Given the chance, I'd definitely like to check this out:
Four years after angry protests by the Los Angeles branch of the NAACP and other groups forced him to yank his planned showing of D.W. Griffith's 1915 film The Birth of a Nation, the owner of the Silent Movie Theater in Los Angeles has vowed to screen the film beginning tonight (Monday). Charlie Lustman, who describes the film as both "a cultural and artistic monument" and a "shameful stain" on the history of U.S. race relations, told Saturday's Los Angeles Times that he intended to launch a series on the most important silent films with Nation because he regarded it as "the biggest and most cinematic gem in history." (He intends to show the film with a disclaimer stating that he does not endorse the racist content of the film but wants to honor its place in cinema history, the Times observed.) However, L.A. NAACP President Geraldine Washington told the newspaper that she still opposes the screening. "This movie has no positive value whatsoever," she said. "And it runs the risk of creating unrest and hate crimes. It's just too risky to take a chance."
Heavens, yes. You know, I remember seeing The Birth of a Nation for a film class. At the end, it was all the TAs could do to keep us from donning our Klan robes (Whitey always has one handy), jumping on our mighty steeds, and galloping across I-35 to scare hell out of some minorities.
That Lustman even has to offer a disclaimer is asinine. Still, if theater owners covering their asses is the future of moviegoing, I wish they'd at least post something useful like This theater does not endorse the directorial style of Michael Bay, or Audience members may experience uncontrollable nausea at Ashley Judd's performance.
Ignorance runs on both sides of the political spectrum when it comes to film. Every few years the religious right has to single out another movie they haven't bothered to watch to get lathered up about (The Last Temptation of Christ, Priest). And now the NAACP wants us to believe a 90-year old movie will inflame latent racist passions and lead to attacks on African-Americans.
Washington ignores the fact that The Birth of a Nation does have positive value, provided you have an appreciation for film. From the innovations Griffith brought to the screen (cross-cutting, fade-outs, full screen close-ups, moving tracking shots, and many more) to the brilliance of the early battlefield scenes, its significance can't be denied.
I'm not insensitive to the feelings of those who see the film's horrendous caricatures (white actors in blackface) or, to cite one example, the fact that the leader of the black horde that overruns the Reconstruction South is named "Lynch" (subtlety wasn't Griffith's forte) and are honestly dismayed. I wonder, though, if Washington sees any parallels in her denouncement of Birth and in the way some public officials asked theaters not to show Malcolm X because they were afraid it would incite widespread gang violence. It didn't, though I almost had to resort to violence myself to get white guys to stop wearing those goddamn 'X' caps.
And who besides film nerds will want to sit through a 3+ hour polemic on the dangers of the Black Man? Maybe Washington is worried that skinheads will attend the screening and go on a rampage, although speaking from personal experience, the skins I've met don't have that much of an attention span. Really, the only people seeking this screening out are those with an honest desire to see the original classic of American cinema on the big screen. And the only thing The Birth of a Nation is likely to inflame in those people is their hemorrhoids.
UPDATE: I'll be damned. They canceled it again:
The owner of the Silent Movie Theater in Hollywood canceled a planned screening of D. W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation after the Los Angeles branch of the NAACP and a group called the National Alliance for Positive Action vowed to picket the theater. Although owner Charlie Lustman had planned to show the film with a disclaimer stating that he does not endorse the racist content of the film but wants to honor its place in cinema history, the two groups had charged that the film would continue to poison race relations. Lustman said that he had also received threatening phone calls and was concerned about the safety of patrons and 92-year-old Bob Mitchell, the onetime leader of the famed Mitchell Boys Choir, who was to provide organ music to accompany the film.
Un-fucking-believable.
I think it would be the height of performance art to attend a showing wearing full redneck regalia, wait until 15 minutes into the showing, and then stand up and shout "I'M TIRED OF THIS CRAP! PAW, YOU SAID THERE'D BE UPPITY NEGROES!"
Sure, I'd be dead, but I'd make the papers.
Right on, Pete. Can't add anything else - just loved what you had to say.
I saw BOAN in a class, too. The last shots, with Jesus smiling beatifically over the white victory, were so absurd and completely incorrect in today's political landscape that I started laughing. Big, hysterical guffaws.
And I couldn't stop.
There were a lot of ill stares in my direction that day.
Pete, I really enjoyed your pithy comments. This type of grandstanding on the part of Washington is the worst kind of revisionism. As much as Americans, especially black Americans, would like to eliminate the stain on the fabric of American history this film portrays, BOAN is relevant today if for no other reason than to show how the overall American psyche has changed over the past century.
BOAN should not only be lauded for its important contributions to American film, but for showing how far we have come as a nation. Certainly, we have a great deal of work left to do in the area of civil rights, but we have grown! The kind of myopic, shallow thinking Washington exhibits is the same type of prejudicial thinking illustrated by BOAN. Give the American people some credit!
Somehow I think the NAACP voiced objection out of obligation, rather than genuine concern over a causal connection between the film and a spike in hate crimes. I'm not sure the NAACP is worse today than the religious right, but both seem to spew vehemonent rage at things most middle-of-the-road folks are largely unaware of, or could care less about.
However, at least the NAACP was central to civil rights movement in this country. And for that alone I give them a wide birth on trivial issues, such as their flacid opposition to a 90 year old film. Still, don't they have something better they could be doing with their time?