THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7 is Netflix’s Best Original Yet

Riding in the background, or perhaps its even in the foreground depending upon your political persuasions, in Aaron Sorkin‘s latest is an element of timeliness. It shouldn’t be lost on any viewer that a film about a group of activists being put on trial by a corrupt administration, and aided and abetted by a police force that doesn’t apply law and order equally, would have echoes into the present moment. This is where we are, and to the degree that cinema can reflect history and provide teachable moments, Sorkin and the team behind this telling of the alleged conspiracy trial of the group branded as the “Chicago 7” hits with the same emotional effect of something like BlackKklansman in the wake of Charlottesville. Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it, and all that, but the importance of hitting a very particular inflection point in history becomes a value-added proposition to an already impressive work.

The Trial of the Chicago 7 is a bit of an oddity in Sorkin’s resume, given his general penchant up to this point either celebrating institutions or great white pioneers. For those who find efforts like The West Wing as still the sort-of platonic ideal for how democracy and our government should function, they may see The Trial of the Chicago 7 to be a radical about-face. And while it’s possible one could look at a growing trend in his work for semi-rebellious figures beginning to occupy his thoughts, from Mark Zuckerberg to Steve Jobs to Molly Bloom, this is easily the most forceful piece of anti-systemic filmmaking of his career.

As it says on the tin, this effort centers on the seven men, Abbie Hoffman (Sacha Baron Cohen), Tom Hayden (Eddie Redmayne), Jerry Rubin (Jeremy Strong), Rennie Davis (Alex Sharp), David Dellinger (John Carroll Lynch), Lee Weiner (Noah Robbins), and John Froines (Daniel Flaherty), who were charged with conspiracy, inciting to riot, and other charges by the incoming Nixon Administration for their roles in organizing the Anti-Vietnam War protests at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago. In addition to that core seven, the Black Panther chairman and co-founder Bobby Seale (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) was charged in the same proceedings, despite the fact that he knew none of the above listed men at any point and barely spent any time in Chicago during those protests. What follows is a legal drama that finds a pair of sympathetic defense attorneys (Mark Rylance and Ben Shenkman) squaring off against a pair of pugnacious prosecutors representing the US Attorney’s office (Joseph Gordon-Levitt and J.C. MacKenzie) with a Judge (Frank Langella) who is placing his thumb on the scales of justice throughout the trial’s proceedings.

One of Sorkin’s great gifts as a storyteller is his ability to play with structure to great effect within his screenplays, and The Trial of the Chicago 7 is no exception. While the trial ostensibly acts as the “present day” story driver and the film itself is fully and totally a legal drama, Sorkin takes creative liberty with the way information is parlayed to the viewer, while making extensive use of his talented cast as a way to deliver information. In one moment, a witness will be giving testimony that provides the onus for a flashback, and in the middle of that flashback, we’re treated to Hoffman describing those same scenes from his perspective in the midst of one of his campus presentations. Between this kind of narrative flexibility, and sparing but effectual uses of real footage of police brutality, it’s a film that literally is propelled through the trial’s twists and turns, with a nary a flagging moment. This is also a bit of a bounce back moment for Sorkin as a filmmaker, whose directorial debut, Molly’s Game, was a shrug-worthy effort. Sorkin isn’t on par with his The Social Network collaborator David Fincher in terms of scene setting, opting more for storytelling choices that are less cerebral and lack some of the moral flexibility present in that aforementioned filmmaker’s work. But there’s a directness on hand here that is immensely satisfying, and that approach frankly heightens the injustice of the central conflict.

Of course, beyond bells and whistles, what really makes this trial sing are the performances that sit front and center throughout. What’s really incredible about the film is that you could watch it one day and find yourself immediately drawn to Cohen’s magnetic charisma as the gutsy and affable Hoffman or the somewhat more understated physicality of Redmayne’s straight-laced and nervous Hayden. But on a return viewing, it’d be so easy to suddenly attune instead to Strong’s hapless romantic Rubin, Abdul-Mateen’s dynamically explosive Seale, or Rylance’s morally indefatigable William Kuntsler. Even Lynch’s family man revolutionary and Michael Keaton‘s nuclear bomb near-cameo performance as former Attorney General Ramsay Clark mark the cast as an up and down awards murderer’s row. But the immediate focus, and clearest center-point of the story such as can exist in an ensemble of this nature, is on Hoffman, with Cohen giving the finest performance of his career. There’s something to be said for the ballsiest actor in Hollywood making his biggest awards play in a role like this, but poetic is the term that immediately comes to mind. And to be a (if not the) highlight of a cast that is firing on all cylinders, drawing in the audience from the first scene, it’s nothing short of remarkable.

If there’s room for minor complaints, the film could have done perhaps with perhaps a more subtle grace note in its conclusion rather than its somewhat throwback thundering finish. There’s also a strange bit of hedge-betting with Gordon-Levitt’s Richard Schultz. His wavering convictions during the case are presented in a way that approach concession and perhaps even strain credulity a bit. But in a film that reflects the kind of rare permanence that could make this a mainstay of high school civics classes for decades, these are minor distractions at worst.

With a new Fincher movie just around the corner, a new challenger for both of those titles may approach rather soon, but in the meantime, The Trial of the Chicago 7 is the best film that the barren 2020 cinematic landscape has given way to, and certainly the best original feature in Netflix’s continually strengthening lineup.

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