The Insurrectionary People's Picture Show Theater

The Weather Underground is a 2002 documentary film based on the rise and fall of the American radical organization The Weathermen. The group's goal was to "bring the (Vietnam) War home" through acts of militant tactics.

Anarchism has historically gained the most support and influence in Spain, especially in the seventy or so years before Francisco Franco's victory in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939. Here is the history of the Spanish anarchist movement from the words of those who where involved.

The Russian Revolution and Civil War were major watersheds of the 20th Century. Now, for the first time, the story of this bloodsoaked time is being told in full color. New footage from the battlefields, expert testimonies, and exciting colorized archives help to unfold the dramatic story of the Communist rise and seizure of power in 1917.

This powerful two-part series argues that the Russian Revolution was not so much perverted by Stalin, as it was rotten from the start. This was no idealistic uprising of the masses, but a brutal coup d’etat carried out by a handful of megalomaniacs. Almost overnight an entire society was destroyed and replaced with one of the biggest and most radical social experiments ever seen. Within a generation, millions would be killed and almost 1/3 of the world’s population would be living in the shadow of communism.

The film focuses on the sailors from the island naval base of Kronstadt, who took up the revolutionary cause with bloody enthusiasm in 1917 only to have their dreams shattered when Lenin creates a brutal police state. The sailors denounce their former ally and face the Red Army in a final desperate battle. Much of the history relating to the role of these sailors has been recently unearthed and is told here on film for the first time.

The National Film Board of Canada (well, what's left of it anyway)
has started a new website, nfb.ca that showcases its back catalog of films in the you tube format.

The following film is among many to be found on the site.

Titled "Bethune" it covers the life of the famous lung surgeon and communist. It is a Donald Brittain film, from 1964 and has a run time of 58min 38 sec.

The Ten Point Program was as follows:

1. We want power to determine the destiny of our black and oppressed communities' education that teaches us our true history and our role in the present day society.
2. We want completely free health care for all black and oppressed people.
3. We want an immediate end to police brutality and murder of black people, other people of color, and all oppressed people inside the United States.
4. We want an immediate end to all wars of aggression.
5. We want full employment for our people.
6. We want an end to the robbery by the capitalists of our Black Community.
7. We want decent housing, fit for the shelter of human beings.
8. We want decent education for our people that exposes the true nature of this decadent American society.
9. We want freedom for all black and oppressed people now held in U. S. Federal, state, county, city and military prisons and jails. We want trials by a jury of peers for all persons charged with so-called crimes under the laws of this country.
10. We want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice, peace and people's community control of modern technology.

The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara (2003), directed by Errol Morris, is an American documentary film about the life and times of former U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara. The original score is by Philip Glass.

Using archival footage, United States Cabinet conversation recordings, and an interview of the eighty-five-year-old Robert McNamara, The Fog of War depicts his life, from his birth during the First World War remembering the time American troops returned from Europe, to working as a WWII Whiz Kid military officer, to being the Ford Motor Company's president, to his being employed as Secretary of Defense and the Cuban Missile Crisis, to managing the American Vietnam War, as defense secretary for presidents Kennedy and Johnson — emphasizing the war's brutality under their regimes, and how he was hired as secretary of defense, despite limited military experience.

Romance! Prostitutes! Anarchists!

Love and Anarchy (Italian: Film d'amore e d'anarchia) is a 1973 film directed by Lina Wertmüller and starring Giancarlo Giannini and Mariangela Melato. The story, set in Fascist Italy before the outbreak of World War II, centers on Giannini's character, an anarchist who stays in a brothel while preparing to kill Benito Mussolini. Giannini's character, while preparing to assassinate Mussolini, falls in love with one of the whores working in the brothel. This film explores the depths of his emotions concerning love, his hate for fascism, and his fears of being killed while assassinating Mussolini.

One thing you need to do is know who your enemy is. For that, Here’s an excellent History Channel documentary titled “Nazi America: A Secret History,” in its entirety. Lots of information on the underground hate culture and the development of the white supremacist and neo-Nazi movement in America.

This film, shot by 100 amateur camera operators, tells the story of the enormous street protests in Seattle, Washington in November 1999, against the World Trade Organization summit being held there. Vowing to oppose, among other faults, the WTO's power to arbitrally overrule nations' environmental, social and labour policies in favour of unbridled corporate greed, protestors from all around came out in force to make their views known and stop the summit. Against them is a brutal police force and a hostile media as well as the stain of a minority of destructively overzealous comrades. Against all odds, the protesters bravely faced fierce opposition to take back the rightful democratic power that the political and corporate elite of the world is determined to deny the little people.

Hat-tip to Roig i Negre Videos for this.

Night of the Living Dead is a groundbreaking film in the history of the horror genre. Zombies where not from the Haiti, but Pennsylvania — this was Middle America at war, and the zombie carnage seemed a grotesque echo of the conflict then raging in Vietnam. I don't know what would have been more frightening for the times: zombie hordes, or a black male lead.

On a July day in 1990, a confrontation propelled Native issues in Kanehsatake and the village of Oka, Quebec, into the international spotlight. Director Alanis Obomsawin spent 78 nerve-wracking days and nights filming the armed stand-off between the Mohawks, the Quebec police and the Canadian army. This powerful documentary takes you right into the action of an age-old Aboriginal struggle. The result is a portrait of the people behind the barricades.

A Place Called Chiapas is a Canadian documentary of first-hand accounts of the Ejercito Zapatista de Liberación Nacional (EZLN or the Zapatista Army of National Liberation or Zapatistas) and the lives of its soldiers and the people for whom they fight. Director Nettie Wild takes the viewer to rebel territory in the south west Mexican state of Chiapas, where the EZLN live and evade the Mexican Army.

This documentary examines the battle strategies of citizens, scientists, loggers, environmentalists and First Nations people who are fighting over the liquidation of public forests and, with it, a way of life

This is a great film. I've been somewhat hesitant to post it, as it's not political, and I was worried that some folks would think it "ableist". I would argue that it is the opposite. It does not demonize those with deformities, rather celebrates there differences. The physically deformed "freaks" are inherently trusting and honorable people, while the real monsters are two of the "normal" members of the circus who conspire to murder one of the performers to obtain his large inheritance.

Freaks is a 1932 United States horror film about sideshow performers, directed and produced by Tod Browning and released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, with a cast mostly composed of actual carnival performers. Director Browning took the exceptional step of casting real people with deformities as the eponymous sideshow "freaks," rather than using costumes and makeup. Browning had been a member of a traveling circus in his early years, and much of the film was drawn from his personal experiences.

This documentary-drama tells the story of Ethel MacDonald, a remarkable young woman whose name hit the world headlines during the Spanish Civil War. She was hailed as the Scarlet Pimpernel of the workers revolution but has since become something of a forgotten legend.

Ethel MacDonald (24 February 1909—1 December 1960) was a Glasgow-based Scottish anarchist and activist and, in 1937, during the Spanish Civil War, a propagandist on Barcelona Anarchist radio.

I just wanted to a prevue of Coming attractions to The Insurrectionary People's Picture Show Theater. I am slowing going to show some old, non-political films mixed in with very political films. Here's what to expect in the next couple of weeks:

Nineteen Eighty-Four : Released in 1984, based upon George Orwell’s novel of the same name, following the life of Winston Smith in Oceania, a country run by a totalitarian government. The film was directed by Micheal Radford, and stars John Hurt, Suzanna Hamilton, and Richard Burton in his last film role.

Freaks: a 1932 horror film about murder at a sideshow. Directed and produced by Tod Browning (who had been a member of a traveling circus in his early years) the film was based on a Tod Robbins’ short story “Spurs”. Director Browning took the exceptional step of casting real people with deformities as the eponymous sideshow "freaks," rather than using costumes and makeup.

Reefer Madness (aka Tell Your Children): 1936 exploitation film revolving around the tragic events that ensue when high school students are lured by pushers to try "marihuana": a hit and run accident, manslaughter, suicide, rape, and descent into madness all ensue. It was originally financed by a church group and made under the title Tell Your Children.

The Grapes of Wrath: 1940 American drama directed by Academy Award Winner John Ford. Based on the Pulitzer Prize novel written by John Steinbeck, the film follows tells the story of the Joads, an Oklahoma family, who, after losing their farm during the Great Depression in the 1930s, become migrant workers and end up in California. Stars Henry Fonda as Tom Joad.

A Place Called Chiapas: Canadian documentary of first-hand accounts of the Ejercito Zapatista de Liberación Nacional (EZLN, or the Zapatistas) and the lives of its soldiers and the people for whom they fight. Director Nettie Wild takes the viewer to rebel territory in the south west Mexican state of Chiapas, where the EZLN live and evade the Mexican Army.

Salt of the Earth was produced, written and directed by victims of the Hollywood blacklist. Unable to make films in Hollywood, they looked for worthy social issues to put on the screen independently. This film never would have been made in Hollywood at the time, so it is ironic that it was the anti-communist backlash that brought about the conditions for it to be made. In many ways it was a film ahead of its time. Mainstream culture did not pick up on its civil rights and feminist themes for at least a decade. This film entered the public domain in 1982 and was selected for the National Film Registry in 1992.

The Free Voice of Labor: The Jewish Anarchists is a 1980 documentary by Steve Fischler and Joel Sucher of Pacific Street Films. It memorializes the story of the Yiddish anarchist newspaper Fraye Arbeter Shtime, and the Jewish anarchist movement of the early 20th century. The movie contained a short interview with a very young Joe Conason. Paul Avrich was a consultant on the film.

As of 2006, AK Press has begun distributing it as part of a double DVD release with Anarchism in America, named after the latter.

This film was on one of the specialty channels I am currently receiving for free. I'm kind of disappointed I didn't watch it. It is a hip-hop reinterperation of the racialist D.W. Griffith film Birth of a Nation. Birth presented a vision of the Civil War and reconstruction-era KKK in a sympathetic light.

Rebirth of a Nation turning the tables on the 1915 D.W. Griffith film that simultaneously launched the modern film industry and gave the Ku Klux Klan a foothold in the 20th Century. Dj Spooky applies DJ techniques to cinema in a way that parallels, deconstructs and remixes the original.

Breaking the Spell is a 1999 anarchist documentary, directed by Tim Lewis, Tim Ream, and Sir Chuck A. Rock.

Using amateur camera footage recorded by protesters at the scene of the 1999 WTO protests, it documents the events from the perspective of the anarchists, their opinions of fellow protesters, local politicians, and includes footage which aired nationally on 60 Minutes.

The film is currently distributed by CrimethInc. on the CrimethInc. Guerilla Film Series, Volume One DVD.