The Sixth Side of the Pentagon / The Embassy

This DVD contains two short films by Chris Marker (of La Jetée fame), The Sixth Side of the Pentagon (circa 1967, 26 minutes) & The Embassy (circa 1973, 21 minutes).The first film is a short but powerful visual essay about the anti-war march on the Pentagon that year, with footage showing counter-protesters (young American Nazi Party members & elderly clerical anti-Communists), as well as the wide range of anti-war people, ranging from a handful of semi-hippies to average college students to middle-aged men in suits & ties—the latter putting the lie to the easy clichés & one-dimensional caricatures of those who protested the illegal & immoral war in Vietnam. How many people today even realize that there were organized groups like Businessmen for Peace, or Housewives for Peace, for example? Very few. So much idealism & moral passion from that time has been erased from our history since. The film isn't merely documentary, but also advocacy for political action against injustice at the highest levels.The second film is fiction, shot like a documentary in Super-8, about refugees from an unnamed country suddenly gone far right-wing due to a military coup. The refuges are various members of the intelligentsia, from activists to actors & artist to educators, taking refuge in a foreign embassy. The point is made that a traditionally democratic country can & has suddenly been transformed by an upsurge of fascism, with mass arrests & executions taking place, in order to secure the new regime. The final shot, revealing the location of the country gone fascist, serves to remind viewers that it can happen anywhere, any time. For a film nearly 50 years old now, it's all too timely, in fact. And it's a necessary counterpoint to the first film, saying that if political action & resistance to budding fascism isn't taken in time, the result can be horrific.Most urgently recommended!

We had worked in the San Joaquin Valley of California running programs to help Mexican-American farm workers and moved to DC to work for an international self-help housing program. Shortly after our move to DC we attended the Mobilization to End the War in Vietnam. There was such a large crowd that it was difficult to tell what was happening. One thing was clear: the police and military were attacking the anti-war protesters and many were seriously injured. It was a frightening experience. The Chris Marker film does a good job of capturing the actions of the protesters on both sides.

As someone who was there --The footage captures many of the day's (but, unfortunately, not the night's) highlights. However, the voice-over narration is both informative and annoying. It helps place the events being filmed in a chronological context that makes sense of the day. But the didactic gloss on the demonstrators' politcs is sometimes condescending.

Great

Good Buy. Arrived on time.

This film gives us the other side...