Posted on 10/07/2016 11:03:37 AM PDT by C19fan
There is plenty of extracinematic material to chew over in considering Nate Parker’s The Birth of a Nation—the film’s rapturous response at Sundance, the way it rode over the horizon and onto the awards scene just as the movie industry was grappling with #oscarssowhite, the emergence of the story of Parker’s 2001 trial for rape—but let’s start with the sheer bravado of the movie’s title. Parker’s gambit in nicking the title of the 1915 D.W. Griffith Civil War epic now remembered less for its brilliant cinematic innovation than for its vile racism is plain: to take back not just film history but American history, to give the nation a second chance at birth.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
Turner killed women and children out of tactical necessity. If he’d left them alone, the white men could have easily formed up a militia and annihilated the rebels. As it was, they were forced either to stay with their families or to escort them to safe havens.
Yes, it was terrorism, and it may have been out of pure race hatred, but what else did he have?
I read somewhere that Turner said that if he had succeeded in gaining more military strength, “he would have waged war in a more Christian manner.”
The same thing may be said of the "education" people receive regarding the Civil War. I found out the hard way that there are a lot of things they didn't tell me about why it happened.
The more I learn, the more the "history" starts to appear like a movie script.
In the original movie former slaves attack Lillian Gish and she jumps off a cliff to her death to get away from her attackers. The clan then “avenge” her death and are seen as the protectors of white women from the “black horde”.
It sounds to me as if they are flipping the script in this new version. Black women are raped by the slave masters and Nate Turner is the protector of black women from the white overlords...
For those here who are complaining that Hollywood plays fast and loose with the facts, I remember reading an interview once from famed silent movie and early talkies movie actor Douglas Fairbanks Jr. on this. For those of you who don’t know, he joined the Navy in 1941 and was a WWII veteran who participated in landings in North Africa, Italy, France and protected convoys going across the North Atlantic. He retired from the Naval reserve a Captain (0-6).
He was asked if it bothered him that Hollywood over romanticized WWII and played fast and loose with the facts. His reply was heck no! That’s what they are supposed to do. It’s entertainment, not a documentary.
From what I've seen Nate Parker and you would probably get along very well.
So we have to turn this into a dig directed at me?
I simply point out that the History we were taught is crap, and you have to make it personal?
I’m sure they already have been.
“I’ve never been able to appreciate the film making quality, if the story is a POS.”
Well, even if you don’t mind the story, it’s tricky to appreciate a movie like BoaN, since the tricks it introduced are old hat to viewers nowadays. Most people could watch it and not even notice the innovations unless someone pointed them out. Even Citizen Kane suffers from a bit of the same syndrome. The critics love it, but unless they know a bit about cinematic history, most casual viewers don’t get what all the fuss is about.
Yes, well if the shoe fits...
I simply point out that the History we were taught is crap, and you have to make it personal?
History is history. How people tend to twist it is what's crap.
“Sort of” is exactly right. It basically makes sense, the original glorified the KKK, this one glorifies BLM, which is the modern-day KKK.
CK is still a very entertaining and engaging film.
I’m done with black shite
Those here who drink it up can kiss my ass
You’ve always been my enemy
This jacksss who directed and starred in this garbage raped a white woman who subsequently killed herself a few years later
Anyone on this forum excusing his movie is common trash
Fast and loose my ass
Fast and loose is your own character and guts and convictions
And more importantly your honesty
The Nate Turner shoe fits on me in your opinion?
History is history. How people tend to twist it is what's crap.
History and Narrative are two different things. We've been fed a narrative and told it was "History." Most of us just accept it and leave it at that.
The problems only crop up when you start looking at the bits that don't make any sense and then realize it's a cobbled together Frankenstein monster that bears little actual resemblance to History, meaning an accurate retelling of events.
Is Soviet style History. Not real History.
I’m with you 100%
“In fact, its a level of arrogance one would normally associate with the British.”
The British issued two emancipation proclamations during the Revolutionary War, Dunmore’s proclamation and the Philipsburg proclamation. Had they crushed the colonial rebellion American slavery would have ended 90 years earlier. I’m always curious to see how this forgotten aspect of American history gets explained away in justifying American secession from Britain.
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