Good doc on the protest movements of the 60s in the Bay Area with some glorification of the decade
The title of this documentary is a bit misleading. While it does cover several events in Berkeley such as the Free Speech Movement and the protests over the University of California Berkeley owned People’s Park it is really about the protest movement that took over the San Francisco Bay Area and the United States in the 1960s. The first event covered for example is a demonstration against the House Un-American Activities Committee coming to San Francisco City Hall in May 1960.<br /><br />As the opening statement said, the Baby Boomers were coming to age in the 1960s and were not content to follow their parents’ lead. Instead, there was a general feeling of wanting to explore political and social freedoms.<br /><br />Several major events are covered.<br /><br />First, was the protest in SF against the Un-American Activities Committee which organizers believed was anti-American for going after people’s political beliefs. Next, was the 1964 Free Speech Movement at the UC Berkeley when students protested against the school’s administration trying to ban political activism on campus. There are some great speeches by Mario Savio about how the university system was simply a machine which was only interested in pumping out students into the workforce and tried to deny them the other sides of their lives such as politics. Next is the anti-Vietnam War movement that was probably the most famous. There was also a conservative backlash against these activities as shown by the election of Ronald Reagan to governor of California who specifically ran against the student radicals. That leads to a short part on the hippy movement. Luckily they note that the counterculture was not involved in the protests. In fact, they rejected politics and wanted to create their own society.<br /><br />Another group included was the Black Panthers, which were a black nationalist party formed in Oakland, California. They began following the police in Oakland carrying guns. This was a huge shock to the police and government and put the group on the map. Confrontations with the police became a huge part of the group’s life.<br /><br />The feminist movement is also included, and that is important, because these other protests are usually given much more coverage. Many women were involved in these different groups, and when they tried to gain leadership roles, there was a lot of resistance. That led some women to begin thinking about their own activism.<br /><br />Last was People’s Park. This was a plot of land that UC Berkeley owned right down the street from the campus. People decided to turn this area into a public park in 1969.<br /><br />At the end various people talked about the accomplishments of the 1960s. I think that’s really a glorification of the decade. Only the civil rights movement and the Free Speech movement actually made sustained changes. The Vietnam War for example, was not ended by demonstrations. The Black Panther Party didn’t end racism or lead to a revolution. While obviously the people who participated in these different groups felt like they had changed personally, what they actually brought about in the country was much smaller. Again, the conservative backlash cannot be emphasized enough.<br /><br />What really makes this movie was the huge collection of archival footage of all of these events. It’s really had to understand the Stop The Draft Week for example, without seeing what chaos broke out in downtown Oakland as a result.<br /><br />For those interested in the history of the Bay Area or the Sixties era this is a very good documentary to check out. As noted above, there are some shortcomings, but overall it presents the feelings of the decade.<br />C
The movie title "Berkeley in the Sixties," available on Movies & TV, has received an average rating of 4.3 from 78 reviewers. 
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 {"Aspect Ratio": "1.33:1", "MPAA rating": "Unrated (Not Rated)", "Product Dimensions": "0.7 x 7.5 x 5.4 inches; 4 Ounces", "Item model number": "Relay Time: 117 min", "Director": "Mark Kitchell", "Media Format": "Multiple Formats, Color, NTSC", "Run time": "1 hour and 57 minutes", "Release date": "December 10, 2002", "Actors": "John Searle (III), Jackie Goldberg, Susan Griffin (II), Jack Weinberg (II), Nancy Davis", "Language": "Unqualified, English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo)", "Studio": "First Run Features", "Number of discs": "1"}

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