Re-Birth of a Nation Allows Director,

Writer-Actor Nate Parker to Control Film

By Sandra Olmsted

Say Birth of a Nation and anyone who has had a film studies class will think D.W. Griffith ’s racist film that was also Hollywood’s first block buster and used innovative filmmaking techniques. Well, writer, director, and star Nate Parker is turning that thinking on its head by appropriating the title of Griffith’s film.

In telling the story of Nat Turner, who lead a slave uprising in rural Southampton County, Virginia in 1831, Parker tells the reason why the slaves had just cause to revolt against the tyranny of slavery and why his rebellion inspired the fear by Southern whites of African American violence. Knowing the guilt they might have felt or should have felt for the horrors that too many slave owners perpetrated on slaves, from everything from rape to murder, the Southerners’ fears that Griffith taps into is real, but so is the righteous indignation of the slaves. The difference is the slaves had justice and religion on their side.

Parker’s Birth of a Nation takes the audience inside the life and thoughts of the slaves through Nat Turner’s experience as the property of slave owners who were kind and fair by comparison to the others. Nat, a preacher meets those worse off, when his owner and childhood friend, Sam Turner (Armie Hammer), hires Nat out to preach obedience to those much more abused slaves on other plantations. As Parker’s Nat Turner looks out at the torture bodies and souls of the slaves, tears well in his eyes, but he must tell them to obey.

When Nat’s wife Cherry (Aja Naomi King) is raped and beaten by the local vigilantes, Nat’s soul, his whole being, begins to burn with the injustice. Although Parker’s performance seems a little subdued even for a character tightly controlling his feelings, Nat Turner’s heart chafing at the injustice and mistreatment of his fellow slaves is evident on Parker’s face.

Then Nat baptizes a white man who comes to him personally, seeking forgiveness and salvation, and Sam sees this transgression against the strict codes of the South as a serious threat to his business plans to save the plantation and “all of us” from financial ruin. The rift between the two men grows greater and greater. Soon, Nat organizes the slaves and they rise up against the tyranny they have suffered, and although Nat’s little army with only hatchets and axes murdered between 55 and 65 slave owners, hundreds of slaves died. Entire slave populations on some plantations were lynched, women and children included.

While I am generally not a fan of directors also starring in their films because it usually detracts from the whole all quality of the production since the star and director are distracted by conflicting duties, it is not a glaring mistake in Parker’s Birth of a Nation. While the dream sequences and/or flash backs are handled well and contain some dancing which the slaves brought with them from Africa, there was one dance number that had a Bollywood quality to it which took me out of the film for a moment. The nitpicking that a critic is required to do aside, the film has many good qualities.

The emotions evoked by the actors and actresses are indeed powerful enough to cross the race line and appeal to any human being. The real lives and emotions of the slaves are not glossed over and their ability to dream, to fall in love, and to hope for a better tomorrow is inspiring. The telling of this history strictly from the African American point of view is an important history lesson which I encourage everyone to see because it should, I hope, generate an understanding of the baggage of the past that African American’s fear.

The focus on Nat’s preaching also explains the African American community’s relationship with religion in ways that many in other communities may not understand unless they see this film and may come to admire.

The film also showcases the talents of African American and international actors and actresses of color who rarely get such excellent roles. I would expect some Oscar nominations for this film. Nate Parker’s Birth of a Nation, is a Fox Searchlight Pictures release, and is rated R for disturbing violent content, and some brief nudity. It runs a fast 120 minutes because of the film’s compelling nature.

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