Wikipedia says:
The film is... credited [sic] as one of the events that inspired the formation of the "second era" Ku Klux Klan at Stone Mountain, Georgia, in the same year. The Birth of a Nation was used as a recruiting tool for the KKK. Under Democratic President Woodrow Wilson, it was the first motion picture to be screened in the White House. Despite the film's controversial content, Griffith's innovative film techniques make it one of the most important and influential films in film history.Here, you can watch the whole thing:
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27 comments:
Hey, look, kids! See the hoods? Democrats!
You forgot the "Democratic Party" tag. After all, the membership of the KKK was and is entirely made up of Democrats.
Maybe we can get Margaret Sanger to pose for a photo opp with them in their hoods! Margaret, you stand there orating in the middle. Great! Ok, everybody say, "freeeeeeee!"
I always thought a good porno name would be Lillian Gash.
Look, Robert Byrd! Third horseman from the left!
Let's not forget this was one of Woodrow Wilson's favorite films.
(See, for one source, this.
I didn't know the actual title started with "The." Curious what gets lost over time. Indeed, I wonder when people started dropping the "The."
Wilson was a perfectionist lawyer from Georgia that got himself appointed President of Princeton. And he was a complete Racist. How he got to be so popular was an early mistake from Democrats glamorizing Educators as if they know secrets with the answers to life.
madisonfella said...
You forgot the "Democratic Party" tag. After all, the membership of the KKK was and is entirely made up of Democrats.
You think that's funny. Guess what one of the reasons the National Rifle Association was formed.
KKK was not just a Southern blight. Here in Colorado the KKK was very strong in the 1920's. As a recent picture showing a parade for KKK being led by Mayor of Denver Ben Stapleton. The old airport Stapleton was named after him. The German immigrants that settle in Colorado were attacked by the KKK.
You think that's funny. Guess what one of the reasons the National Rifle Association was formed
Wasn't trying to be funny. As a party, the Democrats are more racist than the Nazis.
And one of the reasons the NRA was founded was because Yankees couldn't shoot straight. What was the reason you wanted to share?
The opening credits are interesting themselves, and very relevant today.
Notice the stern warning about the "Griffith" branding and the implied ferocity with which they would find and prosecute copyright violators. Very modern concern? No, its just that piracy is nothing new at all, this was a huge problem far back into the 19th century and earlier (Cervantes bitched about copycats).
And then there is the plea to be permitted free speech in spite of the controversial topic. This is still a very modern worry. This was indeed a very controversial film in its time, as it attacked much of the conventional wisdom of many decades, such as the righteousness of the Union cause. Griffith was going far out on a limb.
"It's like writing history with lightening".
This is what Wilson is said to have stated to Griffith after his viewing of the film.
"Birth of a Nation" was a revolutionary film. Up to that time there was nothing that could match it in scale and scope. Epic and shocking as it was, the film changed everything about motion picture production.
It was the birth of an industry. The big studios, the stars, controversial photo plays, the rise of the director and moguls. There was nothing more exciting than the product Hollywood dream factories turned out in the 1920's.
D.W. Griffith was responsible for all of that.
He lead the way.
Immediately after he did Birth, realising the full potential of the motion picture, Griffith worked on another epic.
It is a true masterpiece and greater than "Birth of a Nation".
"INTOLERANCE".
True about the Yankees not shooting straight, or not quite as straight as the Southerners. Its still true, or, rather, even more so today, depending on how one defines Yankees and Southerners in these times.
Boston Mayor, James Michael Curley found his political fortunes going badly in the 1920’s. He needed an issue to fire up the Irish Catholic base, and found one in the revival the Ku Klux Klan. Fiery crosses began conveniently to brighten the hillsides overlooking his political meetings and Klan leaflets turned up in the mailboxes.
Wilson spent part of his childhood in Columbia, SC. His father was a Presbyterian minister there.
BTW, I understand that Indiana had the highest KKK membership in the 20s.
Fandor said...
Immediately after he did Birth, realising the full potential of the motion picture, Griffith worked on another epic.
It is a true masterpiece and greater than "Birth of a Nation".
"INTOLERANCE".
2/8/15, 4:47 PM
Hell no. Have you ever seen "Intolerance"? An endless boring archaic hectoring turd. Ever since watching it I've referred to it as "Intolerable". And Birth of a Nation is little better. When people make fun of the ridiculous pantomime and overacting of silent films, it's those movies they're making fun of. And not all silent movies are so histrionic. Victor Sjostrom's The Wind with Lillian Gish for example is far more modern, as well as all of Chaplin and Keaton's work and most of Harold Lloyd's, save for the earliest ones.
P.s.
You spelled "lightning" wrong.
Sherman's Westerners shot pretty damn straight.
Just ask Leonidas Polk.
The acting is of a style unfamiliar to us, but I suspect the audiences of the time were used to it.
Its a bit like kabuki and other traditional forms. To appreciate it you have to accept the conventions.
Very similar to the need to adjust to different literary styles. Some people can't stand Dickens because they can't adjust to the language.
It takes an open mind and some effort to appreciate and understand the past.
As for slamming with a "message", that's never gone out of style. These days people like James Cameron are just as happy to berate their audience.
I've found a lot of romantic comedies that will not be remembered.
Is this the one with Jar Jar Binks?
I am Laslo.
I tried to watch but bleh. It was awful although the black folk marching off to war seemed happily excited. Maybe not for the reasons the director envisions.
Movies exist in two dimensions, and it is thus their nature to present stereotypes. Nowadays they choose different people to stereotype, but the stereotypes remain. Christians have replaced black people as good natured simpletons. Corporate executives, especially those in the oil industry, have replaced carpetbaggers and scalawags as manipulative villains preying upon the stupidity of the simpletons........Hollywood spends a few generations propagating harmful stereotypes, and then they develop fresh new stereotypes to criticize those people who believe in last years stereotypes.......Where is the stereotype of the self righteous liberal with his head up his ass. Wilson fits that stereotype. They should make a movie about what a total wad he was. Stereotype the right villains for a change.
A true cinematic masterpiece. Revolutionary. After BOAN, the whole nature of cinema changed. Griffith had hits and misses, but he was a genius at his art.
For those baffled by the acting style? It's the stage acting of the 19th century, adapted to the very peculiar medium of silent film. Already elaborate and exaggerated acting had to be kicked up, because the actors can only communicate with the audience through body language. Therefore the focus has to draw attention to things like facial expressions and the entire body itself. These were cues for an audience already conditioned by the drama body language of stage acting of that time period. It seems very strange to us now, but it wouldn't have fazed the audience of a century ago.
Don't forget, D. W. Griffith was a Progressive.
Chef Mojo said...
For those baffled by the acting style?
Who's "baffled by the acting style"? Yeah it was a transitional period and the actors were coming off the stage to perform in the new medium of cinema, but a ham is a ham. Like I said, not every silent movie has such absurd histrionic gesturing. Even today actors can overact, huff and puff and ham it up and suck, like Jack Nicholson in "The Departed". It's up to the director to regulate the actor, even then it was the directors decision and vision to restrain, guide and refine the performances of the actors. Griffith was a technical innovator, but he let his actors chew the scenery to an absurd degree, just as Scorcese does today.
The National Rifle association supposedly opposed gun laws that restricted African-American gun ownership and in some instances offered support to Black Americans seeking to defend themselves with firearms. In 1958, retired Marine Robert Williams opened a chapter of the NAACP in Monroe, North Carolina. Monroe was also Klan country, and the KKK mounted several vicious assaults agains African-Americans in Monroe. In 1960, Williams applied for and was granted a charter to establish an NRA chapter in Monroe; the association also provided firearms training materials. Mr. Williams and other black NRA members in Monroe subsequently successfully defended themselves with firearms against an attack coordinated between the KKK and the local police.
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