Country: USA
Released: January 12, 1920
Genre: Drama
Directed by: Oscar Micheaux
Produced by: Oscar Micheaux
Written by: Oscar Micheaux
Within Our Gates follows Sylvia Landry (Evelyn Preer), a young black woman from the south who travels north to visit her cousin Alma (Flo Clements) and fiancee Conrad (James D. Ruffin). However Alma has desires for Conrad and accuses Sylvia of infidelity, convincing Conrad to leave her. But then there's a black school Sylvia works at that's gonna close down unless she raises $5,000. But how will she get the money in time!? By getting run over by a wealthy philanthropist of course! Who agrees to donate $50,000 dollars to the school. Wait, because then there's also this gambler who... uh cheated I guess. But that's not important, what's important is the school! Oh that got saved, okay, um, here's a flashback about Sylvia's past that doesn't have much to do with anything but shows her troubled childhood. Wait, did the gambler just kill a guy? What the fuck is happening!?
So if it isn't apparent already I don't really know what happens in this movie. Even the wikipedia page sounds confused. To be fair that isn't entirely the director's fault as the film hasn't aged intact and major segments are missing, but that doesn't make the parts that did survive any less slow; which is to say that if I could not have been more mind numbingly bored if had been two hours of paint drying. Seriously, if this film ever makes a come back ambien sales will plummet.
I am absolutely amazed with some of the praise this film gets from contemporary film critics. Granted it ain't easy to follow The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (a film so ball-numbingly good I'm tempted to just write about that some more instead) but nothing about Within Our Gates is particularly praise-worthy. The cinematography is flat and uninteresting, the story is schizophrenic, the themes are as subtle as D.W Griffith (or a kick to the balls), and almost every single character looks the same. And before you go crying racism I'll have you know that the white characters were just as interchangeable as the black ones thank you very much.
The one notable thing about the film is it's anti-racist themes. And I mean real, 100% anti-rasicm, not 'let's make our virtuous asian protagonist be played by a squinting white guy' anti-racism. Griffith, take notes: every black character is played by a black actor and the ultimate message of 'black people are human beings (paraphrasing) while cheesy and ham-fisted by today's standards is probably what 1920s America needed. Basically my point is that 1920s America needed a kick to the balls.
The only time I was ever even remotely invested was when they shifted to the self-hating minister who preached black subservience under the guise of moral purity in exchange for money from white backers. At least I think that's what was happening, this segment is so brief and unessential to the plot its not even referenced on the wikipedia page. In any case, watching him struggle with his guilt at selling out his dignity is fascinating and would have made for an interesting film all on its own. Instead its just a bizarre digression from the main plot.
I don't know how much of the original Within Our Gates is missing but I don't want to write off Micheaux so soon. I hope he has at least one more film on this list, because this was definitely not the best movie to judge him by.
At least tomorrow I've got another Griffith film to look forward to, if nothing else he's entertaining I'll give him that
Released: January 12, 1920
Genre: Drama
Directed by: Oscar Micheaux
Produced by: Oscar Micheaux
Written by: Oscar Micheaux
Within Our Gates follows Sylvia Landry (Evelyn Preer), a young black woman from the south who travels north to visit her cousin Alma (Flo Clements) and fiancee Conrad (James D. Ruffin). However Alma has desires for Conrad and accuses Sylvia of infidelity, convincing Conrad to leave her. But then there's a black school Sylvia works at that's gonna close down unless she raises $5,000. But how will she get the money in time!? By getting run over by a wealthy philanthropist of course! Who agrees to donate $50,000 dollars to the school. Wait, because then there's also this gambler who... uh cheated I guess. But that's not important, what's important is the school! Oh that got saved, okay, um, here's a flashback about Sylvia's past that doesn't have much to do with anything but shows her troubled childhood. Wait, did the gambler just kill a guy? What the fuck is happening!?
So if it isn't apparent already I don't really know what happens in this movie. Even the wikipedia page sounds confused. To be fair that isn't entirely the director's fault as the film hasn't aged intact and major segments are missing, but that doesn't make the parts that did survive any less slow; which is to say that if I could not have been more mind numbingly bored if had been two hours of paint drying. Seriously, if this film ever makes a come back ambien sales will plummet.
I am absolutely amazed with some of the praise this film gets from contemporary film critics. Granted it ain't easy to follow The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (a film so ball-numbingly good I'm tempted to just write about that some more instead) but nothing about Within Our Gates is particularly praise-worthy. The cinematography is flat and uninteresting, the story is schizophrenic, the themes are as subtle as D.W Griffith (or a kick to the balls), and almost every single character looks the same. And before you go crying racism I'll have you know that the white characters were just as interchangeable as the black ones thank you very much.
The one notable thing about the film is it's anti-racist themes. And I mean real, 100% anti-rasicm, not 'let's make our virtuous asian protagonist be played by a squinting white guy' anti-racism. Griffith, take notes: every black character is played by a black actor and the ultimate message of 'black people are human beings (paraphrasing) while cheesy and ham-fisted by today's standards is probably what 1920s America needed. Basically my point is that 1920s America needed a kick to the balls.
The only time I was ever even remotely invested was when they shifted to the self-hating minister who preached black subservience under the guise of moral purity in exchange for money from white backers. At least I think that's what was happening, this segment is so brief and unessential to the plot its not even referenced on the wikipedia page. In any case, watching him struggle with his guilt at selling out his dignity is fascinating and would have made for an interesting film all on its own. Instead its just a bizarre digression from the main plot.
I don't know how much of the original Within Our Gates is missing but I don't want to write off Micheaux so soon. I hope he has at least one more film on this list, because this was definitely not the best movie to judge him by.
At least tomorrow I've got another Griffith film to look forward to, if nothing else he's entertaining I'll give him that
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