Birth of a Nation (Silent Version)

Was on TCM last night, I only caught the last half hour of it, it was 3 hours long. Wish I could have seen the whole thing. Anyone see the entire movie??

I missed it the last two times it was on TV.

I've never heard of this title. It's a three hour silent film?

Yep, and not a very well liked one either.




Morbid curiosity is what's my interest in seeing this...what I also find interesting is the next year, D.W. Griffith made a movie called Intolerance,




that involved several stories of prejudice around the world, a real 180 I'm guessing...but people don't care to remember Intolerance, they only choose to remember him for Birth of a Nation.

Chris wrote:I've never heard of this title. It's a three hour silent film?

Yep, three hours. SN is right when she says it was not very well liked, here is an article why:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Birth_of_a_Nation

I would like to see it in its entirety if it comes back on again, I remember my Grandfather telling me about this film when I was a boy.

Thanks. Despite hearing that it's not very well liked, the Wikipedia synopsis sounds interesting; I'm usually very curious about films from the early 1900s/pre-sound era.

Chris wrote:Thanks. Despite hearing that it's not very well liked, the Wikipedia synopsis sounds interesting; I'm usually very curious about films from the early 1900s/pre-sound era.

Oh it was very interesting from the little I saw of it. I too like early silent movies, its definetly something very different to watch.

I've seen bits and pieces but it makes my skin crawl too much to sit through the whole thing. I happened to channel surf past it last night.

alan smithee wrote:I've seen bits and pieces but it makes my skin crawl too much to sit through the whole thing. I happened to channel surf past it last night.

I am curious, why does it make your skin crawl, is it that bad?

^^The overt racism. It glorifies the Ku Klux Klan. I belive the original title was The Clansman.

And this film proves that the idea of people blaming movies for what people do in real life is not a new concept because people blame this movie for the KKK coming back into existence.