The Animal People (2019)

A chilling portrait of what happens when activism rattles the institutions of power.

Directors:

Denis Henry Hennelly, Casey Suchan

Stars:

Steven Best, Heidi Boghosian, George W. Bush

Cast

Credited cast:
Steven Best	...	Self (professor of philosophy)
Heidi Boghosian	...	Self (National Lawyers Guild)
George W. Bush	...	Self (archive footage)
Brian Cass	...	Self (HLS) (archive footage)
Jake Conroy	...	Self (Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty)
Darioush Dagdar	...	Self (HLS, 1996-2002)
Alexandra Deyo	...	Self (SHAC Philadelphia activist)
Daniel Andreas San Diego	...	Self (rumored)
Katie Fedor	...	Self
Darius Fulmer	...	Self (Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty)
Lauren Gazzola	...	Self (Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty)
Ray Greek	...	Self (former animal researcher)
Josh Harper	...	Self (Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty)
Paul Hetznecker	...	Self (attorney)
Tim Hitchins	...	Self (SHAC Florida activist) (as Tim Hitchens)

Storyline

Fifteen years in the making, this feature documentary - Executive Produced by Joaquin Phoenix - follows the journey of six young Americans who find themselves targeted as terrorists by the US government for their involvement in a controversial protest campaign. Seeing the future of social movement organizing, the activists used the then fledgling internet to dramatically magnify their impact as they systematically knocked out the pillars of financial support that kept the company in business. But when letter writing and protests began to mushroom into dead-of-night vandalism and worse by unknown activists, this corporation and the government formed an alliance to destroy the group. The FBI began an unprecedented campaign of surveillance in preparation for prosecution, creating a model that would later be used against Occupy Wall Street and Black Lives Matter. Congress, under corporate influence, rewrote laws and bent the definition of incitement in order to accomplish the prosecution ...

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Plot Keywords:

shac | animal activist | animal liberation movement | animal liberation | anti vivisection | 

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Genres:

Documentary

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Did You Know?

Quotes

Self (professor of philosophy): Social change always happens through a wide variety of forces. It's always pluristic. And people wanna revise history. They wanna say, "Well, Gandhi won the Indian independence movement." Well, I'm sorry, Gandhi didn't win it alone. There were forces that were violently attacking the British, and that helped pressure the British to leave India. Dr. Martin Luther King did not win the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by himself. Standing behind him was Malcolm X. It wasn't hippies that stopped the ...
[...]

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Connections

Features Beastly Business: Tactics of Terror (2000)

User Reviews

Power to the (Animal) People

Extremely well edited and perfectly paced documentary that will make your blood boil. Shows the abuses of the Patriot Act fervor that led to the horrible Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act.

Goes well with Earth Crisis and vegan pizza.

Details

Official Sites:

Official Facebook Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

10 December 2019 (USA)

Also Known As:

Terrorist: SHAC 7

Filming Locations:

Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Bird Street Productions, Finngate Pictures, Seafox Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

97 min

Color:

Color