The Birth Of A Nation

[Drew Horton]

Saw it a couple days ago with my girlfriend. Everyone should check it out, although bear in mind that since it's a film about slavery there's a lot of extremely graphic violence and racism (obviously). My girlfriend actually had to turn away for a bit during one particular scene, and that happened with my roommate and his girlfriend too. I won't spoil what happened, but if you see it, the scene with the two chained up slaves on a hunger strike involves some teeth gone bad.

 

Overall it's a good film, although the pacing is a bit off. By the time they get to the actual revolt the movie is almost over. The actual revolt was only 2 days long, so it makes sense that it was short, but for a film perspective it leaves you wanting some more. The film is very powerful, although as far as movies on the topic of slavery I think 12 Years a Slave is better, if only because the director, Steve McQueen, is a total auteur and master of filmmaking.

 

One last thing, as far as the previews before the film. Jordan Peele, from Key and Peele (he's the one with the glasses), is directing a movie called Get Out which comes out in February. The trailer is absolutely bonkers and I'm super excited for the movie.

 

Here's the trailer:

 

[sno]

Get banned for racism. Later <3

[FoxHound]

any comparison to the original?

[Drew Horton]

any comparison to the original?

 

It's hardly a remake. And by hardly I mean not at all.

 

The Griffith TBOAN is about the rise of the KKK in the antebellum South, and is, by modern standards (and I would say past standards as well, although the film was made far before the Civil Rights Era), incredibly racist in a pro-racism way. The film was even originally called The Clansman, for Christ's sake. Griffith's version is about two families on either side of the Civil War, and takes place during it. We even see Lincoln's assassination. The Klan used the film for recruiting efforts, as it showed black men (some played by white men in blackface) as stupid and rapists. There's even a scene where a woman throws herself off a cliff to her death in an attempt to avoid being raped.

 

The Parker TBOAN is set about 30 years before the Civil War. We do see one scene at the end during the Civil War, but it's literally just one shot of some Union soldiers. Parker's version is just about the slave rebellion of Nat Turner, although it details his life as a slave before the revolt. We see him as a child slave who learns to read, and becomes very religious after the slavemaster's wife let's him read the Bible. After getting into debt, Nat's master basically rents him out to other plantations to preach to the slaves, hoping that the slaves will follow their owners better after being preached to by a fellow black man. After his wife is assaulted, Nat slowly turns from the path of peace and into the path of retribution, and after a whipping, leads a revolt against his master and later the county.

 

What Parker did by naming it the same as Griffith's film was an attempt to reclaim a piece of art, much like how Kanye West started wearing Confederate Flag patches on his jackets. By taking something that previously subjugated his race, he is turning it against itself, allowing a retrospective into what Griffith's version was: A racist propaganda tool.

 

Griffith's version is still important to watch, not only for film history but for history in general, as we can see what black Americans had to go through in the South during that time, and see how they were STILL viewed nearly 60 years after the Civil War.