From watching the first scene of “The Trial of the Chicago 7,” I knew I would be hooked. The movie is based on events that happened during the 1969 political trial. 

The movie takes us back to late August, 1968 in Chicago when a protest was taking place around the Democratic National Convention. About 12,000 Chicago police officers, the National Guard and U.S. Army troops were deployed against the 10,000 demonstrators. There were seven people who were seen as the organizers for the event which the federal system could indict. At the protest, many people from different parts of organizational groups all came together with a goal of pacifism and ending the Vietnam war. 

At the start, there are some scenes that show eight people all of who are going to be put into trial. They describe who they are and what group they are a part of. Soon after, it jumps to meeting the lawyers that are in charge of putting them in jail. Then, the movie starts escalating after their first trial scene is shown. 

Throughout the movie, there were a lot of exciting moments. They were times where I found myself laughing a lot due to Abbie Hoffman’s (Sacha Baron Cohen) and Jerry Rubin’s (Jeremy Strong) funny jokes and antics, which helped lighten up the mood a bit. Being able to watch the events unfold that lead to the trial and seeing how their lawyers William Kunstler (Mark Rylance) and Leonard Weinglass (Ben Shenkman) tried to find ways to help their case was interesting. 

As the trial plays itself out, I couldn’t help but get emotional at times when I start learning more about who the characters were and what they were fighting for. Each character can relate to one another by wanting to end the war. Several scenes were shown of what happened at the demonstration and how violent the police were against the people. When watching the demonstrators get beat up, I started getting angry towards the officers, and I felt empathy towards the people. 

During the trial an eighth person was mentioned, Bobby Seale (Yahya Abdul-Mateen Ⅱ), the leader of the Back Panther party. He was put on trial with the other seven because he was accused of murdering someone. Seale being placed in trial with the other seven and also having the trial start without his lawyer was very wrong. That shouldn’t have happened to him, and he should have been allowed a fair trial in the first place.

Although the movie is spectacular and really enjoyable to watch, there were a couple of dull scenes which didn’t last long. I would have liked to have seen a bit of what happened to Bobby Seale after the trial. Also, it would’ve been interesting to learn more about two people, John Froines (Danny Flaherty) and Lee Weiner (Noah Robbins), who didn’t get to talk much. 

Overall, I believe many people should watch “The Trial of the Chicago 7.” Everything about the movie was great as it had a lot of drama, real videos shown taken during that time and amazing and interesting characters to watch. 

“The Trial of the Chicago 7”- ★★★★☆