William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe

William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe is a documentary film about the late American civil rights attorney William Kunstler directed by daughters Emily Kunstler and Sarah Kunstler that premiered at the 25th Sundance Film Festival in January 2009.[1]

William Kunstler was a famous 20th-century lawyer whose clients included Martin Luther King Jr., the Chicago Seven, Larry Davis, Malcolm X,[1] Phillip and Daniel Berrigan, Abbie Hoffman, H. Rap Brown, Stokely Carmichael, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., Filiberto Ojeda Ríos and Leonard Peltier. The New York Times called him "the most hated and most loved lawyer in America". Kunstler served as the negotiator for inmates at the prison uprising at Attica State Prison in New York in 1971.[2]

This film is a co-production of the Independent Television Service (ITVS) and was broadcast on the PBS television series P.O.V. in June 2010. The film was an official selection of the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. It also received a 2008 grant from the Foundation for Jewish Culture's Lynn and Jules Kroll Fund for Jewish Documentary Film. Arthouse Films released the film theatrically in North America in 2009.