Hearts And Minds
-
Tue 24 January 2006 // 19:00
(Davis / USA / 1974 / dvd / 112mins / cert15)
(Tues 24th / 7pm / £2)
'Hearts and Minds is not only the best documentary I have ever seen, it maybe the best movie ever. If I were to pick the one film that inspired me to pick up a camera, it is Hearts and Minds, a film that remains every bit as relevant today' Michael Moore
On the 30th anniversary of its release, the Cube is proud to present a documentary that has had a lasting impact on all cinematic representations of the Vietnam. The title comes from the now infamous speech by Lyndon Johnson in which the president declared that "ultimate victory will depend on the hearts and minds of the people who actually live out there." Assembling eminent talking heads, stock footage, veteran testimony, and even clips from corny Hollywood agitprop, director Peter Davis creates a searing and incisive thesis that carefully balances both the American and the Vietnamese experiences of the war. He searches everywhere to inform the debate, exploring even his own place as documenter-cum-voyeur within the disastrous extended intervention of the confict. A firestorm of controversy greeted the film upon its initial release in the mid-1970s (Frank Sinatra denounced it on-stage after it won the Best Documentary Oscar) and it still has the capacity to ignite furious debate today, so effectively does the film transcend its specific subject to speak of war in general.
(Tues 24th / 7pm / £2)
'Hearts and Minds is not only the best documentary I have ever seen, it maybe the best movie ever. If I were to pick the one film that inspired me to pick up a camera, it is Hearts and Minds, a film that remains every bit as relevant today' Michael Moore
On the 30th anniversary of its release, the Cube is proud to present a documentary that has had a lasting impact on all cinematic representations of the Vietnam. The title comes from the now infamous speech by Lyndon Johnson in which the president declared that "ultimate victory will depend on the hearts and minds of the people who actually live out there." Assembling eminent talking heads, stock footage, veteran testimony, and even clips from corny Hollywood agitprop, director Peter Davis creates a searing and incisive thesis that carefully balances both the American and the Vietnamese experiences of the war. He searches everywhere to inform the debate, exploring even his own place as documenter-cum-voyeur within the disastrous extended intervention of the confict. A firestorm of controversy greeted the film upon its initial release in the mid-1970s (Frank Sinatra denounced it on-stage after it won the Best Documentary Oscar) and it still has the capacity to ignite furious debate today, so effectively does the film transcend its specific subject to speak of war in general.