Speakers Series presents Gabriel Over the White House film screening & discussion

WHAT: The University of Illinois Springfield Engaged Citizenship Common Experience (ECCE) Speakers Series presents a screening of the film Gabriel Over the White House. A discussion led by Andy Egizi, program coordinator and academic adviser in the UIS College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and adjunct Liberal Studies instructor, will follow the film.

WHEN: Monday, June 18, 2012 at 6 p.m.

WHERE: Brookens Auditorium, located on the lower level of Brookens Library

DETAILS: Imagine this scenario if you can. The President of the United States is involved in a serious car accident and, while recovering, receives a visit from the Archangel Gabriel. Forced to acknowledge the desperate state of the country due to his poor leadership, the President vows to set the nation right, fires the crooked cabinet members who got him elected and transforms himself into an all-powerful dictator who wages war against organized crime, all in a determined bid to restore social order in America.

What sounds like a right-wing paranoid fantasy is actually the plot of Gabriel Over the White House, a political allegory that was one of the first films to openly address the problems resulting from the Great Depression such as unemployment, homeless people and the rising crime rate. You also won't see another Hollywood film in which our fearless leader is viewed by his constituents as either a madman or a messiah.

Egizi has spent the last ten years researching and watching classic films as well as gathering an archive of more than 1,100 films from the studio era.

For a list of other ECCE Speakers Series events and more information, visit http://illinois.edu/goto/speakerseries. All events are free and open to the public.