Screening “The Other”: The Movies, Race and Ethnicity Gary Handman Director Media Resources Center Moffitt Library

…Or: What’s a Nice Jewish Boy Like You Doing in a Face Like That!

Into the 30s…Rise of the Big Studios Studios are the in business of making profitable films, not questioning prevailing mainstream social and political views and assumptions. Some images fade, while others persist and solidify Some studios (e.g. Warners) toy with “social problems) – but race issues rarely…

The Rise of Identifiable Ethnic/Racial Character Actors Anna May Wong Hattie McDaniel Willie Best Bill Robinson

Stepin Fetchit [Lincoln Theodore Monroe Andrew Perry] ( )

The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932) Blackface and actors in black roles in the movies diminish somewhat….but… Paul Muni – The Good Earth

Gone with the Wind Gone with the Wind (1939) Based on 1936 Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Margaret Mitchell Highest grossing film in history of Hollywood until that time First drafts include Klan as a virtuous organization “In our picture I think we have to be awfully careful that the Negroes come out decidedly on the right side of the ledger, which I do not think should be difficult)” -- Producer David O. Selznick (as quoted in Memo from David O. Selznick. Rudy Behlmer, ed. New York: Viking Press, p. 147) Scene 1: Mammy (Hattie McDaniel) Scene 2: Prissy (Butterfly McQueen)

Separate Cinemas: Movies Beyond the Cultural Mainstream Oscar Micheaux Independent Black Cinema (“Race Movies”) (1920s-50s) Yiddish Films (1930s-40s) Edgar G. Ulmer

World War II: The Expedients of Democracy Or Redefining & Refiguring “The Other” Know Your Enemy: Japan Frank Capra [for the US Army) (1945) The Negro Soldier Frank Capra [for the US Army) (1944)

Post-War America: The Image Begins to Shift: “Social Problem Films” Pinky Dir. Elia Kazan, 1949 Dir. Stanley Kramer, 1958 Dir. Mark Robson, 1949 Dir. Alfred L. Werker, 1949

Post-War America: The Image Begins to Shift: “Social Problem Films” Dir. Stanley Kramer, 1958

But … Old stereotypes die hard… Breakfast at Tiffany’s Dir. Blake Edwards, 1961

Cold War Paranoia: Aliens from Outer Space & Elsewhere

“…He’s a Mean Mutha…”: 1970s Blaxploitation

The 70s and 80s: Raging Against the Machine: The Politics of Generation, Identity, and Race Easy Riders & Raging Bulls storm Hollywood Vietnam as metaphor & catalyst The intensification of social activism The intensification of identity politics The entry of independent filmmakers of color: “We Speak to You About US”

True Lies (dir. James Cameron, 1994)

Eastsidaz (dir. Michael Martin, 2000)

Animated Shorts: : Are We Amused Yet? Chinese Laundry Blues (1930?) Scrub Me Mama (1943)

Broken Blossoms (or, The Yellow Man and the Girl) D.W. Griffith (1919) Richard Barthelmess Lillian Gish

"Film is more than the twentieth-century art. It's another part of the Twentieth-Century mind. It's the world seen from inside. We've come to a certain point in the history of film. If a thing can be filmed, the film is implied in the thing itself. This is where we are. The Twentieth century is on film....You have to ask yourself if there's anything about us more important than the fact that we're constantly on film constantly watching ourselves." --Don Delillo (The Names)