X
- 1969
- R
- Paramount Pictures
- 1 h 51 m
- 1969
- R
- Paramount Pictures
- 1 h 51 m
Summary A TV news reporter finds himself becoming personally involved in the violence that erupts around the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
Directed By: Haskell Wexler
Written By: Haskell Wexler
- 1969
- R
- Paramount Pictures
- 1 h 51 m
- 1969
- R
- Paramount Pictures
- 1 h 51 m
Medium Cool
87
User Score
Available after 4 ratings
tbd
Summary A TV news reporter finds himself becoming personally involved in the violence that erupts around the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
Directed By: Haskell Wexler
Written By: Haskell Wexler
Top Cast
Metascore
Universal Acclaim
Based on 10 Critic Reviews
87
80% Positive
8 Reviews
8 Reviews
20% Mixed
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Universal Acclaim
Based on 10 Critic Reviews
87
80% Positive
8 Reviews
8 Reviews
20% Mixed
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Medium Cool stages, not so much with voguish nihilism, despite its demonstrably downbeat ending, as dispassionate vérité straightforwardness, the growing pains that strain a nation when the countercultural ideal of limitless possibility matures into something closer to political reality.
Medium Cool encapsulates the divisive issues of race and poverty that remain as urgent today as they did in 1968. It also makes us think about the way the media shape our lives and are used to deflect public attention from sustained political action.
So strongly does it challenge the usual commercial film techniques and themes that Hollywood, ever wary both of stylistic innovation and contemporary politics, may never recover. Socially and cinematically, Medium Cool is dynamite.
Medium Cool is also recognized as a pointed early critique of the news media, noting the amoral detachment of TV journalists and the collusion between their corporate bosses and the government to shape a political narrative. But for people who love Chicago, the film may be most valuable as a cultural document, recording a much younger city in the midst of a turbulent summer.
Aside from the romance between Forster and Bloom—which gets in the way of the volatile Summer Of Love action, and ends in typically nihilistic '60s-youth-pic fashion—Medium Cool still has impact.
Photographed in Chicago against the clamor and violence of the 1968 Democratic National Convention, where cast principals were on their own as they made their way through the crowds and police lines. Buildup to these later sequences frequently is confusing and motives difficult to fathom.
A fascinating though not wholly successful fusion of cinéma-vérité and political radicalism.
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Production Company
H & J
Release Date Aug 27, 1969
Duration 1 h 51 m
Rating R
Genres
Tagline Dateline: Chicago August '68
Awards
National Society of Film Critics Awards, USA
• 3 Nominations
National Film Preservation Board, USA
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
Mannheim-Heidelberg International Filmfestival
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
