“1619: Up From Slavery” (Mill Creek Entertainment)
The 14-part documentary couldn’t have been released on DVD at a better time—although time is relative given the 400-plus year history of slavery in the lands that became the United States. Africa had long known slavery but with the establishment of Spanish and Portuguese sugarcane plantations in the New World, demand for forced labor skyrocketed. The African kingdoms along the Atlantic coast became the brokers, raiding hundreds of miles inland for human to sell as commodities.
There were slaves in the Spanish colony of Florida in 1565; in 1619 Dutch traders brought Africans to the British colonies as indentured servants but any legal distinctions they enjoyed were soon eroded. By 1860 four million slaves labored under 400,000 slaveowners in the U.S. Because 3/5 of each slave was counted toward seats in the House of Representatives, Southern politicians held inordinate sway over the nation. “1619” accurately summarizes a painful history.
Lost in America (Indican Pictures)
Estimates on the number of homeless American youth range from 48,000 to two million. Another startling number referenced in Lost in America: the U.S. has 5,000 animal shelters but only 500 shelters for homeless youth. Rotimi Rainwater’s documentary collects stories from the streets and seeks answers to a problem that mushroomed in the 1980s from slashed social-service budgets, closed mental institution, abusive fathers and a changing economy. Many of the accounts by the homeless are heartbreaking.
Beanpole (Kino Lorber)
Young Russian filmmaker Kantemir Balagov took the director’s prize at Cannes in 2017 for Beanpole. With beautiful cinematography and editing in the best European art house tradition, Beanpole shows the story of two damaged women living in Leningrad shortly after World War II. As the camera watches steadily, the women are shown at work in a veterans’ hospital where shortages of everything is the rule. Life continues with great difficulty. The performances are intensely felt.
