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Cinéma & Cie. Film and Media Studies Journal
Linda Williams, Playing the Race Card: Melodramas of Black and White from Uncle Tom to O.J. Simpson (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001)
Text.Serial.Journal
https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/cinemaetcie
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2003-03-01
2022-12-03
2003-03-01
2024-02-14
Cinéma & Cie
Lauren Rabinovitz
2003/03/01
2036-461X
2
en
Linda Williams, Playing the Race Card: Melodramas of Black and White from Uncle Tom to O.J. Simpson (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001)
https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/cinemaetcie/article/download/19221/17214
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personaggio trova un suo corrispondente,            dell’oggetto “cinema muto”, a partire dalle
simile ed “altro” nello stesso tempo (appog-        consapevolezze sulla conservazione di quel
giandosi anche a fonti letterarie: The              patrimonio, da esigenze di ordine filologico, da
Birthmark di Nathaniel Hawthorne, ad esem-          una nuova impostazione metodologica. Che
pio). La situazione potrà non essere nuovissi-      un romanzo costruisca una storia su queste
ma, nelle sue relazioni con il cinema, ma qui è     basi appare come la sanzione più forte, incon-
ribadita con una radicalità e una sistematicità     trovertibile dell’acquisizione, istituzionale, di
inconsuete e più profonde. Coinvolta non è          tali trasformazioni. Con tutte le contraddizio-
solo una materia narrativa (ove si disegna un       ni che esse ancora contengono. Pure nell’epoca
rapporto di affinità tra il destino di Hector       del DVD e della digitalizzazione più estesa, sul
Mann e quello del professore/narratore), coin-      lavoro dello storico continuano a pesare i para-
volto non è solo il piano esistenziale (e tutto     dossi segnalati dal narratore: “I spent three
romanzesco) dei due destini, ma un po’ tutto        months watching old movies, and than I loc-
ciò che ruota attorno al sistema “cinema”, fino     ked myself in a room and spent nine months
alle caratteristiche della voce off, principio      writing about them. It’s probably the strangest
utilizzato in tutti i film dell’”ultimo periodo”    thing I’ve ever done. I was writing about
di Hector Mann, attentamente analizzata e           things I couldn’t see anymore, and I had to pre-
messa in valore dal protagonista.                   sent them in purely visual terms. The whole
   Il cinema è associato, inoltre, sempre, a una    experience was like a hallucination” (p. 64).
situazione di perdita. E qui non è solo in que-
stione la sorte dei film del passato, emblema-
tizzata nelle vicende di quelli del comico, del     1   Ringrazio Werner Sudendorf per la segnalazio-
primo o dell’ultimo periodo. Il professore ini-         ne del libro.
zia ad occuparsi di cinema dopo la morte della      2   Ecco l’inizio del saggio: “Before the body, there
moglie e dei figli; un altro personaggio scrive-        is the face, and before the face there is the thin
rà una biografia dell’attore dopo la morte della        black line between Hector’s nose and upper lip.
madre; Hector Mann riprenderà a girare film             A twitching filament of anxieties, a metaphysi-
(che non avrebbero mai dovuto avere un pub-             cal jump rope, a dancing thread of discombobu-
blico) dopo la morte del figlio… Emerge dalle           lation, the mustache is a seismograph of
pagine di Paul Auster un’idea di cinema con-            Hector’s inner states, and not only does it make
nessa a funzioni di riparazione e compensa-             you laugh, it tells you what Hector is thinking,
zione. Il film è un fantasma: presente e visibi-        actually allows you into the machinery of his
le, ma conseguenza di una scomparsa essen-              thoughts. […] None of this would be possible
ziale. Ovvero: il cinema è potenziamento del-           without the intervention of the camera. The
l’esistenza, ma determinato da una situazione           intimacy of the talking mustache is a creation
di crisi. E’ Chateaubriand, ora, ad essere chia-        of the lens. At various moments in each of
mato in causa: “Les moments de crise produi-            Hector’s films, the angle suddendly changes,
sent un redoublement de vie chez les hom-               and a wide or medium shot is replaced by a
mes” (p. 238). L’esergo del romanzo (ancora             close-up.” (p. 29).
Chateaubriand) tuttavia recita: “ L’homme n’a
pas une seule et même vie; il en a plusieurs
mises bout à bout, et c’est sa misère”…
   Ma il dato forse più originale è che in questo   SELECTED BY: LAUREN
romanzo viene “novellizzata” è una situazione       RABINOVITZ
frutto della ricerca più recente (quella cui
CINEMA & Cie ha dedicato il suo primo nume-          Linda Williams, Playing the Race Card:
ro…), quella che ha portato alla rifondazione       Melodramas of Black and White from Uncle

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Tom to O.J. Simpson (Princeton: Princeton           subject historically to criticism of “feminine
University Press, 2001)                             excesses.” First, these films are unlike west-
                                                    erns or gangster films that have been per-
   Well-known for her scholarship on feminist       ceived within film studies as preoccupied with
film theory and melodrama as well as for her        masculine cultural values. Second, this corpus
groundbreaking study of pornography (Hard           engages action and realism in the service of
Core: Power, Pleasure, and the Frenzy of the        sensation, sentiment, and feel-good moralism:
Visible), author Linda Williams takes on            they achieve the merger of “morality and feel-
American film melodrama as the primary nar-         ing into emphatically imagined communities
rative mode for dealing with the national           forged in the pain and suffering of innocent
struggle over race relations. She first carefully   victims, and in the actions of those who seek
defines melodrama not so much as a genre but        to rescue them” (p. 21).
as a mode that has been highly suitable (and           2) Williams contends that melodrama can-
stable) for expressing an evolving national pre-    not be understood fully within the confines of
occupation. In this way, Williams moves her         classical cinema. In this regard, she rejects the
project out of film genre studies – where so        overarching definition of classical Hollywood
many previous discussions regarding melodra-        cinema as a container for “genres” in general,
ma have taken place – into an expanded arena        for looking at how groups of American films
of cultural studies. Her goal is to explain the     adhere to or depart from a “classical” norm. It
narratives and tropes that have anchored “the       is because of the normative category of classi-
primary way in which mainstream American            cal Hollywood cinema, she argues, that melo-
culture has dealt with the moral dilemma of         drama is seen in the first place as “excessive.”
having first enslaved and then withheld equal       Rather, she opts for what is now fashionably
rights to generations of African Americans” (p.     known as an “inter-medial” definition of
44). Williams, therefore, aims at broad political   melodrama, one that takes into account melo-
concerns but ones that are less about cinema’s      drama as a form of representation and story-
general relationship to ideology and culture        telling in literature, in the theater, and ulti-
than about a deeply-felt concern for defining       mately in the tabloid press. An inter-medial
American-ness, of “just who we mean when we         definition opens up her corpus even further:
say ‘we’ are a nation” (p. 44).                     melodramas prior to classical Hollywood cin-
   But if her subject addresses content specific    ema and even prior to cinema may be com-
to an American national identity, her histori-      pared and become important for long-range
cal trajectory of movie melodramas as a vehi-       historical continuities and the origins for
cle for representing racial identity and strife     today’s racial narratives.
proceeds from three major arguments that               3) She therefore rejects outright the idea
have broad implications for film genre studies      that melodrama is a genre at all. Her claim
in general. 1) Williams asserts that melodrama      offers a bold feminist thesis regarding film
as a category encompasses more than the             theory and history:
group of women’s pictures that first gave rise
to putative definitions of melodrama as “femi-        Narrative cinema as a whole has been theo-
nine excess” and then to feminist recupera-         rized as a realist, inherently masculine medi-
tions of melodrama. Following the line of rea-      um whose ‘classical’ features were supposedly
soning of melodrama critics from Peter Brooks       anathema to its melodramatic infancy and
to Christine Gledhill, Williams submits a cor-      childhood […] Melodrama has been viewed
pus that includes a wide range of social prob-      either as that which the ‘classical’ cinema has
lem films about everyday life.1 There is good       grown up out of, or that to which it some-
reason that this expanded corpus has been           times regresses (p. 17).

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   Instead of a genre, melodrama is a “modali-        novel and play. She examines three different
ty of narrative with a high quotient of pathos        texts for a variation of narratives through
and action” (p. 17). Williams’ key texts for          which the Tom backlash narrative of black
analysis here are the multiple manifestations         male sexual threat emerges. But she does lit-
(novel, play, and/or film) of Uncle Tom’s             tle to explain that this backlash against the
Cabin (1903), The Birth of a Nation (1915), The       “suffering Tom” narrative occurred only
Jazz Singer (1927), Show Boat (1936), Gone            when African Americans migrated in record
with the Wind (1939), Roots (1977), the “texts”       numbers from rural southern counties to
surrounding the Rodney King police beating            Southern and northern cities, found expand-
case (1991-92) and O. J. Simpson’s televised          ed job opportunities during the labor short-
trial for murder and its subsidiary texts (ca.        age of World War One, and asserted a work-
1995) (the dates for fictional texts above are        ing class African American culture within
for film and television versions rather than          northern white cities. American cities were
original novels and plays).                           dominated by non-white and non-native
   Two racial narratives bind this intercon-          born citizens, who brought religious, sexual,
nected chain of melodramatic texts: one she           and cultural values that threatened those of
labels the “Tom” narrative and the other is the       white, nativist Americans. The “anti-Tom”
reversal of it called the “anti-Tom” narrative.       narrative found voice amidst the onset of
The former features the beating, suffering,           immigration restrictions and even mass scale
and victimization of a “good” black man,              deportations, nativist preaching, wide-scale
which lends virtue and humanity to slaves             segregation and discrimination laws, a
and former slaves. The latter inverts the histo-      national epidemic of lynchings, and major
ry of racial abuse against African Americans          race riots in several American cities. In other
and casts the African American male as an             words, Williams neglects the power and func-
arrogant villain who poses a threat of rape and       tion of her narratives within larger spheres of
endangerment to suffering white women. The            cultural power. Hers is a textual study, an
cycle of these two narratives for more than a         excellent one that compares the important
century and continuing up through two                 relationships among texts not usually consid-
recent nationally-televised trials demon-             ered side-by-side in genre studies. But, as an
strates the wide extent to which victimization        explanation of cultural power, it treats liter-
as a melodramatic form of moral power has             ary narratives as though they operate in a
played a prominent role at different times, for       somewhat self-contained, insular fashion.
different individuals, and in different ways in       Such a criticism should not be leveled solely
defining American racial politics.                    at Williams, who here dramatizes cultural
   Williams’ analyses of individual examples          studies at its best, but at the short-sightedness
are smart, richly rewarding interpretations           of American cultural studies as a historical
that read the texts within and against existing       method.
criticism. To each case study, she brings to             What Williams does accomplish is a mas-
bear a synthesis of the best scholarship              terful interweaving of film criticism and the
already accomplished on that example. The             complex historical depth to today’s disturb-
single limitation of her approach is one of cul-      ing racial values. She makes a persuasive argu-
tural studies in general: there is little sensitiv-   ment for how the past conditions the present
ity to the reality outside the texts that gave        – that we continue to be ready to feel sympa-
them power at specific historical moments for         thy only for the suffering and victimization of
specific historical reasons.                          either white women or black men. Such a
   For example, Williams studies The Birth of         Manichean polarity and cycle of victims and
a Nation as a case of adaptation from both            villains are ultimately tales of race, gender,

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and power. They both serve not only to erase            where the critical activity is deliberately
the African American woman and justify her              atheoretical or programmatically post-theo-
continued abuse but to serve up a disturbing            retical. This volume deals with the other-
narrative of national identity.                         ness, expressed and documented not only by
   The extent to which Williams has hit upon            the works exhibited in the Platform 5 –
a basic nerve of the American character and             works which are oriented towards the cross-
its history can best be illustrated here for an         ing of thresholds and of frontiers between
Italian audience by the 1997 curtain call of            territories, bodies, minds, texts, societies,
The Birth of a Nation at Le Giornate del                signs, etc. – but also by the expositive context
Cinema Muto in Pordenone. When the con-                 itself.
ductor turned to an onscreen picture of direc-             Documenta 11, as maintained by its curator,
tor D.W. Griffith, the mostly Italian audience          Okwui Enwezor,
rose as one and gave a thundering ovation of
applause and cheers. The Americans scattered              was conceived not as an exhibition but as a
throughout the audience sat dumbfounded,                constellation of public spheres. The public
unable to applaud or react. The difference in           sphere of the exhibition gesture, implicit in
cultural understanding was telling: in Italy,           the historical formation of Documenta, in
the film is a stunning achievement of film art;         which art comes to stand for models of repre-
for Americans, as Williams so effectively               sentation and narratives of autonomous sub-
shows, the film represents a landmark in a              jectivity, is rearticulated here as a new under-
complicated racial history of shame and                 standing in the domain of the discursive
denial that is reenacted regularly in today’s           rather than the museological.1
racial politics and injustices.
                                                           Enwezor presents a new curatorial model,
                                                        consisting of an experimentation of the “plat-
1    P. Brooks, The Melodramatic Imagination            form” concept as referring to world cultures
    (New Haven: Yale University Press, reprint          and to their geography – traced out by histori-
    1976); Ch. Gledhill, “The Melodramatic Field:       cal and contemporary conflicts –, according to
    An Investigation,” in Ch. Gledhill (ed.), Home Is   the following thematic paths: Democracy
    Where the Heart Is: Studies in Melodrama and        Unrealized (Platform 1, Vienna); Experiments
    the Woman’s Film (London: BFI, 1987).               with Truth: Transitional Justice and the
                                                        Processes of Truth and Reconciliation
                                                        (Platform 2, New Delhi); Créolité and
                                                        Creolization (Platform 3, St. Lucia, West
SELECTED BY: COSETTA SABA                               Indies); Under Siege: Four African Cities
                                                        Freetown, Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Lagos
  Documenta 11 Platform 5: Exhibition.                  (Platform 4, Lagos).
Catalogue, Kassel, June 8 – September 15, 2002             The discourse of Documenta 11, planned by
(Ostfildern-Ruit: Hatje Cantz Publishers, 2002,         Enwezor together with his co-curators, high-
English edition)                                        lights through works of art, the theme of the
                                                        difference between Postmodernism and
  The catalogue of Documenta 11 Platform 5:             Postcoloniality, in a context of modernity.
Exhibition outlines a circuit of attention on           Enwezor asserts that
the otherness of art, producing at the same
time a short circuit of our attention on the              postcoloniality must at all times be distin-
same subject: a “behind the times” operation,           guished from postmodernism. While post-
which muddles modern Western societies,                 modernism was preoccupied with relativiz-

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