film

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• SOURCE: Texas Monthly
  1/22/2022
  

  New Documentary on 1996 De La Hoya vs. Chavez Fight Digs Into Complexity of Mexican Ethnicity Across the Border

  Director Eva Longoria Bastón's documentary on the 1996 match between Mexican champion Julio César Chávez and LA-born Oscar De La Hoya examines how the fight revealed tensions between Mexican and Mexican-American communities expressed in citizenship, language and sports allegiance.

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• SOURCE: Times of Israel
  1/18/2021
  

  Outcry over Sparse Representation of Jews in Movie History at New Academy Museum in Hollywood

  The contributions of Jewish pioneers of film seem oddly invisible in the new Academy Museum of Motion Pictures; some prominent donors hope this changes.

• 
• SOURCE: Made By History at the Washington Post
  1/13/2022
  

  Sidney Poitier Set the Template for Barack Obama

  by Aram Goudsouzian

  Sidney Poitier's portrayals of characters whose self-contained charm, virtue and dignity obliterated previous racist stereotypes in film but also excluded the frustrations and anger of contemporary African Americans were a model for Barack Obama's campaign promise to heal America's racial wounds.

• 
• SOURCE: The Atlantic
  1/9/2022
  

  Sidney Poitier Gave More than He was Given

  by Samantha N. Sheppard

  Sidney Poitier's gift and burden as an actor was to constantly deliver more than his scripts contained, pushing the limits of Black representation in Hollywood films. 

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  9/7/2022
  

  Sidney Poitier, First Black Man to Win Best Actor Oscar, Dies at 94

  The actor's performances reflected the social tensions at the rise of the Civil Rights movement, advancing beyond the caricatured and one-dimensional characters prior Black actors were given to play, and often embodying the tensions between moderate and militant factions of the Black freedom movement.

• 
• SOURCE: NPR
  1/4/2022
  

  Is Now a Good Time to Mention that "Soylent Green" Was Set in 2022?

  "The movie's dystopian future bears some distant similarities to reality, with climate change already exacerbating hunger and poverty and one giant corporation that could one day control pretty much everything."

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• SOURCE: National Museum of American History
  12/15/2021
  

  History Film Forum: It's a Wonderful Life

  The NMAH History Film Forum discusses the 1946 classic "It's a Wonderful Life" and the film's enduring and changing meaning. 

• 
• SOURCE: Smithsonian
  12/16/2021
  

  Learning Lessons from "It's a Wonderful Life"

  by Christopher Wilson

  "With a panel of experts including the Smithsonian’s Lintelman, historian Jason Higgins, film critic Nell Minow, Leo Landis, curator of the State Historical Society of Iowa (the home state of actor Donna Reed who played Mary Bailey), and Reed’s daughter, Mary Owen, we explored American history as presented in a holiday favorite."

• 
• SOURCE: The Guardian
  12/9/2021
  

  Burying Leni Riefenstahl: Nina Gladitz's Lifelong Crusade

  In 1982, documentarian Nina Gladitz examined Reifenstahl's use of ethnic Roma concentration camp inmates as extras in a feature film, actions which demonstrated her knowledge of and complicity in atrocities. It cost her dearly, professionally and personally, over a decades-long pursuit of the truth. 

• 
• SOURCE: Forbes
  12/3/2021
  

  Seneca Falls, NY Celebrates 75 Years as the (Self-Proclaimed?) Inspiration for "It's a Wonderful Life"

  "Since the 1990s, Seneca Falls has been the site of an “It’s A Wonderful Life Festival” held on the second week of December. It’s also the location of a permanent museum, which honors the film as well."

• 
• SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
  11/7/2021
  

  The Academy Museum Ignores Hollywood Labor History

  by Andy Lewis

  The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was originally established to help studios negotiate contracts with the studio unions. Today, the on-set tragedy in New Mexico reminds that film production is an industry and workers make it run. The Academy Museum misses that part of the story.

• 
• 11/7/2021
  

  Writing a Classic: Richard Tregaskis and "Guadalcanal Diary"

  by Ray E. Boomhower

  Combat reporter Richard Tregaskis's account of the August 1942 Marine invasion of Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands passed military censors and became a popular sensation while offering the public an account of the difficulty and brutality of the Pacific war.

• 
• SOURCE: Slate
  10/14/2021
  

  Fact and Fiction in "The Last Duel"

  by Sara McDougall and David Perry

  "The film effectively depicts the violence embedded in medieval ideas of elite masculinity while taking historical liberties when it comes to the real nature and function of trials by combat, or how rape accusations worked in medieval Europe."

• 
• SOURCE: Forward
  10/14/2021
  

  The Most Important Band of the 80s Broke Up a Decade Before

  "For all the reams that have been written about the band in recent decades, nothing has so succinctly dissected the Velvet Underground's dark magic as Haynes’ new documentary."

• 
• 10/17/2021
  

  Passing Time and the Challenge of Catching "Eyewitnesses to History"

  by Thomas Doherty

  Historians have only recently wised up to the need to capture eyewitness remembrances of events. As the "Greatest Generation" passes and the Baby Boomers age, a cultural historian urges: talk to people while you still can. 

• 
• SOURCE: Public Seminar
  10/6/2021
  

  Why Hollywood Can't Change a Diaper

  by Janet Golden

  While Hollywood portrayals of motherhood have adapted to incorporate single and working mothers, popular culture images of fatherhood have remained stubbornly stuck in the past. Would supports for child care and parental leave in the budget reconciliation bill help bring movie dads up to date? 

• 
• SOURCE: Bloomberg CityLab
  9/9/2021
  

  In Slasher Film ‘Candyman,’ the Horror Is U.S. Housing Policy

  by Brentin Mock

  “Candyman isn't the only ghost in this show,” says Stanford Carpenter, a cultural anthropologist based in Chicago. “The other ghost is Cabrini-Green. In both cases, the thing that makes them scary is that they were made that way by white systemic racism.”

• 
• SOURCE: The Atlantic
  8/27/2021
  

  The "Candyman" Reboot Subverts Cinematic Tropes of Black Suffering

  Director Nia DaCosta, with co-writers Jordan Peele and Win Rosenfeld, has turned the problematic racial framing of its predecessor on its head, and casts critical light on the treatment of Black characters throughout the history of film. 

• 
• 9/5/2021
  

  Nationalist Nostalgia in Russian Film Mirrors Putin's Political Bending of History

  by Walter G. Moss

  Director Nikita Mikhalkov expresses through film much of the same nostalgic nationalism that anchors Vladimir Putin's authoritiarian leadership in Russia. 

• 
• SOURCE: Made By History at the Washington Post
  8/23/2021
  

  What Connects 2021's "Stillwater" and 1979's "Norma Rae"?

  by Aimee Loiselle

  Both Amanda Knox, an American student accused of murder in Italy, and Crystal Lee Sutton, the southern labor organizer portrayed in "Norma Rae," have challenged the way that Hollywood films have reinterpreted their stories for commercial gain.