Cinema Can Do Pop & Politics: Sympathy for the Devil (One plus One)

May ’68, which connected cinema with protest and film with politic, has always been an important point of reference for Arsenal. In 2008, there was a large-scale attempt to grapple with the manifestos, collectives, harbingers and aftereffects of May ’68 in a program of 98 films shown over a period of 3 months that was also documented in a comprehensive publication. The opening film from back then, Jean-Luc Godard’s SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL (ONE PLUS ONE), brings together pop and politics by combining the Rolling Stones’ studio sessions for “Sympathy for the Devil” with Mick Jagger as a highly concentrated musician with actors who deliver texts by the Black Panthers at a scrapyard, hardly a location chosen by accident. Further threads include an interview with “Eve Democracy” (Anne Wiazemsky), whose only answers are yes and no, as well as young Nazi who recites passages from “Mein Kampf” in a purple denim suit. Klaus Theweleit: “There is hardly a better documentation of the political moment – the state of mind – this is referred to as ‘1968.’” (bik)