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Nov
11
    

Before Ken Burns’ Jazz hit the airwaves last January, the critical sparks started flying. Some reviewers disliked the political emphasis that related the plight of African Americans to jazz development. Others noted the lack of footage of post-1960’s jazz and every fan named at least one musician who should’ve been covered, but wasn’t. Oddly, all of this criticism occurred within the jazz world, an audience that Jazz never really considered. Since the film never meant to be more than a lengthy introduction, centered on social and political elements, most of the analysis missed its mark.

Like Jazz, American Roots Music has so much to offer it would be unfortunate if roots fans got sidetracked. In four one-hour programs, American Roots Music introduces viewers to the folk, country, bluegrass, gospel, zydeco, Cajun, Tex-Mex, and Native American music that has simmered and boiled in a huge US melting pot over the last hundred years. Because it covers so much ground, American Roots Music never pretends to be more than a thorough introduction to the major styles and artists. While the program does cover several contemporary artists—Bela Fleck, Gillian Welch, and Keb’ Mo’—it’s mostly concerned with the founders of a particular genre and how it developed. That means that the section on folk covers Woody Guthrie, Leadbelly, and Pete Seeger but bypasses John Gorka and Sam Bush.

For non-insiders, American Roots Music offers the perfect introduction. One shouldn’t worry too much over the use of “roots” as opposed to folk or traditional. Director Jim Brown, like a number of modern commentators, simply felt it was more inclusive than older terms (folk, for instance, has seldom been used to describe zydeco or Native-American music).

While each emigrant brought his or her own songs to Plymouth and Jamestown, it wasn’t until the music began to intermingle that it became a uniquely American music. During the twentieth century scholars and musicians began to recognize the distinct heritage of American music while the phonograph, radio, and TV made regional music available to everyone.

Early on, roots fans and the curious will find much to like about American Roots Music. In the first segment, “When First Unto This Country,” Kris Kristofferson narrates the rise of County music in the 1920’s and 1930’s. There’s the wonderful story of how talent scout Ralph Peer accidentally tapped into a brand new rural market by recording Fiddlin’ John Carson, and how he discovered both Jimmy Rodgers and the Carter Family during sessions in Bristol, Tennessee. These stories may be familiar to the faithful, but the cream of the coverage includes rare footage of these founding fathers and mothers of yesteryear. There’s a wonderful clip of Rodgers singing “Waiting for a Train,” and when part one turns to the blues, a potent clip of Son House shouting as he flails his guitar. Another nice touch is the comments of latter day musicians like Merle Haggard and Ricky Skaggs on the early founders.

Segment three, “The Times, They Are A-Changin’,” dips into the electric blues and folk revival of the ‘50s and ‘60s. There’s a fun clip of the Kingston Trio, decked out in their pinstriped shirts and singing their mega-hit, “Tom Dooley.” (A folk purist, watching this clip, might even be tempted to point out that banjo player Dave Guard seems to hit the wrong note on the intro.) And who could resist a youthful Peter, Paul, and Mary singing, “If I Had a Hammer, ” or Bob Dylan singing the anthem that gave name to this particular segment? It is particularly engaging to hear Peter Yarrow and Pete Seeger sort out Dylan’s “betrayal” of the folk community when he plugged in an electric guitar at the Newport Folk Festival in ’65. Between Yarrow calling Dylan “Bobby” and Seeger saying how much he liked “Maggie’s Farm” (the amplifiers were just turned up too loud), one would never guess what a spat this incident caused. Traditional performers like Doc Watson and Mike Seeger also recall the heady revival days and even take time to play a song or two.

There’s much more. The rise of modern gospel. Nice clips of Mahalia Jackson and the Staple Singers. Sections on Cajun popularizer Dewey Balfa and contemporary Native-American performer Robert Mirabal. Interviews with Keith Richards, Gillian Welch, and Bonnie Raitt. And a nice folksy narrative by Kristofferson.

Perhaps the outstanding achievement of American Roots Music is the number of rare clips that have surfaced. Imagine seeing a film of Leadbelly, including color footage, singing, “Pick a Bale of Cotton,” or Woody Guthrie singing “John Henry.” There’s old footage of Lefty Frizzell, Howlin’ Wolf, Bill Monroe, Muddy Waters, and dozens of others. Bob Dylan was kind enough to lend his extensive private video collection—put together by Jeff Rosen—to the project. It probably didn’t hurt that the Country Music Hall of Fame, the Smithsonian, and the Rock Hall of Fame backed the program. If for no other reason, these fabulous clips make American Roots Music worth seeing.

Of course none of this would’ve tied together so seamlessly without the guiding hand of director Jim Brown. While Burns approached jazz as a novice, Brown has emerged himself in film projects surrounding roots music for twenty-five years. He won an Emmy for The Weavers: Wasn’t That A Time!, directed programs on Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly, and worked with Alan Lomax on the American Patchwork series. This familiarity guarantees that the knowledgeable roots fan will not be jumping up from his or her Lazy Boy every few minutes to correct a mistake in the narrative. Brown also seems to be on good terms with most of the folk community because a number of high profile musicians—Pete Seeger, Ricky Skaggs—gave freely of their time. Brown’s familiarity assures that American Roots Music is warmer and more all embracing than your average music documentary.

One could mention that American Roots Music is educational and then talk about how the program will help Americans better understand their ethnic heritage. But “educational” always sounds a bit drab and this program isn’t drab. It’s shot-through with the wonderful music that has built the foundation for all American music, from rock to pop to country. For roots fans it offers a chance to see old footage of heroes and listen to contemporary musicians discuss—on national TV—folk, bluegrass, and the blues. For those unfamiliar with roots music, the program will be a fascinating history lesson. Either way, American Roots Music offers an opportunity for all Americans to learn about and celebrate the multiple roots and branches of their distinct and rich musical heritage.

Ronnie D. Lankford, Jr.
doanechristine@msn.com

American Roots Music will begin broadcasting nationally on October 29th. Check www.pbs.org for local listings.


 
Nov
11
    

There were no ceremonies to mark the day when Mary Todd Lincoln left the White House. She had remained secluded in her room for a month following her husband’s assassination, too distressed to attend his funeral. Now she and her son Tad boarded a train to Chicago, Illinois, leaving the White House for the last time. They would not stay in Chicago for long. Mary was restless, and many believed her grip on reality was slipping. She moved from hotel to hotel, resided with her sister, and even stayed in a mental institution for a short time. Mary Todd Lincoln would live a shattered and isolated life until her death in 1882, 17 years after her husband’s death.

Click here to read the full review by Ronnie D. Lankford Jr.


 
Nov
11
    

28UP begins with a set of questions that seems to hark back to the sociological and psychological ideas of the ‘40s and ‘50s. Is an individual’s personality fully formed at age seven? Will his or her class status bear heavily on life decisions? Will the education one receives be central to one’s career choices? Director Michael Apted goes one better by re-visiting the same group of individuals at seven-year intervals to ask each of these questions once again.

Click here to read the full review by Ronnie D. Lankford Jr.


 
Oct
02
    

Imagine the emotions a soldier might feel on seeing his wife for the first time after being held in captivity in a North Vietnamese prison for eight years. Imagine that same soldier seeing his children for the first time in eight years. Watching film footage of American POWs returning to enthusiastic crowds in early-1973 makes imagining such scenes easy. These scenes of families reuniting—families who had believed they might never see one another again—would evoke an emotional patriotism from even the most cynical.

“Return With Honor” explores the lives of a number of American pilots who were captured and retained in North Vietnamese prisons for up to eight and a half years. 462 Navy and Air Force pilots were held at a number of prisons in and around Hanoi. Directors Freida Lee Mock and Terry Sanders allow the pilots to tell the stories of their capture, hardships, and return home, in their own words. The directors supplement these narratives with rare film footage from Vietnamese sources.

Between 1964 and the death of Ho Chi Minh in 1969, pilots like Lt. Ron Bliss and Major Tom Madison endured physical and mental torture from their North Vietnamese captors. Many were isolated, living in rat-infested cells where they slept on concrete floors. Their captors, hoping to learn useful information such as flight patterns, tortured them with beatings, and by using ropes to cut off their circulation and to pull their shoulders out of socket. “There’s a point,” Captain Bill Baugh confesses, “where you’ve had it. Where you loose control of your bowels, you throw-up. You’ll sell your mother down the river in a heart beat.” Baugh’s solution, like many other pilots, was to start making up stories, inventing harmless targets in order to fool their captors.

The term “return with honor” became a motto for these soldiers. The repeated torture would force them to reveal more than their name, rank, and serial number, but they would refuse to reveal anything that would truly help the enemy. They would feed their captors information, but nothing that would cause them to be ashamed when they returned home. This may seem quaint in a time when many continue to look at Vietnam as a mistake. Still, pilots like Lt. Tom McNish expressed nothing but steadfastness in continuing to serve the United States, even as a prisoner of war. They believed that their country would remember them and eventually bring them home (which it did). Even when the North Vietnamese showed the prisoners film footage of the war protests in America, their resolve remained unwavering. “If we didn’t question the value of the war as we went into it,” Lt. Commander Bob Shumaker states, “sitting in prison wasn’t the time to start re-examining whether we ought to be there or not.”

“Return With Honor” is a moving documentary about human endurance under the worst possible circumstances. Because of their experiences, these pilots would never see life in the same way. “I think that few people are rarely called upon to use everything they have,” Lt. JG Everett Alvarez says when recalling his experience. “And once you go through something like that . . . these day to day ordeals and stresses and crisis. They’re not crises. They’re nothing.” “Return With Honor” views the Vietnam War from the point of view of soldiers who served their country bravely and have no regrets about doing so. Clearly this sobering and emotional documentary offers a fresh look at a war that continues to haunt many Americans.

Ronnie D. Lankford, Jr.
lankford@dellnet.com
Credits

Freida Lee Mock—Director/Screenwriter
Terry Sanders—Director/Cinematographer/Screenwriter
Eddie Marritz—Cinematographer
Greg Byers—Editor
Charles Bernstein—Composer (Music Score)
Christine Z. Wiser—Co-producer/Screenwriter

“Return With Honor” will air on PBS on November 13, 2000.


 
Jun
04
    

Woodrow Wilson has always been easy for liberals to like.  He was a reformer during the Progressive era, establishing an eight-hour workday, outlawing child labor, and busting trusts.  He instituted the federal income tax and the Federal Reserve System, and created the parameters of American foreign policy that remain with us today.  He also served as the great liberal link between Andrew Jackson and FDR, bringing the concept of a strong central government into the Democratic Party.  Indeed, he becomes something of a father figure for 20th century liberalism.

Click here for the full review by Ronnie D. Lankford, Jr.


 
May
28
    

On November 25, 1999, three Cuban refugees were rescued off the coast of Florida. It was a story made for Thanksgiving, and one the refugees, six-year old Elián Gonzolas, quickly captured the imaginations of two countries. The situation, though, would soon be overwhelmed by politics. Castro demanded that the boy be returned to be his father in Cuba; the Cuban-American community insisted that he belonged in the United States. The Thanksgiving rescue story, and Elián himself, would soon be lost within the controversy.

Click here for the full review by Ronnie D. Lankford, Jr.


 
May
28
    

Once upon a time, one worried about protecting his or her kids from the type of porn one might find at the local drugstore.   In that quaint time, placing a brown cover over the offending material, or simply putting the magazines behind the counter, solved much of the problem.  With the internet, however, the problem has become more pervasive and invasive.  Spam and pop-up ads attack even the most pure-at-heart computer user, while libraries force even their god-fearing patrons to sign pledges to avoid smutty-net pages.  But what if some curious kid really wants to find smutty-net pages?  Well, the net shows little prejudice.  Almost anyone, it seems, can hook up to a computer somewhere that will reveal a world that will make the old Hustlers look tame.  Call it a new kind of democracy.

Click here for the review by Ronnie D. Lankford Jr.