Antrim - Event Notice
Thursday January 01 1970

Film showing: Sacco and Vanzetti

antrim | arts and media | event notice

Monday March 26, 2007 00:30

by Ciarán

Irish premiere

Sacco and Vanzetti

An Chultúrlann,
Falls Road, Belfast

Monday 26th March, 7.30pm

£4.50/£3.50

Part of Belfast Film Festival

Two immigrants accused of murder and electrocuted in the U.S. after a trial widely recognized as pervaded by intolerance and prejudice.

The first major documentary film about this landmark case, this film tells the story of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti. The two Italian immigrants, anarchists and writers, were accused of a murder in 1920, and executed in Boston in 1927 after a notoriously prejudiced trial.

The ordeal of Sacco and Venzetti came to symbolise the bigotry and intolerance directed at immigrants and dissenters in America, and millions of people in the U.S. and around the world protested on their behalf. On this the eightieth anniversary of their executions, their story continues to have great resonance as America once again grapples with issues of civil liberties and the rights of immigrants in the wake of 9/11.

A beautifully rendered tale of tragic injustice, the film makes the historical uncannily present through interviews, music, poetry, and by interweaving readings of Sacco and Vanzetti's powerful prison writings.

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Comments (1 of 1)

even if you don't have a chance to get to Belfast, some links about one of the 1920's biggest cases

by iosaf

Mon Mar 26, 2007 01:54

about a case which has much to teach us today about intolerance, about justice, about migration, about rules of evidence, about show trials etc.

"The story of two Italian-born anarchists, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, framed for murder and then executed for their beliefs. "Did you see what I did to those anarchist bastards?"
- Presiding Judge Webster Thayer Sacco and Vanzetti (see picture, below) were committed anarchists who had been active in many workers' struggles. In 1916, Sacco was arrested for taking part in a demonstration in solidarity with workers on strike in Minnesota. In the same year he took part in a strike in a factory in Plymouth, Massachusetts. It was here that he met Bartolomeo Vanzetti, who was one of the principal organisers of that strike. Like most anarchists, the two were also active in their opposition to the First World War......"
read more at http://libcom.org/history/articles/sacco-vanzetti/

a memorial at infoshop (an anarchist umbrella site based in the US)
http://www.infoshop.org/sacco_vanzetti.html

pages in french which link to coverage and support posters of the 1920's (in french)
http://increvablesanarchistes.org/articles/1920_36/sacc...i.htm http://increvablesanarchistes.org/articles/1920_36/21tr...i.htm

The case saw writers and poets such as Edna St. Vincent Millay, Dorothy Parker, John Dos Passos & Mitchell Gold come out of their safe idealism of "American modernisn" and support the Italian anarchists joining with anarchists & trade unionists. At the demonstrations in Boston on the day they were executed - 23 viii 1927 - an estimated 25,000 people marched. St.Vincent Millay who had been the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1923 lost her career & popularity among Americans & thus joined many of her generation to seek exile in Europe. It was a case which people like us - knew about & knew the why & wherefore of.

Great to see people in Belfast have a chance to see it. This is the site of the movie just in case you want to show it or just buy it and keep it in a box so we all forget about it.
http://www.willowpondfilms.com/sacco_and_vanzetti.html

Vanzetti (middle) & Sacco (right) handcuffed together 1923 the man on the left is a Bostonian. (they didn't like Italians or Anarchists)

one of many demonstrations to support them around the world - this one in London.

a simple memorial to "the anarchists" on the 79th anniversary of their execution at the square named after them in Milan- Italy.

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Film showing: Sacco and Vanzetti

Comments (1 of 1)