William Kunstler

Known for Acting

7/7/1919

New York City, New York, USA

Biography

William Moses Kunstler was an American attorney and civil rights activist, known for defending the Chicago Seven.

Known For (11 credits)

William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe

6.1

Movie

William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe

2009

William Kunstler was one of the most famous lawyers of the 20th century. His clients included Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Phillip and Daniel Berrigan, Abbie Hoffman, H. Rap Brown, Stokely Carmichael, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., and Leonard Peltier. Filmmakers Emily Kunstler and Sarah Kunstler explore their father’s life, from middle-class family man, to movement lawyer, to “the most hated lawyer in America.”

Movie

60 Spins Around the Sun

2003

Helmed by "Saturday Night Live" alumna Laura Kightlinger, this hourlong exposé chronicles -- warts and all -- the life of comedian turned activist Randy Credico, an up-and-coming funnyman whose candor tanked his career. But the end of his showbiz days didn't stop him: He switched gears and became a mouthpiece for various causes, including the fight against New York's draconian drug laws. Credico's peers and ex-girlfriends weigh in with insights.

Movie

Seven Songs for Malcolm X

1993

The Black Audio Film Collective’s seventh film envisioned the death and life of the African American revolutionary as a seven part study in iconography as narrated by novelist Toni Cade Bambara and actor Giancarlo Espesito. The stylized tableaux vivants that memorialise Malcolm’s life referenced the early 20th century funeral photography of James Van der Zee’s The Harlem Book of the Dead and the elemental static cinematography of Sergei Paradjanov’s The Colour of Pomegranates.

7.5

Movie

Malcolm X

1992

A tribute to the controversial black activist and leader of the struggle for black liberation. He hit bottom during his imprisonment in the '50s, he became a Black Muslim and then a leader in the Nation of Islam. His assassination in 1965 left a legacy of self-determination and racial pride.

7.0

Movie

Incident at Oglala

1992

On June 26, 1975, during a period of high tensions on the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota, two FBI agents were killed in a shootout with a group of Indians. Although several men were charged with killing the agents, only one, Leonard Peltier, was found guilty. This film describes the events surrounding the shootout and suggests that Peltier was unjustly convicted.

Movie

Warrior: The Life of Leonard Peltier

1991

An intimate exploration of the circumstances surrounding the incarceration of Native American activist Leonard Peltier, convicted of murder in 1977, with commentary from those involved, including Peltier himself.

7.4

Law & Order

1990

In cases ripped from the headlines, police investigate serious and often deadly crimes, weighing the evidence and questioning the suspects until someone is taken into custody. The district attorney's office then builds a case to convict the perpetrator by proving the person guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Working together, these expert teams navigate all sides of the complex criminal justice system to make New York a safer place.

10.0

Movie

Growing Up in America

1989

Filmmaker Morley Markson shows Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Allen Ginsberg, Timothy Leary, and other '60s rebels, then and now in a follow up to his 1971 film "Breathing Together: Revolution of the Electric Family."

6.3

Movie

We Can't Go Home Again

1973

Nicholas Ray plays himself, acting as mentor, friend, and artistic inspiration to his students at Binghamton. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with The Film Foundation.

Breathing Together: Revolution of the Electric Family

5.3

Movie

Breathing Together: Revolution of the Electric Family

1971

The title of this Canadian documentary may have some relation to Canadian Marshall McLuhan's theories. It combines interview with famous U.S. militants of the '60s, such as Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman, with reenactments of their Chicago trials (i.e., the "Chicago Eight," etc.). Other figures of cultural interest from the time, including Alan Ginsberg and Buckminster Fuller, are interviewed or featured. The filmmaker indicates his belief that powerful forces in the U.S. government worked together to suppress American radicals. This view, widely disbelieved at the time, has since been confirmed.

5.4

Movie

Street Scenes 1970

1970

In the late spring of 1970, nationwide protests against the war in Vietnam focused in the Wall Street area of New York City and ultimately in a major anti-war demonstration in Washington, D.C.. A group of New York University film students documented the demonstrations as they happened in both cities. Later, in New York, the massive amount of black and white and color 16mm footage was edited into this important record of the day-by-day events. The extended final scene, shot by Edward Summer in a hotel room in Washington, D.C., is a spontaneous conversation among Martin Scorsese, Harvey Keitel, Jay Cocks and Verna Bloom who, along with a large group of NYU students, found themselves frustrated and perplexed by the events and hopeful that the protests would result in change.