." (There was an especially good critics conclave in the produce section at Albertson's.) I'll report back soon on what ought to be an action-packed weekend, but the big, silly party in this frigid little town is off to a hot start.

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