Includes filmographies, bibliographical references (pages 329-339) and index.
Black silence and the politics of representation / Clyde R. Taylor -- The notion of treatment : black aesthetics and film / based on an interview with Peter Hessli and additional contributions from Pearl Bowser, A.J. Jafa -- From shadows n shufflin' to spotlights and cinema: the Lafayette Players, 1915-1932 / Francesca Thompson -- The African-American press and race movies, 1909-1929 / Charlene Regester -- Oscar Micheaux's Within our gates / Michele Wallace -- Within our gates : from race melodrama to opportunity narrative / Jane Gaines -- Oscar Micheaux's The symbol of the unconquered / Pearl Bowser and Louise Spence -- To redream the dreams of white playwrights : reappropriation and resistance in Oscar Micheaux's Body and soul / Charles Musser -- Black patriarch on the prairie : national identity and black manhood in the early novels of Oscar Micheaux / Jayna Brown -- Telling white lies : Oscar Micheaux and Charles W. Chesnutt / Corey Creekmur -- Planes, trains, and automobiles : the Flying Ace, the Norman Company, and the Micheaux connection / Phyllis Klotman -- Colored Players Film Corporation / Charles Musser -- Lost, then found : the wedding scene from The scar of shame (1929) / Pearl Bowser -- Richard D. Maurice and the Maurice Film Company / Pearl Bowser and Charles Musser -- Cinematic foremothers : Zora Neale Hurston and Eloyce King Patrick Gist / Gloria J. Gibson -- Appendix A, The reemergence of Oscar Micheaux : a timeline and bibliographic essay / J. Ronald Green -- Appendix B, an Oscar Micheaux filmography : from the silents through his transition to sound (1919-1931) / compiled by Charles Musser, Corey Creekmur, Pearl Bowser, Charlene Regester, Ron Green, and Louise Spence -- Appendix C, A Colored Players Film Corporation Filmography / compiled by Charles Musser -- Appendix D, Norman Film Manufacturing Company : production and theatrical release dates for all-black-cast films / compiled by Phyllis Klotman.
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Oscar Micheaux-the most prolific African-American filmmaker to date and a filmmakinggiant of the silent period-has finally found his rightful place in film history. Both artist and showman, Micheaux stirred controversy in his time as he confronted issues such as lynching, miscegenation, peonage and white supremacy, passing, and corruption among black clergymen. He emphasized the importance of education and the rights of citizenship (the vote, equal protection under the law) for racial uplift, to advance race progress, to awaken black consciousness, and to correct negative behavior within black communities. These films spoke to black moviegoers in ways that were completely different from Hollywood pictures. In this important new collection, prominent scholars examine Micheaux's surviving silent films, his fellow producers of race films who alternately challenged or emulated his methods, and the cultural activities that surrounded and sustained these achievements. The essays shed new light on the feature filmmaking of Richard Maurice (Detroit), David Starkman and the Colored Players Film Corporation (Philadelphia), and Richard Norman (Florida), as well as the stardom of Evelyn Preer, Lucia Lynn Moses, Paul Robeson, Charles Gilpin, and Lawrence Chenault. Studies of the shorter films shot in 16mm by ethnographer Zora Neale Hurston and religious reformers James and Eloyce Gist (Washington, D.C.) fill out the complex picture of an era. Authors examine Micheaux's films (and novels) from a range of perspectives, including his radical aesthetic strategies, his uses of stereotypes, his powerful critiques of D.W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation and Eugene O'Neill's race plays, his radical uses of other texts (notably the novels of Charles Chesnutt), and his work with such genres as the Western. The relationship between black film and both the stage (particularly the Lafayette Players) and the black press, issues of underdevelopment, and a genealogy of Micheaux scholarship, as well as extensive and more accurate filmographies, give a richly textured portrait of this era. The essays will fascinate the general public as well as scholars in the fields of film studies, cultural studies, and African American history. This thoroughly readable collection is a superb reference work lavishly illustrated with rare photographs.
JSTOR
OverDrive, Inc.
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A5E925A7-289F-46B6-9EAE-414447FC4BD1
Oscar Micheaux and his circle.
Micheaux, Oscar,1884-1951-- Criticism and interpretation
Micheaux, Oscar,1884-1951-- Critique et interprétation
Micheaux, Oscar,1884-1951.
Micheaux, Oscar.
African Americans in motion pictures, Congresses.
Race films, Congresses.
Noirs américains au cinéma, Congrès.
African Americans in motion pictures.
Film.
PERFORMING ARTS-- Film & Video-- History & Criticism.