Reviews: 'The Blues'
and 'Matters of Race'

By Esther Iverem
SeeingBlack.com Editor and Film Critic

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The massive film project, "The Blues" is an intricate study in the power of voice and perspective.

Interpreted freely through seven independent films by seven different filmmakers—Martin Scorsese, Wim Wenders, Richard Pearce, Charles Burnett, Marc Levin, Mike Figgis and Clint Eastwood— the subject of the blues is handled with energy, creativity and as the unique vision of each director or auteur, all of whom are men and only one of whom is African American. The production was not designed to have a pure documentary approach, which might have made it more historically complete and comprehensive but, on the other hand, might have made it far less poetic.

As it is, we are privileged to witness through these full-length films, young bluesman Corey Harris connect with roots of the blues in West Africa. We consider the mindblowing fact that blues records were sent into space to represent earthlings to aliens. We go on the road with B.B. King and also experience the marriage of hip hop to blues as Chuck D and Common jam with the oldheads of "Electric Mud."

But as with any approach so freewheeling to a subject so important, the viewer might especially be conscious of what is included and what is excluded. Take, for example, the fact that the first image for the entire series, repeated each night in the introductory montage, is that of a Black woman bent over with her back to the camera, with her generous and jiggly derriere humping up and down in a booty dance performance.

Considering the fact that Black women are given scant attention in this series, dedicated to an art form launched by the likes of Ma Rainey, Ida Cox and Bessie Smith, this image of a dancer for bluesman Bobby Rush is the strongest impression of Black womanhood presented, overshadowing brief appearances by singer Shemekia Copeland or Taylor. It completely obliterating those artists barely mentioned, if at all, such as Billie Holiday. (In contrast, an entire film, "Red, White and Blues," directed by Mike Figgis, is dedicated to White British musicians who are credited with, in the 1960's, expanding the appreciation for blues artists among Whites in the United States.)

Another striking inclusion, at the start Burnett's film, is an image of a lynching and of a prison chain gang. These images may be the most graphic attempt in the series to give some attention to why African Americans sang the blues in the first place.

Sure, any blues project should highlight the brilliant, moving and often funny performances. [a favorite new blues lyric from Skip James—I'd rather be the devil than be that woman's man]. We'd all prefer to hear Muddy Waters, B.B. King or Howlin Wolf rather than a bunch of talking heads.

But the missing piece of the puzzle—why did we sing the blues?— proves important to countering the undercurrent of questions bubbling beneath the surface of such a massive effort: Are the blues dying or dead? Have younger generations of African Americans let White people "steal" our music? Why don't we honor our roots?

Such questions are left echoing in the wind by "The Blues," which speaks with great eloquence about the art without probing in too much detail the pain of the blues, and why younger generations of African Americans might turn away from that pain or interpret it in a different way. (And why Whites might "embrace" it in a whole other way.)

"The Blues" (which has been trademarked as a phrase for this show! But at least it is not "Martin Scorsese's Blues" ) contains a wealth of information and inspiration. It ultimately serves best the vision of these filmmakers, who are interested in exploring their own questions and approach the subject matter with their own creative perspectives and voices.

Matters of Race

A more provocative title for the new PBS series , "Matters of Race," might have been "Race: Beyond Black and White." (But maybe someone's already tried that.) The four episodes, set in North Carolina, Los Angeles, South Dakota, Hawaii and San Francisco, shift the starting point of the discussion about race away from the U.S. history of slavery and Jim Crow and toward race as it is experienced today by Mexican immigrants, young Native Americans, Hawaiians and those who prefer to be called multiracial.

Not all history is cast aside, however, so the four episodes, shown in pairs, do have something substantial to contribute to the perpetual race debate, especially in light of the fact that those categorized as Hispanic now outnumber Blacks and are considered the nation's number one "minority." The series, which has moments that are riveting, poignant and funny, is also relevant because there are more people choosing to identify themselves as multiracial. Finally, "Matters of Race" gives voice to those, primarily in the Asian and Latino communities, who deeply resent the historical dominance of the Black-White race discussion and desperately long for more emphasis on how race impacts their communities. You can clearly hear this resentment in the comments of Angela Oh, a California attorney who is Korean, who bristles at what she says is a silencing of voices on the race issue "that are not Black or White."

The series begins in North Carolina, where one town, Siler City, has dubbed by some "Little Mexico" because of the tremendous influx of Mexican immigrants. Told primarily through the eyes of the newcomers, the show chronicles the impact on housing, jobs, education, churches and, of course, race relations.

Seen from the perspective of the immigrants to North Carolina, Black people are Americans with citizenship. There is no sense given here that the newcomers relate to Black people as another people of color. And, on the other side, it is clear that many Blacks trapped in low-paying jobs see the immigrants as competition for those jobs and as a force that will keep wages low. Some of the White people are up in arms about the threat to their "way of life." David Duke, the former member of the Ku Klux Klan, seizes the opportunity to speak at an anti-immigrant rally where people hold up signs with slogans such as "Go Back to Mexico."

A Black-Latino divide is also highlighted in the next story, which focuses on the King-Drew County Medical Center in South Los Angeles. The embattled and maligned hospital, born of the 1965 Watts riots, has historically been a Black hospital serving a Black community and now finds itself, as the surrounding community has changed, serving a population that is more and more Latino. Struggles about mission, staffing and service have ensued and there have been racial struggles, which seem to be also struggles about jobs, economics, community power and the preservation of a place of Black empowerment. But these kinds of arguments have been muted by press accounts labeling the hospital as "racist."

What these first two very interesting episodes lack, in their telling of a modern race tale, is the history of the relationship of immigrants to the Black community and to "Blackness." Blacks not only fear and resent competition for job opportunities, we also resent the adoption of racist attitudes by many newcomers. This exploration of racist attitudes and the aspiration for American "Whiteness" among immigrants, which boil beneath many modern race tales, is not included here and would have made these good shows into very good shows.

The third episode, "We're Still Here," offers fresh insights into life on the Pine Ridge reservation of the Oglala Lakota nation, where young Native Americans are wrestling with how to retain their culture and way of life and survive with more success in the "White world." The life expectancy on the reservation is about the same as Haiti. Most are dead by the age of 60. There is also on this show some eye-opening footage about Hawaii and how the little-publicized struggles of natives to those islands are similar to those of the indigenous people here on the mainland.

The final show includes three short bright films directed by young filmmakers concerning the issues of being multicultural, of growing up Cambodian in the Tenderloin section of San Francisco and of raising a young family near the White Mountain Apache Reservation in Arizona.

Any attempt to wrestle with race is ambitious and while the producers, Roja Productions, haven't answered clearly some of the very questions they ask at the start of each show—
such as, for example, who gets to decide what differences mean and who gets to benefit from those differences—they have breathed some fresh air into the perpetual race debate and provided new ways of discussing and seeing race.

These reviews first appeared on BET.com.

— October 20, 2003

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