“The Trial of the Chicago 7” Gets Netflix Premiere Date
By Kip Mooney• On • In NewsNewsComments Off on “The Trial of the Chicago 7” Gets Netflix Premiere Date
Even after his many highs and lows, I always look forward to a new Aaron Sorkin project. The Trial of the Chicago 7 has been in the works for more than a decade, first with Steven Spielberg at the helm, and then more recently with Sorkin coming on board after 2017's underrated Molly's Game. This version was originally set up at Paramount, but then the pandemic caused the studio to rethink their strategy and sold the film to Netflix for a reported $56 million.
This project has an all-star cast including Academy Award nominees Michael Keaton and Frank Langella; Academy Award winners Eddie Redmayne and Mark Rylance; new Emmy nominees Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Jeremy Strong; and some of my favorite actors: Sacha Baron Cohen, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, John Carroll Lynch, and Kelvin Harrison Jr. That's a hell of a lineup.
After the troubled 1968 Democratic National Convention, where cops and protesters clashed, several activists were charged with conspiracy to incite a riot. After a summer of protests, that couldn't be more timely. The film will focus on the trial, and there are few things Aaron Sorkin knows better than a courtroom scene. That should make this one of my favorite movies of 2020.
The Trial of the Chicago 7 will arrive on Netflix on October 16.
About Kip Mooney
Like many film critics born during and after the 1980s, my hero is Roger Ebert. The man was already the best critic in the nation when he won the Pulitzer in 1975, but his indomitable spirit during and after his recent battle with cancer keeps me coming back to read not only his reviews but his insightful commentary on the everyday. But enough about a guy you know a lot about.
I knew I was going to be a film critic—some would say a snob—in middle school, when I had to voraciously defend my position that The Royal Tenenbaums was only a million times better than Adam Sandler’s remake of Mr. Deeds. From then on, I would seek out Wes Anderson’s films and avoid Sandler’s like the plague.
Still, I like to think of myself as a populist, and I’ll be just as likely to see the next superhero movie as the next Sundance sensation. The thing I most deplore in a movie is laziness. I’d much rather see movies with big ambitions try and fail than movies with no ambitions succeed at simply existing. I’m also a big advocate of fun-bad movies like The Room and most of Nicolas Cage’s work.
In the past, I’ve written for The Dallas Morning News and the North Texas Daily, which I edited for a semester. I also contributed to Dallas-based Pegasus News, which in the circle of life, is now part of The Dallas Morning News, where I got my big break in 2007. Eventually, I’d love to write and talk about film full-time, but until that’s a viable career option, I work as an auditor for Wells Fargo.
I hope to one day meet my hero, go to the Toronto International Film Festival, and compete on Jeopardy. Until then, I’m excited to share my love of film with you.
