Shola Lynch: Free Angela and All Political Prisoners

Shola Lynch's Free Angela and All Political Prisoners (2012) is a nifty companion documentary to her Chisholm '72: Unbought & Unbossed (2004). Between Shirley Chisholm and Angela Davis, there's a lot of ground to cover. So much so, given the context of the times both then and now, they'd make for an absorbing, expanded mini-series. In each case, Lynch provides an exciting introduction. 

Free Angela and All Political Prisoners focuses on Angela Davis in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when she twice became a cause célèbre, first in California and then worldwide. Strong reaction to her intellectual engagement came from such high profile characters as Governor Ronald Reagan, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and US President Richard M. Nixon. As we know now, Hoover died in 1972 before the end of Davis' trial, Nixon went down as a result of Watergate, and Reagan went on to become president of the USA in the following decade.

Lynch's documentary starts off at an even pace, then picks up steam when Angela Davis becomes a fugitive, then slows into the details of her final trial, leaving me wanting more, more, more. A sequel about Davis' work from the mid-1970s until now (she just turned 70) would be equally fascinating, I suspect, as would even more about her family -- including her parents, from Birmingham, Alabama -- and siblings Fania, Ben and Reggie. (In the small world department, Ben Davis, now 68, played for the Detroit Lions in the 1970s.)

Today's Rune: Opening.
    

Chisholm '72: Unbought & Unbossed

Shola Lynch's Chisholm '72: Unbought & Unbossed (2004, 2005) uses a mix of split-screen techniques, music straight out of Shaft (1971), Cleopatra Jones (1973) and Foxy Brown (1974), and intermittent scroll worthy of an exciting election night to tell the tale of Shirley Chisholm's run for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1972. The viewer is thrown into the fray with Chisholm herself (at the time and near the end of her life) punctuating the story throughout. "If you understand power," she says in a 1972 clip, "then you know what I'm trying to put together."

It's a wild ride that includes Chisholm (including three assassination attempts), George Wallace (shot in Maryland during the primary campaign), Ed Muskie (effectively knocked out of the race for personal reasons), Hubert H. Humphrey and George McGovern vs. the Nixon-Agnew juggernaut, with the Vietnam War as backdrop. "You do your thing and you let me do mine," Chisholm quips to those breaking for other candidates. It's as complex and fierce a struggle as angling to become Shogun.

Shirley Chisholm -- change agent, way paver, contender. And a whole lot more, from NOW leader to progressive prophet, some thirty-seven years ahead of her time.

The website: http://www.chisholm72.net/home.html



We're talking Greek Tragedy, American-style. Chisholm makes it all the way to the July convention in Miami before conceding (along with Muskie and Hubert Humphrey); McGovern becomes Democratic candidate, only to be crushed in the general election by Nixon and Agnew, who in turn are forced out of office thanks to high crimes and misdemeanors.

Dear readers, Chisholm '72: Unbought & Unbossed is a hip, worthy and timeless documentary. I dig.



Today's Rune: Fertility.

On the Chisholm Trail, 1972

Just got to see Shola Lynch's fabulous documentary on Shirley Chisholm's 1972 candidacy for president of the USA, Chisholm '72: Unbought & Unbossed. More details in the pipeline.

Today's also the first day of the Lenten Season, post-Fat Tuesday. I'm aiming to raise funds for the Catholic Relief Services.

Today's Rune: The Self.

1972 and 2008

In my enthusiastic support of a woman for president in 2008, I blanked out about Shirley Chisholm's campaign as a Democrat in 1972. Turns out there's a nifty documentary available in DVD format that I just ordered for the library: Shola Lynch's Chisholm '72: Unbought & Unbossed (2004). Looks good for its content about candidate Chisholm, the election process (then and now), and the context of the times -- Vietnam, Nixon-Agnew, a fractured USA, all of it. I was a kid at the time living in Durham, North Carolina, but remember viscerally the passionate engagement of my teachers. One was fresh from an Ohio school near Kent State and hopping mad at the Establishment!



For insight into dirty political deeds, this one looks good: Allen Raymond's How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative (2008). Certainly the last two elections had their share of them -- did Bush really win Florida in 2000 and Ohio in 2004? And if he didn't, why is he the president of the USA?


Of course, back in 1972, Shirley Chisholm didn't win the election. She didn't become the Democrats' official candidate, either. Instead, Nixon-Agnew won in a landslide. The two crooks did it again! Here's Spiro Agnew (on the right) at NASA in 1971 shaking hands with former Nazi, SS Sturmbannführer Wernher von Braun ("once the missiles go up, who cares where they come down?"). The Royal Spanish couple watches on (that's Juan Carlos Alfonso Víctor María de Borbón y Borbón-Dos Sicilias just beyond Agnew, if you didn't guess . . . now King Juan Carlos I)

So the Democrats didn't win in 1972, but Agnew and Nixon got theirs eventually . . .


Russell Crowe and Marion Cotillard from Ridley Scott's A Good Year (2006). Archie Panjabi, Albert Finney, Abbie Cornish, and most of the cast is good. The pleasures of pastoral France trump the mad business parade in London . . .

Today's Rune: Opening.

God Save the Queen
Her fascist regime!
They made you a moron
Potential H-Bomb!