Medium Cool

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Medium Cool

R,

1969,

1h 50m,

Drama

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Watchlist

96%

26 Reviews

Tomatometer

78%

1,000+ Ratings

Popcornmeter

96%

Tomatometer

26 Reviews

78%

Popcornmeter

1,000+ Ratings

John Cassellis is a hardened TV news cameraman who manages to keep his distance while he captures daring footage of a nation in the throes of violent change. He maintains this professional detachment when he covers the social unrest in Chicago surrounding the 1968 Democratic National Convention. But, when he discovers that the TV network has been quietly cooperating with the FBI, the enraged Cassellis realizes that he too must join the fight against the establishment.

Critics Consensus

Medium Cool merges a bracing cinéma vérité with deft drama to authentically chronicle a nation at odds with itself and a media struggling to get the story straight.

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Vincent Canby

New York Times

May 9, 2005

3.5/5

Medium Cool is an awkward and even pretentious movie, but, like the report of the President's National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, it has an importance that has nothing to do with literature.

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Roger Ebert

Chicago Sun-Times

Oct 23, 2004

4/4

Moviemakers have at last figured out how bright the average moviegoer is. By that I don't mean they're making more 'intelligent' pictures. I mean they understand how quickly we can catch onto things.

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Harvey G. Cox

Tempo (National Council of Churches)

Jan 7, 2021

[It's] a disturbing repristination of Chicago 1968... It is also an attempt to indict the media for its reportorial coolness and detachment from pain and reality. In its first objective it succeeds brilliantly. I am not sure it does so in its second.

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Tom Meek

Cambridge Day

Oct 3, 2020

4/4

A plucky, hybrid film...

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Rocco T. Thompson

Screen Rant

Jun 22, 2020

As relevant and timely as ever, Medium Cool is a masterclass in using real-life footage for narrative propulsion and remains one of the most influential documentaries of all time.

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Nathanael Hood

Unseen Films

Jun 22, 2020

7/10

As a document of 1968 America's psyche it's irreplaceable.

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Jan 26, 2019

The best movie ever made!

Anakin P

Jul 14, 2018

Eat five eggs toda think bad for my stomach, nicely film with some remade scenes in modern films. about journalism in time when R.Kennedy goes up from democracy - was an horrific family doomed line. For naked scene which was not realistic and naive they run and something, so for stars.

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George M

Nov 10, 2017

this appears to be a bunch of fake hippies fighting a bunch of fake cops in fake riots

Hagrid R

May 15, 2017

An almost autobiographical time capsule of 60's America by Haskell Wexler, Medium Cool is an excellently shot motion picture with most of its drama achieved through editing.

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Anakin S

Apr 12, 2017

There's history written on the face of everything and everyone. This phrase is what I kind of took from this great movie. The different camera techniques and unique use of different lenses is what makes this movie that much more interesting to watch. The cinematography is wonderful as well. As always, the technicolor makes everything look beautiful. It's interesting to see the different shades of life portrayed in this movie. Like how the poor family lives their life humbly without asking for much. And how the camera guys are just trying to do their jobs. And how the black community are just trying to live. This movie is very insightful in showing the lives of not only the ones who are fighting for equal rights and for war to end, but also the lives of everyone and anyone. It's obviously a political movie but that's only on the surface. When you start digging in deep, you see what the movie is really about. I think it's absolutely genius, brilliant, and innovative how the director was able to tie in the mother's story into something politically profound that was really going on in the real world. It was a piece of history seen right there, right before our very eyes. And it's so amazing seeing this mother who has no idea what's going on amidst the chaos of people and cops, she just wants to find her little boy. There's something very profound in watching that. Overall, a very important and still relevant piece of essential cinema history. It hasn't aged one bit since.

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Synopsis

John Cassellis is a hardened TV news cameraman who manages to keep his distance while he captures daring footage of a nation in the throes of violent change. He maintains this professional detachment when he covers the social unrest in Chicago surrounding the 1968 Democratic National Convention. But, when he discovers that the TV network has been quietly cooperating with the FBI, the enraged Cassellis realizes that he too must join the fight against the establishment.

Producer: Haskell Wexler, Jerrold Wexler, Tully Friedman
Screenwriter: Haskell Wexler
Distributor: Paramount Pictures
Production Co: Paramount
Rating: R
Genre: Drama
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Aug 27, 1969, Original
Release Date (DVD): Dec 11, 2001
Runtime: 1h 50m

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