Screening “The Other”:Screening “The Other”:The Movies, Race and The Movies, Race and

EthnicityEthnicity

Gary HandmanGary HandmanDirectorDirectorMedia Resources CenterMedia Resources CenterMoffitt LibraryMoffitt Libraryghandman@library.berkeley.edughandman@library.berkeley.edu

1889 Thomas Edison

invents a moving image medium

1619 A Dutch ship brings 20 African

indentured servants to the English colony of Jamestown,

Virginia.

1850s25,000 Chinese

immigrate to the

US

1870-190012 million immigrants

arrive from Europe

Native Americans

Waaay BC

1865End of Civil

War

““What Is Cinema?”What Is Cinema?”

--Jacques Bazin--Jacques Bazin

• A wildly popular, 120-year old diversion A wildly popular, 120-year old diversion and entertainment (and and entertainment (and

information)information)

•An increasingly complex artistic endeavor An increasingly complex artistic endeavor involving various “authors” and “actualizers” involving various “authors” and “actualizers” (screenwriters, directors, actors, technicians)(screenwriters, directors, actors, technicians)

•A highly exportable commodity: a global good A highly exportable commodity: a global good with impact on global culture. with impact on global culture.

•A unique form of “grammar” (a new way of A unique form of “grammar” (a new way of describing/viewing/representing the world describing/viewing/representing the world and/or of telling stories) and/or of telling stories)

•A cultural product that comprises various A cultural product that comprises various genres and styles: fiction to non-fiction and genres and styles: fiction to non-fiction and forms in-betweenforms in-between

…It’s ONLYA

Movie!

A. HitchcockA. Hitchcock

…but a movie is NEVER only a movie!

They reflect the culture that They reflect the culture that makes themmakes them

Movies are a Movies are a cultural cultural

constructconstruct

Culture reflects and is shaped Culture reflects and is shaped by the movies it makesby the movies it makes

When reading movies ashistory or social indicator

Use cautionUse caution!!

•Movies are vastly complexartistic, economic, and cultural enterprises -- Defining “authorship” is always problematic

•Studio politics and economic stakes need to be assessed

•Audience and critical reception needs to be considered

The Movies BeginThe Movies Begin

•Actualities = movies of the real world(La Vie sur la Vif: Life being Lived)

•Short sketches and routines (often replicating earlier theatrical forms.

•Trick films (the earliest special effects)

•Newsreels and Travel Films: (increasingly pitched to audience taste for the sensational, exotic & culturally alien)

•The “Cinema of Attractions”: The “Cinema of Attractions”: focus on focus on spectacle rather than storyspectacle rather than story

•Popular for the same reason world’s fairs Popular for the same reason world’s fairs and other exhibitions were popular.and other exhibitions were popular.

Early Motion Pictures Actuality and Spectacle

Congorilla (1930)

What Happened on Twenty-Third Street (1901)

Pan-AmericanExhibition,Buffalo, New York 1901

Birth of the Movies 1880s – early 1900s: Birth of the Movies 1880s – early 1900s:

Corresponds with Enormous Societal Changes:Corresponds with Enormous Societal Changes:

•Political expansionism and colonialismPolitical expansionism and colonialism

•Industrial and technological revolutions Industrial and technological revolutions

•Demographic shifts – movement from rural to urbanDemographic shifts – movement from rural to urban

•Enormous increase in immigrationEnormous increase in immigration

*1870-1900: 12 million immigrants*1870-1900: 12 million immigrants

•Growth of urban Middle ClassGrowth of urban Middle Class

•Increase in leisure timeIncrease in leisure time

The movies reflect theseThe movies reflect thesecultural and societal changes…cultural and societal changes…

New immigrants as moviesubjects & characters…

Immigrants as audiences: The movies as a cultural port of entry

(The “Poor Man’s Theatre”)

EdisonNew York City Ghetto Fish Market

(1903)

Cohen’s Advertising SchemeEdwin S. Porter (1904)

……And targetsAnd targets

…One of earliest filmic examples ofanti-semitic stereotyping.

Porter spools off a whole series of “Cohen” films between 1904 and 1905

•The movies adopt and intensify ongoing fantasies, fears, stereotypes, and cultural tropes re race & ethnicity.

•The evolution cinematic tropes: Metaphor / Metonymn re Race

•The movies make these fantasies and tropes a part of the mass culture/cultural consciousness in unprecedented ways.

The Movies - A Radical New Art Form The Movies - A Radical New Art Form Often Built on ExistingOften Built on Existing

Social and Cultural Notions and Social and Cultural Notions and Older Artistic Traditions Older Artistic Traditions

Edwin S. Porter

•Based on Harriett Beacher Stowe’s wildly popular serialized novel (1852) – written in response to 1850 Fugitive Slave Act (300K copies sold in first year)

•Porter’s 1903 version: One of earliest “full-length” films

•Tom = American film’s first named black character

•Filmed only 38 years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation

•Borrows many of its cinematic conventions from earlier theatrical productions (“Tom Shows” and Vaudeville)

Uncle Tom’s CabinEdwin S. Porter (1903)

•Dozens of subsequent film versions

•Establishes many of stereotypes of African Americans that would persist over the next century:

•The “happy darky” (what Donald Bogle calls “The Coon”)

•The “tragic mulatto” as sex object The Mammy

•The pickanniny

•The Tom – mild, loyal, and subservient “Good Negro”

See also: Donald Bogle’s Toms, Coons, Mulattoes,

Mammies & Bucks (Moffitt & Main Libraries PN 1995.9 N4 B6 2001)

•Michael Rogin suggests film is drained of its anti-abolitionist sentiments—drama is between established “happy” life of Old South/plantation and outsiders who threaten that way of life.

Uncle Tom’s CabinEdwin S. Porter (1903)

Edwin S. Porter

Uncle Tom’s CabinEdwin S. Porter (1903)

Clip 1: TopsyClip 2: Tom and Little EvaClip 3: Auction of Augustine St. Clare’s Slaves

(Biograph, 1905)

Birth of a Nation D.W. Griffith (1915)

•Based on a play by the Rev. Thomas Dixon, Jr.

•The most popular and profitable early film --first box office blockbuster: tops for 5 years

•Protested vigorously by the NAACP: first national political organizing by African Americans

•Riots in major cities

•Censored in some states (notably Ohio) – leads to Supreme Court ruling in 1916 holding that films can be legally censored (because of their vivid psychological effect on women, children and “lower classes”)

•Coincides with the revitalization of the KKK (Los Angeles premiere features actors

on horseback and in hoods outside of the theater)

DavidDavidWarkWarkGriffithGriffith

Birth of a Nation D.W. Griffith (1915)

"It is like writing history with lightning, and my only regret is that it is all so terribly true."

--President Woodrow Wilson upon seeing the film

"The real purpose of my film was to revolutionize Northern audiences that would transform every man into a Southern partisan for life."

--Thomas Dixon, Jr.

The CheatThe CheatCecil B. DeMille (1915)

Sessue HayakawaSessue Hayakawa

……Or: What’s a Nice Jewish Or: What’s a Nice Jewish Boy Like You Doing in a Face Boy Like You Doing in a Face

Like That!Like That!

Into the 30s…Into the 30s…

•Studios are the in business of making profitable films, not questioning prevailing mainstream social and political views and assumptions.•Some images fade, while others persist and solidify•Some studios (e.g. Warners) toy with “social problems) – but race issues rarely…

Animated Shorts: 1919-1940: Are We Amused Yet?Animated Shorts: 1919-1940: Are We Amused Yet?

•Chinese Laundry Blues (1930?)•Scrub Me Mama (1943)

The Mask of Fu ManchuThe Mask of Fu Manchu(1932)

Stepin Fetchit [Lincoln Theodore Monroe Andrew Perry](1902 - 1985)

Gone with the WindGone with the Wind (1939)

•Based on 1936 Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Margaret Mitchell•Highest grossing film in history of Hollywood until that time•First drafts include Klan as a virtuous organization

“In our picture I think we have to be awfully careful that the Negroes come out decidedly on the right side of the ledger, which I do not think should be difficult)”

-- Producer David O. Selznick(as quoted in Memo from David O. Selznick. Rudy Behlmer,

ed. New York: Viking Press, 1972. p. 147)

•Scene 1: Mammy(Hattie McDaniel)

•Scene 2: Prissy(Butterfly McQueen)

Separate Cinemas: Movies Beyond the Cultural MainstreamSeparate Cinemas: Movies Beyond the Cultural Mainstream

Oscar MicheauxOscar MicheauxIndependent Black Independent Black Cinema (“Race Movies”)Cinema (“Race Movies”)(1920s-50s)(1920s-50s)

Yiddish Yiddish FilmsFilms(1930s-40s)(1930s-40s)

Edgar G. UlmerEdgar G. Ulmer

World War II: The Expedients of DemocracyOr Redefining & Refiguring “The Other”

Know Your Enemy: JapanFrank Capra [for the US Army)

(1945)

The Negro SoldierFrank Capra [for the US Army)

(1944)

Post-War America: The Image Begins to Shift:“Social Problem Films”

PinkyDir. Elia Kazan, 1949

Dir. Elia Kazan, 1949

Dir. Stanley Kramer, 1958

Dir. Mark Robson, 1949

Dir. Alfred L. Werker, 1949

Post-War America: The Image Begins to Shift:“Social Problem Films”

Dir. Stanley Kramer, 1958

ButBut……Old stereotypes die hard… Old stereotypes die hard…

Breakfast at Tiffany’sBreakfast at Tiffany’sDir. Blake Edwards, 1961Dir. Blake Edwards, 1961

Cold War Paranoia: Cold War Paranoia: Aliens from Aliens from

Outer Space & ElsewhereOuter Space & Elsewhere

“…“…He’s a He’s a MeanMean Mutha…”: 1970s Blaxploitation Mutha…”: 1970s Blaxploitation

The 70s and 80s:The 70s and 80s:Raging Against the Machine:Raging Against the Machine:The Politics of Generation, The Politics of Generation,

Identity, and RaceIdentity, and Race

Broken Blossoms (or, The Yellow Man and the Girl)D.W. Griffith (1919)

Richard BarthelmessLillian Gish

"Film is more than the twentieth-century art. It's another part of the Twentieth-Century mind. It's the world seen from inside. We've come to a certain point in the history of film. If a thing can be filmed, the film is implied in the thing itself. This is where we are. The Twentieth century is on film....You have to ask yourself if there's anything about us more important than the fact that we're constantly on film constantly watching ourselves." --Don Delillo (The Names)