Uprising

Huey Newton said “I’d rather die on my feet then live on my knees”. The story of Uprising, a film about the rebellion of Jews in the Ghettos of Warsaw during World War II, is a presentation of this philosophy. Germany conquered Poland in about a month during World War II. They isolated the Jews into the Ghettos and then began a process of evacuating Jews to concentration camps where they were killed en mass. Rather than go willingly to their deaths. Heroes in the Warsaw Ghettos fought a hopeless battle against the Germans. The managed to kill many German soldiers and a few of the Jews even escaped to freedom.

I’m generally a sucker for a film with people fighting a hopeless battle and facing their deaths bravely, but it is a little different when the story being portrayed is not a work of fiction. Uprising is very respectful to the people who died in Warsaw. It shows them as human beings who were imperfect, but who were trying to do the right thing. It shows how the anti-Semitism of the allies prevented them from coming to the aid of the successful Jewish fighters. And it showed how the spirit of a people who had been oppressed for millennia could not be destroyed. It is a film which is definitely worth seeing, not just because of its historical content, but because of the quality of the film. It’s worth having in your DVD collection.

Confederate States of America

I was going through the mountains of West Virginia when I first heard of this film. The premise intrigued me, what would the world be like if the South had won the Civil War? I finally got to see it a year later and was not disappointed. The film is set as a documentary of sorts tracking the history and modern life of the Confederate States of America. The South wins the war in the 1860’s spreading slavery through out the United States. It ends up conquering all of Latin America and instituting Jim Crow laws in Mexico.

The film is most interesting when it shows how closely related the United States of American and the Confederate States of America are. It follows a famous politician around as he pontificates about modern issues as they affect the CSA. He could easily be mistaken for a far right religious conservative in his assumptions and belief in his own righteousness. Commercials parodying COPS, shown instead as a show about slave catching, and highlighting brands that really existed in American history, such as Niggerhair cigarettes, the film shows us just close we resembled the CSA for during some portions of our history.

It was a good film, the film is low budget but well executed. It quite enjoyable, being interesting and informative at the same time. The Confederate States of America is worth purchasing and I would recommend that you do so. The director, Kevin Willmott, is a professor at Kansas University and is currently working on a film about a young Native American who escapes the Haskell internment camp.