Unfinished Symphony.(Review)

This fine film depicts the ideological atmosphere that gave rise to the GI antiwar movement, and specifically to its most important organization, the Vietnam Veterans against the War. Documentary footage of American firepower and of brutal treatment of Vietnamese captives is interspersed with scenes from the 1971 'Winter Soldier' investigations, during which former GIs testified about atrocities they saw or participated in. Central focus of the film is on the 1971 VVAW march from Lexington, Massachusetts, to Bunker Hill, which retraced Paul Revere's ride of 1775 and ended in a massive arrest of 410 veterans and civilians by the Lexington police for camping overnight on the village green. John Kerry, then VVAW's leading spokesman, now junior U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, states the vets' moral revulsion against the war and the way they were duped into fighting it; interviewees, including Professor Howard Zinn, provide historical context. The moral and political weight of the film is borne by the many short statements both of veterans and of Lexington townspeople, many of whom are shown voicing antiwar views, openly supporting the vets' march or even joining it-a dramatic reminder of a ...