About racism

Aug 30, 2017 09:56

There are two American movies with the same name divided in time by one century.
The classical film created by great director D.W. Griffith in 1915 and work of Nate Parker which was first time presented at Sundance Film Festival in January 2016.
First movie is included to US National Film Preservation Board in 1992. Second one got Audience Award in Sundance although in my opinion deserve Oscar much more than Moonlight.
Griffith's movie is justifying Ku Klux Klan. I wouldn't deny that events shown could be part of reality in American History of 19th century; but I do not believe that protection of innocent people was the only or even main reason for creating KKK: more realistic reason would be desire for revenge and keep of old order where rich Whites and suppressed Black Americans. And still: that film is highly estimated by movie professionals and was very popular in its time.
Parker's film shows another side of history: slave rebellion in Virginia in 1831. Thanks to director (who also wrote screenplay): he was honest and showed main character not totally positive, that makes Nat Turner look even higher. Notably it was not difficult to make scene of Turner's execution with extras' angry reaction: descendants of people killed during rebellion did not forget what has happened.

I wonder: would it be useful to show these two films next to each other to students in History lessons? With proper comments of course. Although: who knows what is proper comment in this case?

cinema, opinion

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