Caricatural representation
In the early twentieth century colored people appeared only as ignorant , wild and brutal people.
You can see below different types of characters who represented black people in the American movies of the twentieth century.
1: The coon:
The term comes from "racoon". It dehumanizes the colored man who is shown as ignorant, lazy and devoid of courage.
Examples of movies:
"Wooing and wedding of a coon" (1905); "The masher" (1907).
2: The tragic Mulatto:
She is a metis woman who act like a white woman and leads a peaceful and happy life until she discovers her African origins. It is the worst situation that she could know. She becomes alcoholic and depressed, she is stuck in a such despair that she ended up to committing suicide.
This character was played by metis actresses and white actresses.
For example Dorothy Dandridge, a metis woman, has plaid a mulatto. She was the frist colored actress on the cover of Life Magazine.
The Mulatto is not only a character because in this era metis women were victims of racist prejudices and were the target of sexual harassers.
Examples of movies: "The debt (1912); In Humanity's cause, In slavery days, The octoroon" (1913); "Within Our Gates" (1919).
3: The Mammy:
She is the representation of an imposing and maternal black servant. She is so devoted to the white family she serves that she does not want to leave them.
Example of movie: "Gone With The Wind" (1939).
4: The Tom:
The Tom is an old black man. He is often a cook or a waiter. He is loyal to white people and he is always smiling even if he undergoes physical violence. He is hard-working.
Examples of movies: "Uncle Tom's Cabin" (1903); "Gone with the wind" (1939).
5: The buck:
He is a wild criminal seen as an animal. The black brute is best known as a white woman's rapist.
The Buck was actually a myth invented and used to justify the lynchings that allowed the control of the colored people, terrifyed them. This myth appeared at the time of reconstruction and has spread through the decades .
Example of a movie: "The Birth of a Nation" (1915) .
A turn in colored people's history in cinema: The black brute.
The Birth of a Nation
In 1915, D.W. Griffith made "The Birth of a Nation" inspired by Thomas F. Dixon's novel, The Clansman. The movie and the novel are about the rape of a white woman by a black man (a brute).
So at this point appears a new way to represent colored people: The Buck or The brute.
To Kill a Mocking Bird
Robert Mulligan made in 1962 "To Kill a Mocking Bird" , an adaptation of Harper Lee's novel. It is about Atticus Finch, a court-appointed lawyer that defends a black man accused of raping a white woman.
The appearance of Race movies
Face to this negative caricatures , some moviemakers have tried to improve the image of African-Americans.
For example, in 1918 John Emmett J. and Scott W.Noble produced "The birth of a Race" in response to the openly racist movie: Birth of a Nation 1915 .
1916 is the beginning of the Race Movies, movies created by Blacks for Blacks.
After the First World War about 150 production companies of Race Movies are created. For example the Western Black Film Company, the Colored Players Film Corporation and the most famous: the Lincoln Motion Picture Company.
But among the 150 companies only half of them have produced films, the other lacked funding. There are more and more movie theaters for the black audience.
The first talking pictures of Race Movie is "The Exile" directed by Oscar Micheaux in 1931.
Oscar Micheaux
Oscar Micheaux is the most famous director of Race Movies. He made forty movies between 1916 and 1948. His career is divided into two periods. The first, that of silent movies where he did not hesitate to denounce injustices such as rape and lynching that the colored people suffered from and also evokes even more taboo subjects like love between black and white persons or passing (when a metis with very fair skin passes as a white persona). Then a second period that begins with the appearance of talking pictures where Oscar Micheaux moves towards a more Hollywood cinema.
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