Sweetback notes
Black representation White actors played black face. Black actors found it very difficult to get into films and usually played roles such as servants. Black power A lot of black people were angry at how slow paced the civil rights was going, they had certain positions in society which was usually 2nd or 3rd. A lot of anger, after Martin Luther King and Malcolm X was shot dead, there was a lot of riots and America "blew up". Sweet back and Van Peebles Only shown in two cinemas across America. The black community watched it and sweet back became a commercial success. An independent film. The debate Different reactions to it. Some people thought it was a bad film due to the sexuality, incoherent narrative. The black community liked it. There isn't a form, it doesn't follow a specific narrative. If you were watching it via cinematography it was quite experimental. It's very difficult to watch and is quite a dull, crude film. The film takes its energy from two sources, the directors fierce anger and the film's score by earth, wind and fire. Legacy After the success of the film, more black films were created. They also remade it as originally it was an all white film, so they made it with black actors. After that, in the 70s, white films also became quite depressing due to the watergate scandal. Documentary: Peebles went up against the system, challenged the core issues in American life and does it in a way that's not simplistic. He showed black people go up against authority. He was full of rage. Playing on black sexuality, showing a black man and a white woman. "Rated X by an all white jury" - this was then used as a marketing tool. Everything the critics or jury said to him, Peebles turned it into a positive. Everything in the film was an artistic choice, there was a reason behind it I.e. some shots or sequences being quite dark. The highest-grossing independent film of its time. "Blaxploitation" the bastard child of Sweetback. There was then a wave of these films. Sweetback and the black panthers made being a revolutionary hip. After Sweetback nobody in the studio system would give Peebles a job, his message was too strong for a white studio system. What is the directors intentions??????? To put something new in the mix and to bust open stereotypes. It's historically important, it opened a lot of opportunities. It was a powerful film made by using counter cinema. Counter-cinema refers to the rough grouping of films, film makers, and institutions which attempt to set themselves against the formalist and ideological domination of Hollywood cinema. Counter culture: A culture, especially of young people, with values or lifestyles in opposition to those of the established culture. Counter culture in Sweetback: 3 gay guys Attack religions Pornstar The blokes on the motorbikes Opening scene: Unsual shaky panning shot of various women and a ragged, starving child that attacking food. The sound is like something's on pressure Man running out of a dark tunnel into the light - freedom A French statement which has also been translated from the Middle Ages - which basically translates into we're still living in the dark ages as a black person but were coming out of it now. Some ideas in the film is a reality, but it's an experience, it's a "hymn". Peebles is playing with stereotypes, what people would expect as an image of black people. See it as a satire. Peebles doesn't allow you to get to know the police, sound wooden Dark, horror-like, expressionist lighting when they're about to get caught by the white police Plays around with visual styles - goes from documentary like to horror and dark An oil Derrick, pumping oil from the ground, building pressure (metaphor) The blackness of the film looks like t could be filmed in hell It doesn't sound real The sound in the background constantly sound likes pressure is building up and up as the police attack Sweetback's friend.. And then Sweetback attacks the police. Saddistic attack. The rage showing through from the director. Quite dark visually. 20 minutes.
