Product Details

• Actors: Mike Wallace
• Format: NTSC
• Studio: A & E HOME VIDEO
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• ASIN: 0767014596
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #405,103 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Remember the Tiananmen Square Massacre, May 29, 2001

By 

"chy5398p" (Cupertino, California, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: 20th Century with Mike Wallace - Democracy Crushed: Tiananmen Square [VHS] (VHS Tape)

It has been twelve years since the protesters, demonstrators and other innocent civilians in China, who were aware of and had great love on democracy and peacefully protested in Tiananmen Square by showing grievance to the Communist government, lost the war against the totalitarian government backed by Li Peng and other hard-liners. Although more and more people around the world have started to forget the Tiananmen Square Incident, this inhumane actions led by the Communists on innocent civilians still haunt to and are still remembered by those who survived the massacre unscathed, people related to the dead in Tiananmen Square as well as many people around the world who are still the supporters of democracy while determining to create a whole new world under a new humane order by the rule of democracy.

This documentary film is, for the supporters (and, of course, lovers) of democracy around the world, one of the best dramatizations regarding both politics of the world and democracy. It is served as a reference for the exact meaning, essences and functioning of democracy. I can utterly feel what it means for the people who have the character of determination, motivation, optimism, righteousness and confidence, similar to 54th colored regiment of Massachusetts, first colored regiment in U.S. Civil War, led by Colonel Shaw in the film "Glory" and Gandhi and his followers in India, while struggling for democracy for China and the world. Some of the prominent political reformers in the China's Communist Party, like Hu Yao-Bang and Zhao Zi-Yang, had politically made a giant step toward democratic China. But the progress was hampered by the hard-liners within the party by forcing Hu to resign. Hu's death without having his dream of creating democratic China come true led to the protest for democracy from students, workers and other civilians in whole China. Zhao was later discharged by the Communist Party for being liberal like Hu, causing the protest to heighten to a zenith. Since the night of third day of June 1989, soldiers and police officers killed and arrested thousands, perhaps millions, of protesters and others civilians by force. Some were executed, some were in prison or labor camp, some lost the rights of citizenship, others fled in exile. I finally learned that the dictators and their followers have used all the speeches and writings that seems "pleasant" but, most of the time, mislead the civilians and cause resentment and sometimes rage against the governments. The civilians don't even know the governments have lied until the very last minute.

Besides this, I also learned that democracy is, in full definition, a government or a principle of a government that allows all civilians to be the equal representatives of the whole body of government, voters and electors for the government and the beneficiaries of the government. It means not only the elite, people of upper class and militants but also people of middle and lower classes as well as everybody. According to Sun Yat-Sen, the father of modern China and, as many people know, the Republic of China (also known as Taiwan), he created a set of doctrines called the Three Principles of the People, which are nationalism, democracy and the social well-being. He also mentioned that democracy is a government of the people, government ruled by the people and, in same importance as the first two, government for the people. It is extremely vital that although democracy is imperfect like other forms of government contrary to it, it is the most suitable form of government in the world.

What I liked the most in this documentary was a civilian standing against a column of tanks in an empty street in Beijing. It symbolizes the civilians are standing up and gallantly fighting against dictatorship without the use of violence. It also symbolizes the bravery of the civilians who are never afraid of failing but, rather, being optimistic that the dictatorship will fall while the democracy will rise high in the sky.

The war against the dictatorship was lost in China, but the civilians will take revenge until the dictatorship in China collapse. I am extremely sure that later on our lives, more young people who are entering the government will make the political reforms that will satisfy the needs of the civilians. At the same time, the older government officials will slowly retire and decease with time. Soon, democracy will have great victory against totalitarianism in China and the world.

If I happened to find the movie or documentaries relating to the true story of the "builders and motivators" for democracy who have the dreams of democratizing the world, like the spreaders of democracy in China Wang Dan, Chai Ling, Uerkesh Daolet (Wuer Kaixi), Li Lu, Shen Tong and Professor and Madam Fang Li-Zhi, "acting on the screen" after their completion, I will come back to Amazon.com to buy them without any hesitation.