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The Birth of a Nation Photos
Movie Info
Two families, abolitionist Northerners the Stonemans and Southern landowners the Camerons, intertwine in director D.W. Griffith's controversial Civil War epic. When Confederate colonel Ben Cameron (Henry B. Walthall) is captured in battle, nurse Elsie Stoneman (Lillian Gish) petitions for his pardon. In Reconstruction-era South Carolina, Cameron founds the Ku Klux Klan, battling Elsie's congressman father (Ralph Lewis) and his African-American protégé, Silas Lynch (George Siegmann).
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Genre: History, Drama, War
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Director: D.W. Griffith
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Producer: D.W. Griffith
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Writer: Thomas F. Dixon Jr., Thomas F. Dixon Jr., D.W. Griffith, Frank E. Woods, Thomas F. Dixon Jr.
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Release Date (Theaters): wide
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Release Date (Streaming):
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Runtime:
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Distributor: Hollywood Classics, Reel Media International [us], Republic Pictures, Image Entertainment Inc., Lumivision, Allied Artists Pictures, Continental Home Vídeo [br], Kino Video, Joseph Brenner Associates Inc. [us]
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Production Co: David W. Griffith Corp., Epoch Producing Corporation
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Aspect Ratio: Flat (1.37:1)
Cast & Crew
News & Interviews for The Birth of a Nation
Critic Reviews for The Birth of a Nation
Audience Reviews for The Birth of a Nation
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It was definitely innovative in many ways when it came out and still delivers a timeless anti-war message, but it is nearly impossible to read "the helpless white minority" and not feel outraged by the film's odious racism as it vilifies black people and glorifies the Ku Klux Klan.
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People get easily offended by old films and not appreciate the scale of the film. The Birth of a Nation was an epic historical drama about the American civil war and the rise of Ku Klux Klan. It was not where near the accuracy of the real history but it was a pretty amazing film utilizing a lot of the modern film making techniques at the standard of the time. There were some really amazing scenes like the fall from the cliff, the battles and courthouse assembly. One of the best silents films in the history of cinema.
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Ignore the five star rating I gave to "The Birth of a Nation" and let's not even discuss it, for ratings are wholly irrelevant in the context of this film. A culmination of all knowledge gained during the silent film era, this D. W. Griffith landmark is as much part of American history as the Civil War, and its impact on our society as well as American cinema cannot be overstated. The camera and storytelling techniques pioneered in the making of "Nation" have influenced nearly every film that came after it, and modern cinema owes a great debt to the director for his unwavering vision and talent. However, I cannot say that I enjoyed the film, as "Nation" is clearly a direct reflection of the director's deeply racist opinions, and is simply put a morally reprehensible affair. Nevertheless, it is permanent blemish in the pages of our American history, and it must be confronted; discussion and reflection are the preferred methods, not blissful ignorance.
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I just watched an over three-hour long 1915 silent film about the Civil War, the Lincoln assassination and a newly restored United States' subsequent Reconstruction era and the simultaneous formation of the KKK. There, that should probably tell you how much free time I have on my hands. Really, what I should be worrying about the most is whether or not this review secures my stance that Alabama is not filled to the rim with racists anymore, and really I don't think that this film is making it all that fair, because even the most ignorant hole in West Virginia is going to get uncomfortable watching this film. Well, really, come on, what did you expect? This is a 1915 film by a man from Kentucky that's about the Ku Klux Klan, so the racism in this film is anything but subtle, and the protagonistic tone over the KKK isn't making things any more comfortable. Hey say what you will about those maniacs, becuase lord knows I will, seeing as how [b][u]"Alabama is not racist"[/u][/b], but they sure make for a fairly decent watch in a movie. Still, if you're thinking that an over three-hour long 1915 silent film about the Civil War, the Lincoln assassination and a newly restored United States' subsequent Reconstruction era and the simultaneous formation of the KKK won't lose you here and there, then maybe you movie buffs should cut back a bit on Terrence Malick films and lower the standards for dullness. It's been noted that this film broke ground with its inventive narrative methods, some of which stand prominent today, and I have to say that if D. W. Griffith's the one who came up with overdrawn scenes of nothingness in a failed attempt at exposition, then racism doesn't appear to be this film's only issue. I understand that they had stuff along those lines everywhere back then, yet those pieces of nothingness were often for the sake of fluff with no subtlety. This film makes an early attempt at a manipulating the nothingness to actually supplement the subtlety, and that is a method that hardly works now, let alone back in 1915, yet it's a method that feels just as cocky no matter what time you're in. Hey, even things do get silly, due to the time (As really pretty as Lillian Gish was, if you thought that a lot of actresses were terrible from the 30s to 60s, then just wait until you see the actresses of the '10s, back when the only thing they could do was expressiveness), you'd be hard pressed to find a groundbreaking film at an unsubtle and underdeveloped time in cinematic history that's not cocky, yet that doesn't make the overbearing tone any less dated and discomforting. The same can be said about the racial overtones and glorification of radicalism, which I find problematic on a personal level for obvious reasons (*cough*Ala*cough*bama*cough*not*cough*racist*cough*) and problematic on a critical level, as the messages of the film, whether they be moral or not - and boy, are they not -, are rather forceful in their delivery, and I understand that the limitations of the time tainted subtlety, yet that doesn't keep it from being a fault in the film. That excuse certainly isn't helped by the fact that the film, even with its faults and lapses in subtlety, still has a certain subtle grace about it that was unheard of at the time, and remains engaging to this day. Sure, maybe the newfound methods of subtlety were quite faulty in their prototype stage, certainly to where the film is rendered unable to transcend to a terribly upstanding point, yet through all of its faults, the film engages through its inventive methods, some of which impress to this day. Stylistically, the film is considerably more impressive than expected, boasting production designs that stand as elaborate and convincing (The Lincoln makeup effect on Joseph Henabery is a particularly impressive production piece), while not in-your-face to the point of damaging the substance within the film. The production handsomely captures the look of the time, while G.W. Bitzer's then-hardly paralleled and now-still rather impressive cinematography captures the scope, as well as the intimacy with the story in many spots. Still, what might very well engage the most of D. W. Griffith's direction, which was limited at the time and is still problematic in a deal of both critical and personal regards, yet does what it can with a kind of subtlety that was both underlooked and faulty at the time, yet more often than not engages, particularly when Griffith plays with the filmmaking limitations of the time. The full-screen tinting gives the film character and visual dynamicity while supplementing tone, and the score breathes livliness and resonance into the film to mostly compensate for the silence and only a few commendable and ageless expressive performances. For this, credit not only goes out to the components of the production, but Griffith's structure of the film that plays with its components in a fashion that gave a glimpse into the now widely practiced technique of marrying production into substance, whether than simply putting on a show. The film's methods still stand as sadly dated to the point of rendering the film relatively workmanlike, yet there's no denying the landmarks this film set, nor its degree of effectiveness by today's standards. It's an overlong slow-mover, yet a ride worth sitting through, as the film charms and resonantes more than expected, and just enough to keep the audience going - nay - simply enjoying. At the end of the reel, it's hard to let go of the slowness and excessive padding in an attempt to supplement subtlety, only to supplement a degree of self-righteousness that dulls down the film and intensifies the sting of its likely-to-be personally discomforting bias, yet with handsome production and style played then-highly uniquely and now-still rather impressively by D. W. Griffith to touch the film with a kind of near-unprecedented level of subtlety and substance depth that may not have conquered the test of time, yet still made it through thoroughly enough to leave "The Birth of a Nation" to stand now as a generally enjoyable piece of classic revolutionary cinema. 2.5/5 - Fair
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