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Alternately celebrated as a filmic masterpiece and reviled as racist propaganda, The Birth of a Nation has forged its place in America’s cinematic, social, and political history. Originally titled The Clansman, after Reverend Thomas Dixon Jr.’s 1905 play on which the film is based, the film’s adopted title does little to hide its true subject, a three-hour epic of the Civil War, post-war Southern Reconstruction, and development of the Ku Klux Klan...
Appealing to nostalgia for the days of the Old South, The Birth of a Nation was, and still is, used as KKK propaganda to recruit new members. The emotions evoked were so strong that Klan membership peaked in the ten years following the film’s cinematic release...
...calling the film “three miles of filth.” Riots erupted in Boston and Philadelphia and the film was prevented from being shown in eight states. Subsequent re-releases have been accompanied by lawsuits and protests; and in 1998, a large outcry erupted when The Birth of a Nation was named #44 in the American Film Institute’s list of the Top 100 American Films...
Particularly interesting are the varied opinions of eminent scholars and leaders of the time. Former University President Charles E. Eliot, Class of 1853, protested The Birth of a Nation and headed the NAACP’s campaign to remove the most offensive scenes from the film; conversely, President Woodrow Wilson’s reaction was much more drastic. After a private screening at the White House, he said, “It’s like writing history with lightning. And my only regret is that it is all terribly true...
Regardless of the storyline or Griffith’s personal history, The Birth of a Nation would likely still find a place in film history for its numerous technical innovations in cinematography. These included the development of the iris shot, in which the camera focuses on a particular visual detail of a shot and blacks out the surrounding scenery, and the development of coloring frames to highlight a scene’s mood...