"The Birth of a Nation (Film)" Topic

"Birth of A Nation [2016] is a cinematic retelling of American History. Its source is Nat Turner's Confessions of Nat Turner written in 1831 in which 60+ white men, women and infants are slaughtered in an 1831 Virginia slave rebellion and about 150+ slaves are victims of revenge…"

From here
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Also…
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Amicalement
Armand

I read in an interview with the writer / director / actor of the film that it was shockingly historical, showing all the horrors of slavery in the United States with scenes of whippings and chains.

I wonder if they show the historical scenes of infants being killed by the rebelling slaves?

I'm guessing not.

Well, Oddball, way to keep an open mind.

From Variety: "It builds to a brutal finale that will stir deep emotion and inevitable unease." So I'm guessing you're wrong.

The advantage of telling your story is you tell it your way.
Nothing new here from former slave owners to ex nazis to the official history of this or that.

The master south has gotten its narrative for a long time. About time the descendents of the slaves get their own.

"Well, Oddball, way to keep an open mind.

From Variety: "It builds to a brutal finale that will stir deep emotion and inevitable unease." So I'm guessing you're wrong."

Ha ha ha. Yeah, I always count on Variety when I'm wondering if a film will be historically accurate or a preachy butchery of the facts. Hilarious, Jpattern.

Yes,for true historical accuracy,see the original.

Ha ha ha. Yeah, I always count on Variety when I'm wondering if a film will be historically accurate or a preachy butchery of the facts. Hilarious, Jpattern.

It was the only review I could find online that mentioned anything about the actual revolt as depicted in the film. I didn't say the article confirmed the historical accuracy of the film, only that it seems to confirm that some of the brutality of the actual revolt would be shown in the film.

We'll see when more detailed reviews are written.

From The Guardian: "When the revolt does come – a rebellion that saw five dozen slave owners and their families killed – Parker doesn't leave anything to the imagination. Heads are crushed, stoved in and chopped off. Bodies are burned, teeth are broken."

I still haven't read anything about the deaths of children in the movie. IF those are left out of the film, I absolutely agree that would be an egregious omission, especially considering that the slaughter of an entire schoolyard of children was a central act of the rebellion.

Most of the reviews also point out the too-heavy-handedness of the direction and some of the acting, with some comparing it to the harder-to-swallow moments in Braveheart.

Ktravlos has it right.

You are aware that "Confessions of Nat Turner" is a 1967 novel based on the original "Confessions of Nat Turner: The leader of the late Insurrection in Southampton, Virginia" written by a white lawyer.

So this is a movie based on a novel based on questionable source material.

All I know is that it was a slave revolt, violent yes but so was the one of Spartacus, and in supposedly a country in which we like people rebelling for their freedom it is treated a taboo subject. So questionable or not, the bringing to forth of this important and of course controversial (all revolutions are controversial) event is a big deal.

I thought Birth of a Nation was a film by DW Griffith about the Civil War, Reconstruction and the Ku Klux Klan…
Silly me!