sacco and Vanzetti - The Men and The Movies

[¿Que?]

Someone recently recommended that I watch the 1971 Italian movie based on these two men. There is also apparently a 2006 documentary. I don't know anything about these guys except that they were anarchists charged with murder and bank robbery and that they did not get a fair trial.

Anybody have any thoughts (please no spoilers :) )

[Os Cangaceiros]

Whiny liberals like to pretend that they were just a couple patsies who got a raw deal from the system, but in reality they were hardcore Galleanists. True radicals. :thumbup1:

[x359594]

The 1971 Italian movie Sacco e Vanzetti is a little difficult to see in a good print but it's definitely worth looking for. The 2006 documentary has an interview with the director of the former movie as well as excerpts from that movie and from the 1950s TV movie directed by Sidney Lumet. It's a concise account that doesn't shirk their militant background and their Gaellanist associations. It takes the position that not only did they not get a fair trial but they were framed.

There's a vast literature on the case that ranges from arguing the guilt of both men, arguing that Sacco was guilty and Vanzetti innocent to arguing that both were innocent of the hold up and murder, and were convicted on the basis of being aliens and radicals.

Some books of interest: Sacco and Vanzetti: the Anarchist Background by Paul Avrich, The Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti by Howard Fast, Boston by Upton Sinclair, The Sacco and Vanzetti Case by Felix Frankfurter, Sacco & Vanzetti: the Men, the Murder and the Judgment of Mankind by Bruce Watson. This last book is the latest account (2007), and Watson is interviewed in the documentary.

[Os Cangaceiros]

The 1971 Italian movie Sacco e Vanzetti is a little difficult to see in a good print but it's definitely worth looking for. The 2006 documentary has an interview with the director of the former movie as well as excerpts from that movie and from the 1950s TV movie directed by Sidney Lumet. It's a concise account that doesn't shirk their militant background and their Gaellanist associations. It takes the position that not only did they not get a fair trial but they were framed.

There's a vast literature on the case that ranges from arguing the guilt of both men, arguing that Sacco was guilty and Vanzetti innocent to arguing that both were innocent of the hold up and murder were convicted on the basis of being aliens and radicals.

Some books of interest: Sacco and Vanzetti: the Anarchist Background by Paul Avrich, The Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti by Howard Fast, Boston by Upton Sinclair, The Sacco and Vanzetti Case by Felix Frankfurter, Sacco & Vanzetti: the Men, the Murder and the Judgment of Mankind by Bruce Watson. This last book is the latest account (2007), and Watson is interviewed in the documentary.

I've been recommended the Avrich book before...should check that out sometime.

[vyborg]

The film has also an outstanding soundtrack. Baez and Morricone did a marvelous job