Paul Robeson - Speak of Me As I Am
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Pam GrierBrand: Kultur
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language)
Format: Color, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 58 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2007-02-27
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: KULTUR VIDEO
Movie Reviews of Paul Robeson - Speak of Me As I Am
Movie Review: Severely lacking in content and delivery-The BBC should be ashamed
Summary: 1 Stars
I was annoyed after seeing this again recently, for the first time since the 1998 centennial. The analysis of Robeson and the USSR is embarrassingly overly simplified and frankly lacking in depth given that the BBC turns out perhaps the greatest television programs and documentaries in the world. The writers and researchers of this BBC documentary seem somewhat new to Robeson and it shows-glaringly so. I even contacted one of the interview subjects (name withheld) whom leads a very well respected career teaching at a top university in the US and in the video made what seems like awful pronouncements about Robeson's life. He told me that his interviews were purposefully edited to show an "anti-robeson" bias and that the producers had their own agenda. He also wrote that he was VERY disappointed with disjointedness and bias of the production.
With only one hour though they made an sadly admirable attempt, but the problem is with Robeson one always wants and expects MUCH more information, given how much has been suppressed. Granted the footage is some of the best in any of the Paul Robeson documentaries including the sections on Peekskill and on the Soviet Union (priceless footage of Robeson at Yalta with Khrushchev) and many Robeson homes and landmarks as they look today. But the written narration is not complex at all, given the subject matter the BBC should have allotted an entire two to three hours. The background music sounds like it should have been used for a funeral. Pete Seeger, Oscar Grant Jr. and Studs Terkel really lay it on harsh though, the way it should be, they don't sugar coat the atrociousness with which Paul Robeson was treated by both the black and white establishment. Pam Grier, one of my favourite screen goddesses narrates but they keep her voice to weaker and softer then it should have been to orally chronicle such a passionate life. You can barely hear her. The sound quality is not the greatest... What the BBC has to offer on Robeson, frankly is an embarrassment given how beloved he was in Great Britain. The radio, world service stuff is even worse than this. One recent world service called him a "simple Negro.." NOT in historical, colloquial context which is outrageous. And shame of shames, the recently aired "American Dream" documentary featured an entire section on the Peeksiall Riots with an indepth interview with Pete Seeger (one of Robeson's dearest friends) and yet NOT ONE MENTION WAS MADE OF ROBESON yet again by the BBC!!!!! Not mentioning Robeson in context with Peekskill is like covering Altamont and never mentioning the Stones or the murder of Meredith Hunter. Just inexcusable that the BBC continues to subtly negate this man's life.
Still, "Speak of me as I am" is recommended if only for the sake of completion in seeing all that is out their on Robeson. DO watch "Here I Stand: American Master PBS" and the less sophisticated (shot on 16,mm during the late 70's on a lower budget) but superior in content and structure 'Tallest Tree in the Forest" directed by Gil Noble, FIRST though. Both are FAR superior to this.
Summary of Paul Robeson - Speak of Me As I Am
Speak Of Me As I Am tells the story of one of America?s foremost African-American citizens, whose courageous stance against oppression and inequality was a forerunner to the civil rights movement of the 1960s. It examines his remarkable life and achievements as a scholar, athlete, artist, social activist and humanitarian. His passion for the stage and screen was matched by his dedication to social justice. Weaving together archive footage of Robeson and interviews with commentators including biographer, Martin Duberman, the film captures the courage and determination that drove Robeson to succeed as a black artist in a white world, to fight against racial inequality in the US and combat oppression around the globe. It traces Robeson?s journey from class valedictorian at university to international stardom and his ultimate fall from grace because of his political views, with which an initially adoring American public could not come to terms."To be free - to walk the good American earth as equal citizens, to live without fear, to enjoy the fruits of our toil, to give our children every opportunity in life - that dream which we have held so long in our hearts is today the destiny that we hold in our hands." ROBESON
Narrator Pam Grier.
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