Gang violence is about as American as apple pie. For anyone who may have doubted this fact, Martin Scorsese did a pretty good job of bringing true-to-life gang bangers of centuries past to the big screen for us in Gangs of New York, showing us with one film how little has actually changed over the last 200 years. And then there’s Charles Cahill and Associates, whose gem of an educational documentary, Street Gangs: Challenge for Law Enforcement (1970s), has recently been dug up from the dustbin of history by a Youtuber who goes by the name of Guildford Ghost.
Sure, Street Gangs may not be a sweeping historical epic featuring Cameron Diaz, and Cahill may be famous for educational classics such as Safety Belt for Susie and Safety Rules for Schools (starting to notice a common theme?), but this short documentary provides some surprisingly fascinating insight into the nature of modern L.A. gang culture, allowing the subjects to speak for themselves and eschewing the sensationalist bells and whistles that tend to accompany basic cable “documentaries” on the subject these days.
Driven along by a funky 70s soundtrack and produced in cooperation with the L.A. Country Sheriff’s Department, Street Gangs was seemingly put together as a law enforcement primer and includes some pointed, though naive, recommendations on how to combat the phenomenon. While “weakening the gang hierarchy” by taking out “hardcore offenders” and searching girls for guns may have seemed like effective police work at the time, maybe the total lack of consideration for deeper structural issues is why gang violence didn’t magically disappear forty years ago.
Be that as it may, Street Gangs is a captivating record of a historical moment that still seems surprisingly current, and a worthy piece of educational filmmaking that had the courage to treat its subjects as human beings.
h/t: Dangerous Minds