The Trial of the Chicago 7 (2020)

Aaron Sorkin delivers a technically impeccable courtroom drama, with brilliant dialogues and superb performances. The film reconstructs the 1968 trial against seven activists accused of conspiracy following the protests in Chicago, but it does so with an explicit political thesis: the judicial system as a weapon of power against dissent. The direction does not hide its sympathy for the accused. Judge Hoffman is the capricious tyrant, the prosecution the repressive arm, the protagonists the martyrs of freedom. It is a classic liberal argument, well-executed but without neutrality. The retrospective scenes of police repression (blows, gas) and the disturbing sequence of Bobby Seale gagged in the courtroom are significant contextual violence. The language is strong, befitting an R rating. For parents: it is adult cinema that demands maturity to process the political bias and discuss where the line lies between legitimate civil disobedience and activism. The technical quality is undeniable, the historical reading is not neutral.