Filmmaker
Stanley Nelson is, without question, one of the most important documentary filmmakers
working today. His many films, such as “Freedom Riders,” “A Place of our Own,” and “Marcus
Garvey: Look for Me in the Whirlwind” have explored various aspects of black life, politics and culture, and how they still resonate today with us.
And
now the Award winning, MacArthur Fellowship filmmaker continues, as he did with “Freedom Riders,” exploring and telling the story of the Civil Rights Movement, with “Freedom Summer,” which chronicles the summer of 1964 in Mississippi, when over 700
student volunteers from around the country joined organizers and local African
Americans in a historic effort to shatter the foundations of white supremacy, in
what was one of the nation’s most viciously racist, segregated states. The film
will make its broadcast premiere on PBS’ American Experience Tuesday June 24th.
Just
yesterday, I had a chance to talk to Stanley about his new film, his filmmaking carreer start, and why he feels the need to make documentary films.
SERGIO: I’ve
never asked this before to a documentary filmmaker, but why documentaries, instead of feature films? Is it because real events are inherently more
dramatic and compelling than any fiction story you could dream up?
NELSON:
I
agree with that entirely, but that’s… (laughs)… not my story entirely. I went to
film school in the early 70’s and that was the age of “Super Fly” and “Blacula.”
SERGIO: Yeah
the stuff I grew up with and still love…
NELSON: (laughs)
And it was the first time that I had ever seen African Americans not only in front
of the camera, but behind the camera as well. So I went to film school really
to make fiction films, and that is what I was interested in. So I got out and I
was looking for work, and I just happened to wonder into documentary filmmaker
Bill Greaves’ (“Booker T.Washington: Life and Legacy,” “Frederick Douglass: An American Life,” “Symbiopsychotaxiplasm”) office and I started working with him, and I got hooked, loved
what I did, and loved making documentaries.
And I loved the idea of .being able
to work sort of continuously. You didn’t spend year after year after year writing
a project, pitching a project, being turned down, writing another one then pitching again, etc. But by working with Bill, and working on my own stuff, I got
better at what I did because I was working continuously on my own stuff.
SERGIO: So
you feel that you have more freedom as a documentary filmmaker, because you make
what you want to make instead of, like narrative filmmakers, who try too many times,
to make something like another film that they think will appeal to an audience?
You make what you believe in; what moves you.
NELSON: Well
I kind of think it works both ways. You have to raise money, and those sorts of
things, and the idea of doing something that does appeal to people. But nowadays
with the lighter equipment that filmmakers are using in production and post-production, it’s easier now to make fiction films that look good and can be
about anything.
But I must say that we have not yet seen the kind of explosion
of different voices in films that I had hoped would come with this new lighter
equipment; but hopefully one day soon that will happen.
SERGIO: Well, as I always say, the great thing about this new technology in filmmaking is that
anyone can make a film, and the bad thing with all this new technology is that
anyone can make a film…
NELSON: I
agree. But let me add that, one of the things that we do here at my production
company Firelight, is what we call Producers Lab, and we work with 15 to 20
filmmakers of color and help them to get their documentary films done and
broadcast on the air, and it’s been a huge success. We have 8 documentaries of
feature length that will on the air in this calendar year and it just keeps
growing strong.
SERGIO: Going
back to Freedom Summer, you have made, of late, quite a few documentaries about the Civil Rights struggle during the
1960’s. Do you think one of the reasons why is because younger generations have
no real knowlege of an important aspect of American history which wasn’t even
that long ago?
NELSON: Well
I think one of the great gifts that I’ve been given is the opportunity to make
films about the Civil Rights Movement, and as you said it wasn’t even that long ago.
50, 60 years ago. And there are so many people alive, who are still vibrant, who
were part of that, and can still talk about it. There’s so much great footage, great
pictures and great stories that we don’t know.
It’s really surprising how
little people know about the Civil Rights Movement, and one of the startling
things that has happened is showing “Freedom Riders” and “Freedom Summer” to
groups of immigrants, people who have recently come to this country. And their
reaction to the films, they are like “WHAT? We had no idea your people have been
treated like that!” I mean they literally had no idea about segregation,
about Jim Crow, about lynchings, about black people being denied the right to
vote, being denied the right to full citizenship. I mean they never even heard about it.
So I
think it‘s really important for a number of reasons, not just for historical
reasons. And also it colors everything that happens in the United States today.
So if you don’t know what happened in the past, then how does anything that
goes on today make sense?
SERGIO: You’re
absolutely right! All you have to do is just look at the current news. They’re
still dealing with the same issues, just in a different way. The more things
change, the more they stay the same.
NELSON: Right,
but it’s also really important for us to understand how racist – how outright
racist – this country was just 50 years ago. And sure, this country has changed,
changed massively, but to understand that, you have to understand some of subtleties,
the racist things, that are going on today; To take a peek behind the curtain
and understand what’s going on; the subtext and the hidden agendas of what we
see constantly in the media today.
SERGIO: You
talk about the reactions that immigrants have to your films, but what is the reaction
from young people? And the reason I bring that up, and I know I am painting
with a very broad brush, but it seems to me that the young generation, the
millennials as they are called, have no interest in history, or the past. When I was
younger, I, like my peers, were fascinated by history. We couldn’t get enough of
it.
NELSON: The
reaction I get from younger viewers has just been incredible. Standing
ovations, just amazing questions, so I think when young people are confronted
with history, and are shown history, they are very involved and really want to
know more. I think one of the problems is that, there’s a general perception in
the United States that we sort of live on this island, and that nobody can touch
us. So, we don’t have the same interest that, say, people in Europe, have, where the countries are all closer together, or like you can walk to China from
India. You see, they’re all connected. So here we’re on an island, and we don’t
really feel or care what happens in, say, Mexico. We’re on an island and nothing
can touch us, and that’s our attitude.
But I do think that one of the important things with young
people is that they are still aware that there are problems and things that
need to be fixed, though they may not necessarily know how to fix them; and also
because they are so distracted. There is so much distraction going on with all
this new technology, compared to what we had when we were younger. It’s hard to
filter out all those distractions.
SERGIO: You’re
right. Look at what people do now, everyone is looking down, always at their iPads or iPhones, with earplugs ,closed off in their own secret worlds. No
one makes eye contact anymore with anyone. No communication.
NELSON: Yeah, I think that young people will have to figure that out for themselves. I don’t
want to sound like a fuddy duddy, or an old man, but it’s up to them. It’s a new
world and somehow the new technology has to be more connected to the real world,
the physical world, that you can touch and hold and feel. Somehow the technology
will find a way to be used in that way.
SERGIO: Finally, what makes you decide on a subject to make a documentary about? You have no doubt
many subjects to pick and choose from that interest you; so what is it about a particular
subject that screams at you and says, “Make me, make me!”?
NELSON: Great
question. Well, my current project that I am working on now, that will be
finished by the fall, is about The Black Panthers. But going back to my first
film, “Two Dollars and A Dream,” about Madame C.J. Walker. That film took me
7 years to make, and that made me realize that, when I enter into a film, it
may be a long journey, and that it has to be something that is really important
to me That I am willing to make, what may be a 3, or 5 or 7 year journey to get
a project completed. So because
of that, I’m going to stay the course, and [make sure] that it’s something that is also very
important to the rest of the country, and the rest of the world as well.
Here’s an exclusive clip from Freedom Summer:
