Tragedy or Hope (1972)
1972 · Ephemeral film · 24 min
Educating 1960s campus protesters as to "what's right with America."
- War
Synopsis
Contrasting radical mobs, anarchy, and 1960s counterculture with footage of American manufacturing and innovation, this film celebrates the concept of American exceptionalism and argues that anti-Vietnam War protesters were influenced by communism, atheism, and immorality. Set mostly in a university library, this political debate between a medical student, his 1770s ancestor, and a history professor is a sequel to the 1972 National Education Program film, Brink of Disaster! Two additional…
Synopsis from OMDb
Details
- Studio
- Jerry Fairbanks Productions
- Released
- 1972-01-01
- Running time
- 24 minutes
Reviews on the Internet Archive
★★★★★ · "The road to anarchy and self destruction" · Steve Nordby · 2003-11-26
Young John Smith is knocked unconscious in the college library by his long dead ancestor while an innocent professor watches. You see, the old man has risen from the dead to save America from the wrong people. All that bad stuff these kids today are doing is part of a diabolical communist plot! They want to destroy America! They hate freedom! The other films from Harding College are lectures about the perfection of capitalism, here we have their attempt at drama and guess what? It's a freaking lecture on how great capitalism is and how everything wrong in America is due to evil communist…
★★★★ · Preachy but good... · Max Grody · 2006-04-15
This is just as appropriate today, except the creepy self-loathing sorts in America today can barely get more then 50 people to go to any protests. Thank god. Though it is a strange idea, with revolutionary American clubbing down the dumb kid, it makes sense. Nothing wrong with America except the lazy abdicate their participation in government. Most who criticize America slough their responsibilities and cry because the world doesn't dance to their childish, narcissistic whims. Instead they wish to enslave everyone to work half heartedly for communist ideas, or socialism (communism-lite). In…
★★★★ · Tragedy or Hope · marzneedzwomen · 2005-08-09
I believe the actor playing the professor is longtime Roger Corman regular Ed Nelson. sure looks like him.
★★★★ · Watch "Brink of disaster, pt 1"' · ubihubi · 2007-06-28
Watch "Brink of disaster, pt 1 ", Which should be the proper beginning, with either " Brink of disaster, pt 2" or "Tragedy or Hope" as the ending. It really shows you that'U.S. drag' that Burroughs wrote about.
★★★ · See also... · uniQ · 2005-06-23
(Average rating, this post is for info purposes) The characters and plot of this film are near exact reprisals of "Brink of Disaster!!" located on this site as well. -uniQ
★★★ · Rabble Rabble · Spuzz · 2005-08-06
More fun from later Jerry Fairbanks. This is QUITE similar to the short 'Brink Of Disaster', with exactly the same premise, kid breaks into a library to wait for his demostrator friends to come in and wreck the place. All of a sudden, his history professor and one of his ancestor arrive to beat him down about Why America Is So Great. Why, they've created some of the most wonderful things in the world! They produce most of the goods! Not like those Communist Viet Nam protestors outside! It's funny how once you start protesting about something, they instantly label you negatively. America will…
