Counterculture
Unconventional appearance, music, drugs, communitarian experiments, and sexual liberation were hallmarks of the sixties counterculture, most of whose members were white, middle-class young Americans. To some Americans, these attributes reflected American ideals of free speech, equality, and pursuit of happiness. Other people saw the counterculture as self-indulgent, pointlessly rebellious, unpatriotic, and destructive of America's moral order. Authorities banned the psychedelic drug LSD, restricted political gatherings, and tried to enforce bans on what they considered obscenity in books, music, theatre, and other media. Parents argued with their children and worried about their safety. Some adults accepted elements of the counterculture, while others became estranged from sons and daughters.
1969 (1988)
5.8/10
Director: Ernest Thompson
Starring: Bruce Dern, Joanna Cassidy, Kiefer Sutherland, Mariette Hartley, Robert Downey J...
Scott and Ralph (Kiefer Sutherland and Robert Downey Jr), two small-town class-of-'67 high school graduates, venture off to college to sow some wild o... Read more
Twist (2003)
5.9/10
Director: Jacob Tierney
Starring: Nick Stahl, Joshua Close, Gary Farmer, Stephen McHattie
Dickens' classic gets the modern treatment, set in Toronto, and told from the perspective of the Artful Dodger. Dodge (Nick Stahl) is a smack-addicte... Read more
Punishment Park (1971)
7.9/10
Director: Peter Watkins
Starring: Patrick Boland, Kent Foreman, Jim Bohan, Catherine Quittner
Set in a detention camp in an America of the near-future, Punishment Park's pseudo-documentary style places a British film crew amongst a group of you... Read more
Sympathy for the Devil (1968)
6.4/10
Director: Jean-Luc Godard
Starring: The Rolling Stones
French director Jean-Luc Godard's documentation of late '60s western counter-culture intercuts footage of the Rolling Stones hard at work on their 'Be... Read more
Making Sense of the Sixties (1991)
8.7/10
One of the most comprehensive studies ever made of the 'decade of change', this 6-part documentary mini-series from PBS includes over a hundred interv... Read more
Across the Universe ( Blu-ray ) (2007)
7.4/10
Director: Julie Taymor
Starring: Evan Rachel Wood, Jim Sturgess, Joe Anderson, Dana Fuchs, Martin Luther McCoy, T...
A revolutionary rock musical, performed by the cast and inspired by the songs of The Beatles, that re-imagines America in the turbulent late 1960s, a... Read more
Easy Rider ( Blu-ray ) (1969)
7.4/10
Director: Dennis Hopper
Starring: Dennis Hopper, Jack Nicholson, Karen Black, Peter Fonda, Phil Spector
Counter-culture road movie with Dennis Hopper (also directing) and Peter Fonda getting out their choppers to travel across the Southwest. On their way... Read more
Woodstock (Special Edition) (1970)
8.1/10
Director: Michael Wadleigh
Starring: Arlo Guthrie, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Joan Baez, Joe Cocker, Richie Havens,...
It was an event destined to become the definitive document on the freaked out craziness of the peace-and-love era. In August, 1969, half a million hip... Read more
Woodstock ( Blu-ray ) (1970)
8.1/10
Director: Michael Wadleigh
Starring: Arlo Guthrie, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Joan Baez, Joe Cocker, Richie Havens,...
It was an event destined to become the definitive document on the freaked out craziness of the peace-and-love era. In August, 1969, half a million hip... Read more
Taking Woodstock (2009)
6.7/10
Director: Ang Lee
Starring: Demetri Martin, Dan Fogler, Imelda Staunton, Emile Hirsch, Eugene Levy, Henry Go...
Director Ang Lee detours into comic territory with this true story, based on Elliot Tiber's book, about how he, an in-the-closet Greenwich Village int... Read more