Jun 20, 2020
"James and Eloyce Gist were African-American evangelists who employed cinema as a tool for their traveling ministry. These self-taught filmmakers screened their surreal visual allegories in churches and meeting halls, accompanied by a sermon and the passing of a collection plate. Hell-Bound Train was their first and most ambitious production. When discovered in the vaults of the Library of Congress, Hell-Bound Train existed as 35 fragmentary rolls of 16mm film, mixed with footage from their other productions. It has been meticulously reconstructed by historian and filmmaker S. Torriano Berry, with labwork and scanning performed by the Library of Congress." HELL-BOUND TRAIN (1930) dir. James and Eloyce Gist