12/23/2023 0 Comments Pandemonium movie haydenHe’d go on to stage civil disobedience to protest the CIA and Iran-Contra affair in 1986, and write Steal This Urine Test to protest the War on Drugs in 1987. In 1974, he had plastic surgery and began living by the name Barry Freed, until he turned himself into authorities in 1980-the same day his interview with Barbara Walters aired. However, Hoffman soon disappeared from public life, becoming a fugitive after he was charged with intent to sell and distribute cocaine in 1973 (he claimed it was entrapment). This occurred about one month before the trial started.Īfter the trial, he built his fame with Steal This Book in 1971, which encouraged readers to find ways to live for free without paying for possessions. Additionally, he had the notoriety of being chased off stage at Woodstock by Pete Townshend after he interrupted The Who’s set to demand the release of John Sinclair, co-founder of the anti-racist White Panther Party. Some investors booed, others began filling their pockets with the green on the floor. He became focused on the Vietnam War in the late ‘60s, but was never afraid of a good stunt, such as when he rained fake and real dollar bills down on the New York Stock Exchange in 1968. Prior to being indicted for conspiracy to incite a riot across state lines, Hoffman was already a counterculture figure who cut his teeth as a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and organizing Liberty House in the fight for Civil Rights. The actual Hoffman was a leader of the Yippie movement and later wrote Steal This Book, but his career extended beyond the courtroom and that literary subversion. Abbie HoffmanĪs played with resounding cynicism by Sacha Baron Cohen, Aaron Sorkin’s Abbie Hoffman convincingly proves you can turn contempt for court into a religion. That’s all well and good, but what happened afterward? A handful of freeze frames and sentences worth of bite-sized information tells us a little bit of what came next for each major player in the trial, but not enough. It doesn’t change anything, other than maybe Hayden’s sentence, but the audience can savor the good fight against corrosive authority, so perfectly personified by Langella’s judge. It’s a symbolic act of defiance, and a welcome one that sends the court into temporary pandemonium. Instead Hayden attempts to read off the names of every American who died in Vietnam since this sham trial began. Tom Hayden ( Eddie Redmayne) is all but promised a lenient sentence by the vindictive, and potentially senile, Judge Julius Hoffman (Frank Langella), provided he offers a contrite statement before the court. ![]() After spending more than two hours witnessing a gross miscarriage of justice that seemed to suggest the deck is stacked against those the establishment deems “radical” or “extreme,” Aaron Sorkin’s The Trial of the Chicago 7 ends with the smallest of victories being given Hollywood heft.
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