Pioneers of African-American Cinema

So you think you know all about ‘black’ cinema? The 70’s Blaxploitation genre, the films of Spike Lee or the Wayans family… not to mention the handful of black Hollywood stars. Well, think again! This 5-disc set contains enough material to last a lifetime – introducing us to feature films and shorts from as early as 1915 to 1946 and thus these productions have no doubt immense historical value.

From 1915 until the late Forties black cinema had began to come to the forefront – producing films for ‘coloured people’ by ‘coloured people’ and by doing so avoiding the often embarrassing stereotypes and clichés black actors where subjected to when appearing in ‘white’ productions. In reality though a lot of these black films dealt with the same topics than the usually much grander productions aimed at a white audience – this set even contains a western from 1939 (!) called The Bronze Buckaroo by Richard Kahn in which pretty much all of the cowboys are black!
We get everything from melodramas and kitchen-sink dramas to slapstick, from daring adventure flicks to the religious and temperance propaganda films by James and Eloyse Gist. Even the supernatural is touched upon! All in all the set offers over 26 feature films by pioneering directors such as Oscar Micheaux and Spencer Williams (who also appeared as an actor). Of course, there are also the countless Special Features on each of the five discs!

As interesting as it all sounds, because the so-called ‘race films’ were considered inferior little effort was made to preserve them for time memorial and many are now completely lost. The ones still in existence – usually in circulation in extremely poor quality 16mm prints – haven been given the digital restoration treatment… a monumental task which took several years to complete! Co-curated by Professors Charles Musser of Yale University and Jacqueline Stewart of University of Chicago, the lot is furthermore produced by Bret Wood while DJ Spooky (aka Paul Miller) sat in the executive producer chair and also supplied some of the soundtrack.
For the obvious reasons it is simply impossible to discuss the mammoth release in detail so let’s ‘cherry pick’ some of what’s on offer here to give a fair impression of the materials variety.

DISC 1 kicks off with Two Knights of Vaudeville, a Music Hall slapstick affair from 1915 which lasts a mere 11 minutes. Mercy, the Mummy Mumbled from 1918 (directed by R.G. Phillips) is a hilarious farce revolving around an Egyptian relic which is used to win a girl’s hand. Unfortunately the short is badly marred due to nitrate damage – it’s not the only one on this disc!
One of the first features of African-American cinema is Within Our Gates from 1920 (written, produced and directed by Oscar Micheaux) involving an idealistic woman named Sylvia Landry (Evelyn Preer, the first black female ‘star’) and her efforts to raise money for a black community school. Via flashback scenes we learn how her foster parents were killed by a white lynch mob and other hardships she had to endure. This is a gripping story and we can’t help being sucked in.
Rather unsettling is The Symbol of the Unconquered: A Story of the Ku Klux Klan (1920), while the drama Body and Soul (1925 – directed by Oscar Micheaux) concerns a black ‘Tartuffe’ character who pretends to be a god-fearing Reverend (Paul Robeson) but in truth is nothing more than an escaped convict who brings grief and destruction to the household of a widow and her naïve daughter. Possibly the highlight of the disc!

DISC 2 once again has various treats in store, foremost the highly entertaining action adventure The Flying Ace (1926 - written, produced and directed by Richard E. Norman). This rural crime caper is great to look at and the stunts are well done, especially the climax which takes place in mid-air (though the stunts were all performed on ground). This is pure entertainment and the film makes no effort to touch upon racial issues.
The Scar of Shame (1929 – directed by Frank Perugini) is a powerful drama about a young woman called Louise (Lucia Lynn Moses) who escapes the clutches of her abusive father and seemingly finds happiness in the arms of her rescuer, an aspiring composer called Alvin (Harry Henderson). Unfortunately the couple’s happiness is marred not only by Alvin’s blind ambition but by his class-conscious mother who objects to Louise’s poor and uneducated background.

DISC 3 features a selection of the truly weird, starting with the 1928 feature film Eleven P.M. (directed by Richard Maurice) in which a journalist concocts a story though it is up to us whether it is based on truth or whether it was a dream. The story concerns an impoverished violinist called Sundaisy (Richard Maurice) who tries to protect an orphaned girl from a small-time crook but soon things spin out of control and there is no happy end in sight for Sundaisy who gets killed by the crook… only to return in the reincarnation of a dog who takes revenge by fatally wounding said crook with a bite. It’s a very ambitious concept and surreal ending aside this gripping melodrama is well executed and acted.
Downright bizarre is Hell-Bound Train from ca. 1930, a film written and directed by African-American evangelists James and Eloye Gist who used cinema as a tool for their travelling ministry. Here, the train in question is driven by the horned devil himself and each carriage stands for a certain ‘sin’ like gambling, dancing, drinking, mistreating animals etc.). As the train travels along the devil picks up his passengers accordingly. Utterly laughable and ridiculous by nowadays standards but a significabt rediscovery of African-American cinema nonetheless!

DISC 4 holds various gems including the 1932 The Girl from Chicago (directed by Oscar Micheaux) about the cultural rift between rural Batesburg and urban Harlem, and the 1932 melodrama Ten Minutes to Live (Micheaux again) which not only features badly post-dubbed dialogue but a steaming performance of Duke Ellington’s ‘Diga Diga Doo’ performed by a bevy of Harlem’s famous Cotton Club beauties.

DISC 5 finally offers another choice of shorts and features, among them the aforementioned Western The Bronze Buckaroo (with questionable results) and the excellent 1946 drama Dirty Gertie from Harlem, USA, in which Francine Everette stars as bad-to-the-bone nightclub entertainer Gertie La Rue - a spoilt diva who, together with her adoring manager and her long-suffering troupe, arrives at a tiny Caribbean resort to entertain the troops and is opposed by an intolerant and overtly religious reformer (Alfred Hawkins)… with fatal consequences!

One needs to make allowances for the not always perfect quality of picture and sound, and occasionally the acting (in sound films) comes across the wooden and derived. That aside, Pioneers of African-American Cinema is an invaluable treasure trove for anyone interested in film history!