Oscar Micheaux and His Circle
Oscar Micheaux and His Circle

Author: Charles Musser

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2016-03-28

Total Pages: 384

ISBN-13: 0253021553

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Oscar Micheaux—the most prolific African American filmmaker to date and a filmmaking giant of the silent period—has finally found his rightful place in film history. Both artist and showman, Micheaux stirred controversy in his time as he confronted issues such as lynching, miscegenation, peonage and white supremacy, passing, and corruption among black clergymen. In this important collection, prominent scholars examine Micheaux's surviving silent films, his fellow producers of race films who alternately challenged or emulated his methods, and the cultural activities that surrounded and sustained these achievements. The relationship between black film and both the stage (particularly the Lafayette Players) and the black press, issues of underdevelopment, and a genealogy of Micheaux scholarship, as well as extensive and more accurate filmographies, give a richly textured portrait of this era. The essays will fascinate the general public as well as scholars in the fields of film studies, cultural studies, and African American history. This thoroughly readable collection is a superb reference work lavishly illustrated with rare photographs.

Oscar Micheaux: The Great and Only
Oscar Micheaux: The Great and Only

Author: Patrick McGilligan

Publisher: Harper Collins

Published: 2009-10-06

Total Pages: 420

ISBN-13: 0061982156

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Oscar Micheaux was the Jackie Robinson of film, the black D. W. Griffith: a bigger-than-life American folk hero whose important life story is nearly forgotten today. Now, in a feat of historical investigation and vivid storytelling, one of our greatest film biographers takes on one of the most talented and complex figures in the history of American entertainment. The son of freed slaves, Micheaux grew up in Metropolis, Illinois, then roamed America as a Pullman porter before making his first mark as a homesteader in South Dakota. Disaster and defeat there led him to forge a career publishing a successful series of autobiographical novels. Ever the entrepreneur, when Hollywood failed to bid high enough for film rights to his stories, he answered by forming his own film production company. Going on to produce or direct twenty-two silent and fifteen sound films in his lifetime, Micheaux became the king of the "race cinema" industry at a time when black-produced films had to scrounge for venues in a segregated society. In this groundbreaking new biography, award-winning film historian Patrick McGilligan offers a vivid and fascinating portrait of this little-known pioneer. Part visionary, part raffish Barnum-like showman, Micheaux was both a maverick filmmaker and an inveterate hustler who used every weapon at his disposal to break the color barrier and thrive in a profession he helped to invent. He made a fortune and lost it again, and launched repeated con games that were followed by public arrests and bankruptcies. He eagerly took credit for the work of others—including his unsung-heroine wife. In his desperate later years, he even sunk to plagiarizing his final novel—a discovery McGilligan reveals here for the first time. In this searching exploration, McGilligan tracks down long-lost financial records, unpublished letters, and unmarked pauper's graves, pinpointing Micheaux's birthplace, his tangled personal life, and the circumstances of his tragic death. The result is an epic that bridges a fascinating period in American history, and offers lessons for anyone who would understand the role of black America in forming the culture of our time.

Straight Lick
Straight Lick

Author: J. Ronald Green

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2000-09-22

Total Pages: 314

ISBN-13: 0253109221

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A critical examination of the films of Oscar Micheaux. One of the most original and successful filmmakers of all time, Oscar Micheaux was born into a rural, working-class, African-American family in mid-America in 1884, yet he created an impressive legacy in commercial cinema. Between 1913 and 1951 he wrote, directed, and distributed some forty-three feature films, more than any other black filmmaker in the world, a record of production that is likely to stand for a very long time. Micheaux's work was founded upon the concern for class mobility, or uplift, for African Americans. Uplift provided the context for Micheaux's extensive commentary on racist cinema, such as D. W. Griffith's 1915 blockbuster, The Birth of a Nation, which Micheaux "answered" with his very early films Within Our Gates and Symbol of the Unconquered. Uplift explains Micheaux's use of "negative images" of African Americans as well as his multi-pronged campaign against stereotype and caricature in American culture. His campaign produced a body of films saturated with a nuanced intertexual "signifying," boldly and repeatedly treating controversial topics that face white censorship time after time, topics ranging from white mob and Klan violence to light-skin-color fetish to white financing of black cultural productions.

With a Crooked Stick—The Films of Oscar Micheaux
With a Crooked Stick—The Films of Oscar Micheaux

Author: J. Ronald Green

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2004-03-18

Total Pages: 327

ISBN-13: 0253027705

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With a "crooked stick," filmmaker Oscar Micheaux (1884–1951) sought to hit a "straight lick" by stressing the strategic importance of class mobility, or "uplift," for African Americans. A theme in all of his more than 40 feature-length, black-produced, black-directed, black-cast, and black-audience films, uplift would allow for the better things in life: fast cars and fancy clothes, freedom of belief, financial security, and an unencumbered intellectual life. Although racism was an impediment to uplift for Micheaux and other African Americans, race as a category was of a secondary order for him in the larger game of class. In With a Crooked Stick, J. Ronald Green pursues this seeming contradiction in a detailed analysis of each of Micheaux's 15 surviving films. He presents critical commentary on each film's plot and action and its contribution to the overall theme of uplift. Readers will also find this an invaluable guide to the preoccupations and features of Micheaux's remarkable career and the insight it provides into the African American experience of the 1920s and 30s.

Flickering Empire
Flickering Empire

Author: Michael Glover Smith

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2015-01-20

Total Pages: 233

ISBN-13: 0231850794

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Flickering Empire tells the fascinating yet little-known story of how Chicago served as the unlikely capital of American film production in the years before the rise of Hollywood (1907–1913). As entertaining as it is informative, Flickering Empire straddles the worlds of academic and popular nonfiction in its vivid illustration of the rise and fall of the major Chicago movie studios in the mid-silent era (principally Essanay and Selig Polyscope). Colorful, larger-than-life historical figures, including Thomas Edison, Charlie Chaplin, Oscar Micheaux, and Orson Welles, are major players in the narrative—in addition to important though forgotten industry titans, such as "Colonel" William Selig, George Spoor, and Gilbert "Broncho Billy" Anderson.

Cult Filmmakers
Cult Filmmakers

Author: Ian Haydn Smith

Publisher: White Lion Publishing

Published: 2019-09-03

Total Pages: 147

ISBN-13: 0711240264

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What makes a cult filmmaker? Whether pioneering in their craft, fiercely and undeniably unique, or critically divisive, cult filmmakers come in all shapes and guises. Some gain instant fame, others instant notoriety, and more still remain anonymous until a chance change in fashion sees their work propelled into the limelight. Cult Filmmakers handpicks 50 notable figures in the world of cinema and explores the creative genius that earned them the 'cult' label, while celebrating the movies that made their names. The book features both industry heavyweights like Tim Burton and David Lynch to the strange and surreal imaginings of filmmakers such as Alejandro Jodorowsky and Ana Lily Amirpour. Discover the minds behind such beloved features as Melancholia, Easy Rider, Lost in Translation and more. From little knowns with small, devout followings, to superstars walking the red carpet, each is special in their individuality and their ability to inspire, antagonise and delight. Cult Filmmakers is an essential addition to any film buff's archive, as well as an entertaining introduction to the weird and wonderful world of cinema. The filmmakers: Ana Lily Amirpour, Kenneth Anger, Gregg Araki, Darren Aronofsky, Mario Bava, Kathryn Bigelow, Anna Biller, Lizzie Borden, Tim Burton, John Carpenter, Park Chan-Wook, Benjamin Christensen, Vera Chytilova, Sofia Coppola, Roger Corman, Alex Cox, David Cronenberg, Claire Denis, Amat Escalante, Abel Ferrara, Georges Franju, Lucio Fulci, Terry Gilliam, Lucile Hadzihalilovic, Dennis Hopper, King Hu, Jim Jarmusch, Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Harmony Korine, Barbara Loden, David Lynch, Guy Maddin, Russ Meyer, Oscar Micheaux, Takashi Miike, Gaspar Noe, Gordon Parks, George A. Romero, Ken Russell, Susan Seidelman, Seijun Suzuki, Larisa Shepitko, Quentin Tarantino, Melvin van Peebles, Lars von Trier, John Waters, Nicolas Winding Refn, Edward D. Wood Jr., Brian Yuzna.

The Conquest
The Conquest

Author: Oscar Micheaux

Publisher: Graphic Arts Books

Published: 2022-01-11

Total Pages: 165

ISBN-13: 1513209973

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The Conquest: The Story of a Negro Pioneer (1913) is a novel by Oscar Micheaux. Before he became the first Black movie mogul in American history, Micheaux was a homesteader-turned novelist whose passion for storytelling and business acumen were born from a youth of hard work and struggle. The son of a former slave, Micheaux dedicated his life to countering the dominant narratives of American history while inspiring and empowering Black people around the world. “The heavy rains washed the loam from the hills and deposited it on these bottoms. Years ago, when the rolling lands were cleared, and before the excessive rainfall had washed away the loose surface, the highlands were considered most valuable for agricultural purposes, equally as valuable as the bottoms now are.” A Black homesteader named Oscar Devereaux reflects on a life of perseverance. Raised alongside twelve siblings in rural Illinois, he leaves home and family behind to seek a life of fortune and independence. Never one to set limits, Devereaux discovers that no dream is beyond his reach. Dedicated to educator and orator Booker T. Washington, The Conquest was described by its author as the “true story of a negro who was discontented and [of] the circumstances that were the outcome of that discontent.” With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Oscar Micheaux’s The Conquest: The Story of a Negro Pioneer is a classic of African American literature reimagined for modern readers.

Colorization
Colorization

Author: Wil Haygood

Publisher: Knopf

Published: 2021-10-19

Total Pages: 473

ISBN-13: 0525656871

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A NEW YORK TIMES CRITICS' TOP BOOK OF THE YEAR • BOOKLISTS' EDITOR'S CHOICE • ONE OF NPR'S BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR “At once a film book, a history book, and a civil rights book.… Without a doubt, not only the very best film book [but] also one of the best books of the year in any genre. An absolutely essential read.” —Shondaland This unprecedented history of Black cinema examines 100 years of Black movies—from Gone with the Wind to Blaxploitation films to Black Panther—using the struggles and triumphs of the artists, and the films themselves, as a prism to explore Black culture, civil rights, and racism in America. From the acclaimed author of The Butler and Showdown. Beginning in 1915 with D. W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation—which glorified the Ku Klux Klan and became Hollywood's first blockbuster—Wil Haygood gives us an incisive, fascinating, little-known history, spanning more than a century, of Black artists in the film business, on-screen and behind the scenes. He makes clear the effects of changing social realities and events on the business of making movies and on what was represented on the screen: from Jim Crow and segregation to white flight and interracial relationships, from the assassination of Malcolm X, to the O. J. Simpson trial, to the Black Lives Matter movement. He considers the films themselves—including Imitation of Life, Gone with the Wind, Porgy and Bess, the Blaxploitation films of the seventies, Do The Right Thing, 12 Years a Slave, and Black Panther. And he brings to new light the careers and significance of a wide range of historic and contemporary figures: Hattie McDaniel, Sidney Poitier, Berry Gordy, Alex Haley, Spike Lee, Billy Dee Willliams, Richard Pryor, Halle Berry, Ava DuVernay, and Jordan Peele, among many others. An important, timely book, Colorization gives us both an unprecedented history of Black cinema and a groundbreaking perspective on racism in modern America.