The Howard Zinn Book Fair Presents: Walker (1987) Screening and Q&A with Director Alex Cox

The Howard Zinn Book Fair, with support from the Anthropology and Social Change Department, welcome legendary film director and writer Alex Cox (El Patrullero, Repo Man, Sid and Nancy) to San Francisco for a special screening and discussion at Piano Fight in San Francisco on November 29th, 2016.

Cox will present his 1987 film Walker, a neo-Western biopic about William Walker, an American mercenary who made himself president of Nicaragua in 1856. Walker is almost unknown today but at the time he was wildly popular, and U.S. newspapers wrote about him more than they did about the sitting U.S. presidents during that period. Alex Cox decided to make a film about William Walker, on location in Nicaragua, during the height of the Cold War in Central America, when Ronald Reagan's government was pouring millions of dollars into supporting sociopathic dictators and paramilitary death-squads across the region.

Cox, Joe Strummer of The Clash (who recorded the soundtrack and who appears briefly in the film), and a band of determined producers, crew and cast worked with the brand new revolutionary Sandinista government of Nicaragua's film ministry, to produce what has been described as an "Acid Western" and what Cox himself says is his best work. This film screening and evening with the director are produced with support from CIIS's Anthropology and Social Change department.

Please join us for an evening of cinema and discussion at 8 p.m. on Tuesday, November 29th at Piano Fight, located at 144 Taylor Street in San Francisco between Eddy and Turk. The nearest BART Station is Powell Street.