Racism in Film

We've recently finished Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing, Steven Spielberg's Schindler's List, and  Edward Zwick's Glory.  If you remember, I asked you to pay attention to the story that was being told and also who was telling said story.  Lee depicts day in the life of a city block in Brooklyn that is dealing with racial tensions; Spielberg depicts the heroism of Oskar Schindler in saving nearly 1200 Jews in occupied Poland; Zwick tells the story of the 54th Massachusetts from the perspective of their commander in the Civil War.  I asked you to notice the story being told and also to notice the directorial choices based on this story: does the director's ethnicity and religious background affect the story?

In his article "How Hollywood Depicts Race," Jared Wright suggests that the director's background does influence the film.  As I think about authors such as John Grisham (a lawyer who writes legal thrillers), Kyle Mills (the son of an FBI agent who writes thrillers centered around FBI agent Mark Beamon), George Pelecanos (a Greek-American living in DC who sets his works in the city with a Greek-American protagonist), and Les Roberts (although born in Chicago has adopted Cleveland as his hometown and sets his most popular detective series here).  So if authors' backgrounds influence their work, why would directors' backgrounds not?

Your task is to utilize the films that we viewed (I also suggest referencing the three sports films: Glory Road, Remember the Titans,  and 42) and explain how the films would be different if the director was of a different race, ethnicity, or religious belief.  Would Do the Right Thing be a powerful and thought provoking if Lee was white (Juju Chang and Lauren Effron's 2014 article for ABC News discusses why the film still resonates twenty-five years after it's release)?  Would Schindler's List be as successful in it's depiction of the Nazi's oppression and elimination of the Jews if Spielberg was a German Catholic?  Would Glory focus on Robert Gould Shaw nearly as much - rather than the lives of those in the regiment - if Edward Zwick was black?

Race and Sports

We've recently finished three movies that deal with race and sports: 42, Glory Road, and Remember the Titans. Certainly, these films were dramatized versions of the actual events often to make the message more pungent. There also seems to be a resonance between sports and racism.

Sanford Jay Rosen explores the differences between 42 and The Jackie Robinson Story (1950) in "Jackie Robinson and Race in America, Then and Now: A Tale of Two Movies" while connecting these films to the present.  Frank Deford discusses "What We Talk About when We Talk About Race and Sports" and Travis Waldron attempts to make sense of The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sports' grading of the four major sports in "50 Years After MLK’s ‘Dream,’ How Do Professional Sports Measure On Race?"  And while we celebrate Jackie Robinson as the first black player in Major League Baseball, Michael G. Long reminds us that we really should first look to Joe Louis in "Making Way for Jackie Robinson: The Quiet Fight of the Brown Bomber."

If you've read more than one of the above articles (or have paid attention to the news) it should be clear that racism still exists in society.  The question (and your prompt) is thus: What role do sports play in racism?  Do they help to eliminate racism?  Do sports - both professional and amateur - have a responsibility to establish a moral high ground?  You will want to reference each of the films and at least two of the above articles while discussing this.  Remember: opinions are stronger when they are supported by the thoughts of others.

Oh, and a final note: It will be very difficult to do this will in only three hundred words; I would expect responses will instead approach five hundred words.