Director: Ava DuVernay
Date Reviewed: 30 June 2020
jamesintexas Rating: ***1/2
The Thirteenth Amendment of The Constitution states, "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." The emphasis is on "except as a punishment for crime," and that phrase contains the crux of the matter.
In the aftermath of the George Floyd murder, protests occurring in cities big and small all over this country, and subsequent police brutality that shocks because it is fully aware of being filmed and does not seem to care, I finally watched Ava DuVernay's 13th, a searing documentary depiction of injustice that doubles as a history lesson that I never received. It would have fit in the curriculum of my US History Seminar teacher's class during my junior year; instead of breadth, she emphasized depth with Howard Zinn's People's History as a seminal text, John Sayles's Matewan, a week-long reenactment of the My Lai massacre trial as well as the trial of George Pullman. The course seems to run out of steam (and time), ending in the 60's-70's, glancing at Watergate (I think) and mentioning Reagan and the Clinton era (our time, circa 1994-1995). DuVernay's work continues my unfinished education and brings in acclaimed authors and scholars like Bryan Stevenson, Henry Louis Gates Jr., Jelani Cobb, and Angela Davis and infuses the film with archival footage from Birth of a Nation to center the audience in the injustice. In short, the Thirteenth Amendment includes a clause about slavery being abolished "except as punishment for crime," which funneled thousands of Black Americans into the prison systems on trumped up charges. DuVernay's systematic unpacking of the cruel, unjust, abhorrent history of our nation's practices and its insidious legacy today is simultaneously horrifying and relevant. From unpacking the codes of what is meant when a political operative recommends talking about "voters' rights" instead of outright racism to the rise of the prison-industrial complex from Presidents Reagan, Bush, and Clinton, the film's outrage is directed at the systems that were allowed to thrive and play on the fears of white America.
Take the "Three Strikes and You're Out" rule from the 90's which included mandatory life sentences, effectively taking the decisions out of the hands of judges, removing sentencing discretion. The film explains how the rise of the Democrats in 1992 with Clinton-Gore came with the emphasis on getting tough on crime and the authoring of the new crime bill. That crime bill included brutal punishments that singled out Black and Brown offenders and crushed communities as a result, transforming families, schools, and industries as a result. Recent documentaries such as this are causing me to unpack history that has occurred in my own lifetime, a weird thing to consider, but now that I am older than nearly all MLB and NFL players, it makes sense to see critiques of policy and history that I vaguely remember. Even though I read the paper and we got Time Magazine at my house, I am woefully and demonstrably ignorant on so many matters. The work continues.
There is no way to watch DuVernay's film and not be charged with action. Like her work Selma, DuVernay offers a rich, layered examination at history and the idea of being an American that could not be more relevant in 2020 and beyond.
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