Having survived a war, you might expect life to move on. But the harsh reality of war stays with you. Moreover, you bitterly realise that history repeats itself: the experience of the 1960s can’t be dismissed like a hippie rock album, but is rather a milestone in musical history, reflecting too the history of war and opposition to it, stretching before and after. And we must go on facing the same issues with anxiety and inner discomfort, as we realise the true long-lasting effects of war horror.

The same reaction is triggered by CSNY Déjà Vu. To visit Neil Young’s Living with War website is to find yourself diving into a world filled with bits of memory and personal experience, that echoes your own lifetime. Whether it is the war in Afghanistan, Iraq or Vietnam (if you’re old enough to remember), it is still the same anguish that makes you take a stand. Those choosing to watch this film are likely to be anti-war already, but the music should make it appeal across generations and political views.

This is a film made by a Vietnam combatant and Iraq war reporter Mike Cerre, together with the Woodstock rat-pack of David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Graham Nash and Neil Young, documenting their 2006 Freedom of Speech Tour through the USA. It depicts their struggle through life, emotionally charged and imbued in a romantic 1960s mantra. However, no romantic mood can be found here, but rather a striking revolt against the people’s ignorance of abuses of power and contrived political reasoning, which led a nation to war.

Nevertheless, the film is altogether enjoyable. You tend to lose yourself in the folk music and take in the facts with a comic, nostalgic attitude of cushioned revolt. Here is its weak point. It is not a blasting nerve-wrecking stand, but a sort of community appeal against war. You are fused into the revolt, yet you are only marginally affected by the violence of war. Long aerial views of concert stages along the tour, backed by the mixed views of reporters and radio hosts, are just that kind of imagistic distance from the harshness of everyday life, allowing the space to digest the reality faced by veterans in the light of brutality in Iraq.

A mother losing a son, or a limbless congress candidate – these are all individuals with heart-wrenching stories. And so are the almost innocent Iraq veterans performing in concerts and gushing their protest. The stage backdrop curtain filled with images of war casualties is more than a collage of faces; it is a real map of personal dramas. A people’s voice, heard through a hundred-strong chorus, sets the stage for the whole documentary. However, Neil Young himself hints at the failure of the concept, saying that he had wished those hundred people in the choir would actually have done something, not be satisfied with just being a voice in a choir singing against the war. Arguably, the band itself actually did something beyond this, through the LWW collaboration, numerous interviews and anti-war campaigns, and even this film.

Nevertheless, this troubadour approach is yet too mild. It may have touched hearts and set minds together at times, but it lacks the raw impact of concrete repercussions of war, such as shown in the crude elements of Brian de Palma’s Redacted (2007), for example; or the situation faced by the people on the other side of the barricades, as the day to day war experience of non-Americans (Iraqi, Afghan, Vietnamese, you name it) is far more brutally engrossing than any of the traumas portrayed in this film.

Still, this is a film about and for America in the end, with the Star Spangled Banner hanging all over. It does address mostly American revellers of a ‘Make Love not War’ world. And as such, CSNY Déjà Vu is a film with a strong political message for a specific society. But even so, you need a more accentuated brain and a harder heart to really address the issue and get people moving, to be able to change that ignorant resentful impression one concert spectator offended by ‘Let’s impeach the president!’ gives at some point. No, the government people are not smarter than you!