13th

Ava DuVernay

Ava DuVernay's 13th is a well made and entertaining screed against the correctional industrial complex that has arisen, partly, out of the "War on Drugs". DuVernay is expert at juggling newsreel footage, song lyrics, photos, newspaper clippings, TV commercials and all sorts of cultural bric a brac into a cohesive whole that prevents this documentary from falling into a torpid mire of talking heads.

My reservations about the film are perhaps not surprising coming from a bald white male of a RINO bent. Namely that the analysis is a Marxist one (heck, one of the talking heads is the Sweet Black Angel herself, Angela Davis) bereft of three dimensionality. The African American churches, the Vietnam war, the Moynihan Report, the Rockefeller drug laws, etc., are barely mentioned, so most of the blame can fall on corporations and Presidents Nixon, Reagan and Clinton. The period between the signing of the 13th Amendment and the premier of The Birth of a Nation is almost completely ignored, so the links DuVernay attempts to make between the institutional racism of the 19th century and the racial flash points of today seem tenuous.

However, this film succeeds in making a visceral impact and if it helps the youth of today remember, say, Emmett Till then it is a worthy document indeed. The critique of the "War on Drugs" and mandatory minimum sentencing is irrefutable. I remember as a teenager listening to my attorney father, self-described as being to the right of Louis XIV, criticize bitterly the idea of mandatory minimums; mostly because it limited the discretionary power of judges. We are paying the price now. I can't say I learned anything from this film, but I appreciated its fervor and DuVernay's craftmanship. (10/10/16)