Coming to PBS’s American Experience today, Monday, February 15: VOICE OF FREEDOM
Director: Rob Rapley
World Premiere: PBS broadcast (February 2021)
About: The story of singer Marian Anderson and the barriers placed upon her because of racism.
While not a household name today, for decades contralto Marian Anderson was heralded throughout Europe and the US as the “Voice of the Century.” While never an outspoken civil rights activist, her 1939 open air performance in front of the Lincoln Memorial – and the long controversy that led to it – marked a pivotal moment of dawning awareness by non-Black audiences of the pervasiveness and injustice of Jim Crow laws. Filmmaker Rob Rapley bookends his profile with this legendary event, telling the Black singer’s story in between, from early promise and success against the backdrop of segregation and racism to a life-changing and career-defining span of years honing her craft throughout Europe between 1927-1935 before returning to the realities of life as a Black woman in America. Little did Anderson know when she agreed to perform a benefit concert for Howard University in 1939 that she would be at the center of a national awakening about racism. Refused the use of a venue by its owners, the Daughters of the American Revolution, the concert became a cause célèbre, spurred on by the canny efforts of Walter White at the NAACP, who used his friendship with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt to attract national attention. While the DAR embarrassingly stuck to its restrictive policies, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt allowed the concert to go on in front of the Lincoln Memorial, ultimately drawing 75000 attendees and millions via radio, and underscoring Lincoln’s pivotal connection to civil rights and freedom, something that had been shockingly downplayed if not buried in the decades since the Civil War. As with virtually all American Experience programs, Rapley’s follows its typical, workmanlike format, resulting in a somewhat muted sense of Anderson’s personality, but there’s still clear power in her story.
About: Presented online – and a few weeks later than its usual concurrence with Sundance – this ever-scrappy event presents 25 features, with docs making up just over half that number, including the highlights below.
About: A personal meditation on the relationship between the gay filmmaker and his grandmother.
The film screened as part of DOC NYC, for which our program notes read: From a young age, filmmaker Stéphane Riethauser was groomed to become the golden heir to his family’s business—an alpha male who would fulfill their patriarchal expectations. His best friend and confidante was his grandmother Caroline, a self-made independent woman ahead of her time. After playing the part for several years, Stéphane matures into his true self and embraces LGBTQ activism. But will glamorous, old-fashioned Caroline understand? Riethauser’s filmis an honest and edgy confrontation with things long left unsaid in a family’s past.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences announced the Best Documentary Feature and Best Documentary Short Subject shortlists today. In addition, two documentary features are included on the International Feature Film shortlist. Congratulations to all the filmmakers – especially the Sundance, DOC NYC, and Nantucket Film Festival alumni represented.
The official lists are below, with links to my previous coverage, where applicable. The final nominees will be announced on March 15.
Documentary Feature:
76 DAYS
ALL IN: THE FIGHT FOR DEMOCRACY
BOYS STATE
COLLECTIVE
CRIP CAMP
DICK JOHNSON IS DEAD
GUNDA
MLK/FBI
THE MOLE AGENTMY OCTOPUS TEACHERNOTTURNOTHE PAINTER AND THE THIEF
TIME
THE TRUFFLE HUNTERS
WELCOME TO CHECHNYA
Documentary Short Subject: Abortion Helpline, This Is Lisa Call Center Blues Colette A Concerto Is a Conversation Do Not Split Hunger Ward Hysterical Girl A Love Song for Latasha The Speed Cubers What Would Sophia Loren Do?
International Feature Film: Denmark, ANOTHER ROUND Hong Kong, BETTER DAYS Czech Republic, CHARLATAN
Romania, COLLECTIVE
Romania, COLLECTIVE Russia, DEAR COMRADES Mexico, I’M NO LONGER HERE Norway, HOPE Guatemala, LA LLORONA
Chile, THE MOLE AGENT
Chile, THE MOLE AGENT Ivory Coast, NIGHT OF THE KINGS Bosnia and Herzegovina, QUO VADIS, AIDA? Iran, SUN CHILDREN France, TWO OF US Taiwan, A SUN Tunisia, THE MAN WHO SOLD HIS SKIN
About: Female officers from the Minneapolis Police Department provide an inside look at a troubled institution.
The film screened as part of DOC NYC, for which our program notes read: When Janeé Harteau becomes Minneapolis’s first female police chief, she sets out to change a troubled department by addressing racially biased policing, increasing transparency, recruiting more women into the force, and championing leadership roles for female officers. But all of her reforms are threatened by an officer’s fatal shooting of an unarmed woman. Filming both before and after George Floyd’s murder, Deirdre Fishel follows four female officers as they navigate the changing department, offering a compelling inside look at the complex intersection of gender, race, and the limits of reform within an ethically questionable institution.
