Educational Media Reviews Online

“A common and natural result of an undue respect for law is, that you may see a file of soldiers, colonel, captain, corporal, privates, powder-monkeys, and all, marching in admirable order over hill and dale to the wars, against their wills, ay, against their common sense and consciences, which makes it very steep marching indeed, and produces a palpitation of the heart. They have no doubt that it is a damnable business in which they are concerned; they are all peaceably inclined. Now, what are they? Men at all? Or small movable forts and magazines, at the service of some unscrupulous man in power?”

These words, delivered in this film with spellbinding intensity by Henry David Thoreau impersonator Jeffrey Hyatt, were taken to heart by the college generation of the Vietnam War and will, perhaps, be food for thought for those members of the current generation who are struggling with the ethical dilemmas posed by the war in Iraq.

Videographer Scan Baker has captured the clarity of light and beautiful simplicity of the New England countryside in and around Concord, Cambridge and Cape Cod, thereby rendering a stunning visual accompaniment to long passages from “Civil Disobedience” and Walden Pond. Hyatt’s mellow baritone and articulate delivery admirably convey the intensity of Thoreau’s thought. Thoreau specialists Lawrence Buell, Robert Richardson and Joel Myerson provide unobtrusive historical commentary on Thoreau, his relationship with Emerson and the philosophy of Transcendentalism.

Hyatt’s body language is somewhat contrived and therefore a distraction from the sheer power of Thoreau’s words. However, the brevity of the film (it is only 32 minutes long), its focus on the works themselves rather than scholarly interpretations of the works make this an excellent vehicle to introduce high school and first year college students to an icon of American literature and to principles and ideas which have become a permanent part of the American culture and psyche.