Sir! No Sir! Exposing and Debunking Military Lies from Vietnam to Iraq

FTA (Film Review) - FTA

This review, by David Kehr, was published by the New York Times, Februuary 22, 2009

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FTA was the slogan adapted by a group of self-styled political vaudevillians — including Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland, Holly Near and Len Chandler — who toured United States bases in the Pacific in 1970, presenting antiwar songs and sketches to servicemen. This documentary record of the tour, directed by Francine Parker, played briefly in theaters in 1972 (released by American-International, youth-exploitation specialists) and then disappeared. Seen today, it is a fascinating period piece: the counterculture answer to Bob Hope’s U.S.O. tours, filmed at a moment when peace signs were giving way to power salutes. There is a self-congratulatory air to some of the proceedings, but Ms. Fonda’s antiwar speech before the Foreign Correspondents Club in Tokyo may be one of the most powerful performances of her distinguished career. (Docurama Films, $26.95, not rated)

FTA (Film Review) - Traitor Jane

This unsigned review was published by the New York Post, Februuary 12, 2009

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AN old skeleton has emerged from Jane Fonda's closet to remind us of her traitorous embrace of the North Vietnamese, which got her dubbed "Hanoi Jane." Docudrama Films is re leasing on DVD a long-suppressed documentary called "FTA," a k a "[Bleep] the Army," which chronicles the anti-war shows Fonda staged in front of GIs. The flick opened in theaters in 1972 the same week she flew to Hanoi and encouraged the Vietnamese communists to fight "American imperialists." It was yanked days later and withdrawn from circulation, and the late director Francine Parker blamed pressure from the Nixon White House.

Film Review - New life for anti-war film Pentagon suppressed

This article, by Brenda Sandburg, was published by Workers World, February 14, 2009

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For 37 years no one was able to see “FTA,” a riveting documentary of the anti-war show that Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland and others performed for GIs during the Vietnam War. The film was yanked from theaters one week after it opened in 1972, and all copies were destroyed. However, the original negatives were discovered a few years ago, and a reprint of the movie is now being released on DVD.
Sundance will broadcast this must-see movie on Feb. 23 at 9 p.m. and on Feb. 28 at 9 a.m. Docuramafilms is also distributing it on DVD so everyone can access it through Netflix and other outlets.
“FTA,” which stands for “F**k the Army,” played at the IFC Center in Manhattan on Feb. 2. Jane Fonda appeared in person to introduce the movie, along with David Zeiger, the director of “Sir! No Sir!,” and a representative of Iraq Veterans Against the War. “It really presents that time in a way that feels present and alive and real,” Zeiger said.
Fonda explained that the FTA show was intended to counter Bob Hope’s pro-war USO program. At the time, there was massive opposition to the war within military ranks, and GIs turned out in droves to see entertainers who told the truth about their experiences. Fonda and Sutherland had just finished filming “Klute,” when Dr. Howard Levy, known for refusing to train Green Berets, asked them to be part of the show.
Witty and moving, the production featured satirical skits (in one number Donald Sutherland and Michael Alaimo call out what’s happening on the battlefield like baseball sportscasters), songs (Rita Martinson’s “Dear Soldier” is remarkable), and searing commentary (Sutherland’s closing call for people to point the gun at the war makers is stunning).
President Richard Nixon would not allow the troupe to take their show to South Vietnam as Bob Hope did, nor permit them on U.S. military bases. Instead, they performed outside bases in Hawaii, the Philippines, Okinawa and Japan. During the two-week tour they held 21 performances for more than 60,000 service men and women.
Fonda said the military tried to keep them away by issuing releases that gave the wrong times for the show. But she said they waited until the audience turned up, and when thousands were unable to get into the packed venue, they held additional shows so everyone could see it.
“FTA” mixes excerpts from the show with interviews of GIs who talk about the government’s deception and the racism and sexism in the military. One Black GI says Black men should be exempt from the war. “The only place a Black man should fight is where he’s being oppressed,” he says. “I’m not being oppressed in Japan, Pakistan or Vietnam.”
The film also reveals what life was like for people living near U.S. bases. In the Philippines women and girls were forced into prostitution by poverty. One soldier says the prostitutes were required to get tested for sexually transmitted diseases and to wear green badges in bars to indicate they were disease free.
In Japan, a man describes what happened when the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Standing by a river, he says the explosion rose 2,000 feet at the epicenter and thousands of people jumped into the boiling river to escape the heat.
Zeiger was instrumental in bringing this extraordinary film back to life. While making “Sir! No Sir!,” a stirring account of GI resistance to the Vietnam War, he tracked down the people who produced “FTA.” He discovered that “FTA” director Francine Parker had just the year before found the original 16-millimeter negative in a vault where it had been edited. She had blown it up into a 35-millimeter print but did not go further, as it appeared thousands of dollars in back taxes were owed on the film.
Zeiger discovered this was not the case, however, and took “FTA” to the Sundance channel.

From the Sir! No Sir! Archives - Review of FTA from the New York Times (1972)

This review, by Roger Greenspun, was originally published in the New York Times , July 22, 1972

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By now most people must know something about the political vaudeville troupe formed by Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland and others to offer soldiers an alternate entertainment to say, Bob Hope, or whatever shows are provided by the U.S.O. The troupe called itself F.T.A., which stands for Free Theater Associates, or for other things such as, Free the Army.
Last year, against considerable official opposition, it toured United States military bases in the Pacific. Francine Parker's "F.T.A.," which opened yesterday at the Baronet and Victoria theaters, is a documentary about aspects of that tour.
The film divides its attention pretty evenly between the performers and their audience, and a lot of time is given to interviews with dissident, or merely disillusioned, servicemen. Some hate the war in Vietnam. Some just voice dismay at certain truths about the military like "They don't want you to be an individual") that have been perpetually rediscovered by raw recruits at least since the Battle of Thermopylae.
So much time is given to the audience, whose insights, though real, are neither original nor profound, that the actual performance comes across in scattered bits and pieces.
A lot of the show must have been very funny, with a kind of humor genuinely in touch with the desperation borne of simply being in the service. (Army doctor prescribing to obviously pregnant wife of enlisted man: "Go home and take two A.P.C. tablets and come back when your swelling goes down.")
But as presented in the movie, most of the show doesn't seem very funny, except inadvertently—as when Donald Sutherland seriously recites the prose of Dalton Trumbo with a straight-from-the-shoulder solemnity that happens to be perfectly in keeping with his phony-preacher characterization in Jules Feiffer's "Little Murders."
Occasionally the F.T.A. troupe becomes involved with the local population, so that we may hear the Just Grievances Against American Imperialism of the people of Okinawa or Japan or wherever Miss Fonda and her colleagues happen to be listening. I found most of this a predictable bore, but it did allow for the film's only really striking sequence: an anti-American guerrilla theater pageant in the Philippines that momentarily turns revolutionary passion into a romantic gesture of extraordinary beauty.
Otherwise there are a few good things. There is the lovely ballad singing of Rita Martinson (most of the singing, by Len Chandler, isn't so lovely), some hints at lively routines, an occasional glimpse of deep happiness in eyes of Miss Fonda or of Holly Near. But the spirit of F.T.A. must lie elsewhere, in other times and special places. For all its agility and pressing close-ups, the film doesn't capture that spirit—or even adequately show the kind of experience that might have let it grow.
The Program
F.T.A., directed by Francine Parker; written by Robin Menken, Michael Alaimo, Rita Martinson, Holly Near, Len Chandler, Pamala Donegan, Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland and Dalton Trumbo; editors, Joel Morwood and Michael Beaudry; camera, Juliana Wang, Eric Saarinen and Joan Weidman; music by Aminadav Aloni; produced by Miss Parker, Miss Fonda and Mr. Sutherland. At the Baronet Theater, 59th Street at Third Avenue and the Victoria Theater, Broadway and 46th Street, Running time: 94 minutes. This film is rated R. Released by American International Pictures.
With: Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland, Len Chandler, Pamala Donegan, Michael Alalmo, Rita Martinson, Holly Near, Paul Mooney and Yale Zimmerman.