Post by Jim MacGregor on Mar 30, 2006 9:40:58 GMT -5
This article was taken from the Detroit News, The Weekend Guide, Page 3f. It does not give a source as to where to obtain this video, but I found it interesting nonetheless.
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'CSA' asks 'What if South won?'
Review
'CSA: The Confederate States of America'
Grade B+
Not rated but contains racially
provocative material.
Running time: 89 minutes
By Tom Long
Detroit News Film Critic
Funny, disturbing, smart and conciously outrageous, "CSA: The Confederate States of America" is the short film that could have been botched really badly. But instead, writer-director Kevin Willmott pulls off a surprising juggling act of awful possibilities and near realities that manages to entertain at the same time it enflames.
"CSA" is presented as a British documentary being shown on American television for the first time, with commercials and newsbreaks and all the usual interruptions. The documentary is a look at what happened after the Confederacy won the Civil War.
Yes, that's right, in this reality the Confederates won the war, New York and Boston were burned to the ground and Abraham Lincoln became a fugitive wearing blackface. The United States became the Confederate States, and its slave-based economy eventually took over all of latin America, as well as South America.
Willmott shows us all of this with a Ken Burns-style mockumentary that uses actual old photos and movie clips, fake re-enactments of historical moments and plenty of academic talking-head interviews. What really sells the film, though, is how Wilmott sticks to at least a skeleton of his historic fact as he brings the viewer from the 1860's to modern times.
We did fight World War II, but, in this film, only against the Japanese since Chancellor Hitler was our firm all.(We even talked him into repurposing Jews as slaves instead of the mass waste of livestock he had planned). And JFK did indeed lead an optimisic movement in the '60s that briefly promised freedom for all.
Elvis caused riots with black-influenced music, of course, but the great wall separating two countriesin the '60s wasn't in Berlin; it was built along the US-Canadian border, the better to keep abolitionist terrorists from attacking our cities.
The scary part of all this is that you can too easily imagine the world veering off in such a vile direction with the loss of a few key battles some 150 years ago. And Willmott drives the points time and again with broad TV commercials that have their basis in actual products that were sold in the U.S. up until fairly recently. The roots for this potential madness existed, and still does exist.
By the time a government official gets around to praising the recent success of the Slave Shopping Network, where families can be bought in sets, or broken up for different buyers, Willmott has indeed established an alternate universe. The problem is, it looks eerily like this universe in too many ways.
But Willmott lets nonhistory speak for itself. He never gets heavy-handed or preachy, just as he never gets too tasteless or crude, and it's this fine sense of balanced tone that makes "CSA" work.
There's something undeniably awful and yet vaguely familiar about the world he builds. And that's enough to make you laugh and cringe at the same time.
----------
You can reach Tom Long at (313) 222-8879 or tlong@detnews.com. Check out hsi blog at detnews.com.
==========
'CSA' asks 'What if South won?'
Review
'CSA: The Confederate States of America'
Grade B+
Not rated but contains racially
provocative material.
Running time: 89 minutes
By Tom Long
Detroit News Film Critic
Funny, disturbing, smart and conciously outrageous, "CSA: The Confederate States of America" is the short film that could have been botched really badly. But instead, writer-director Kevin Willmott pulls off a surprising juggling act of awful possibilities and near realities that manages to entertain at the same time it enflames.
"CSA" is presented as a British documentary being shown on American television for the first time, with commercials and newsbreaks and all the usual interruptions. The documentary is a look at what happened after the Confederacy won the Civil War.
Yes, that's right, in this reality the Confederates won the war, New York and Boston were burned to the ground and Abraham Lincoln became a fugitive wearing blackface. The United States became the Confederate States, and its slave-based economy eventually took over all of latin America, as well as South America.
Willmott shows us all of this with a Ken Burns-style mockumentary that uses actual old photos and movie clips, fake re-enactments of historical moments and plenty of academic talking-head interviews. What really sells the film, though, is how Wilmott sticks to at least a skeleton of his historic fact as he brings the viewer from the 1860's to modern times.
We did fight World War II, but, in this film, only against the Japanese since Chancellor Hitler was our firm all.(We even talked him into repurposing Jews as slaves instead of the mass waste of livestock he had planned). And JFK did indeed lead an optimisic movement in the '60s that briefly promised freedom for all.
Elvis caused riots with black-influenced music, of course, but the great wall separating two countriesin the '60s wasn't in Berlin; it was built along the US-Canadian border, the better to keep abolitionist terrorists from attacking our cities.
The scary part of all this is that you can too easily imagine the world veering off in such a vile direction with the loss of a few key battles some 150 years ago. And Willmott drives the points time and again with broad TV commercials that have their basis in actual products that were sold in the U.S. up until fairly recently. The roots for this potential madness existed, and still does exist.
By the time a government official gets around to praising the recent success of the Slave Shopping Network, where families can be bought in sets, or broken up for different buyers, Willmott has indeed established an alternate universe. The problem is, it looks eerily like this universe in too many ways.
But Willmott lets nonhistory speak for itself. He never gets heavy-handed or preachy, just as he never gets too tasteless or crude, and it's this fine sense of balanced tone that makes "CSA" work.
There's something undeniably awful and yet vaguely familiar about the world he builds. And that's enough to make you laugh and cringe at the same time.
----------
You can reach Tom Long at (313) 222-8879 or tlong@detnews.com. Check out hsi blog at detnews.com.