THOUGHTS FROM AN AGING PIZZA EVANGELIST SEEN ANY GOOD MOVIES LATELY? Bob Fettes / Columnist Published: January 4, 2015 8:00AM Gone are the great movies and the great movie stars. Never again will we see the likes of a Clark Gable, Jimmy Stewart, Humphrey Bogart, Gary Cooper, Audrey Hepburn, Bettie Davis, Grace Kelly, or the like. Gone are classics like High Noon, Casablanca, African Queen, Gone With The Wind and Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Sadly, we will never see their likes again … or will we? People ask me if Ive seen any good movies lately, and I jokingly reply, The last good movie I saw was Quo Vadis in 1951. That isnt entirely true. I have seen a few good movies since the 1950s and I would like to take time in my column to tell you about one such movie. The title is The Great Debaters. It premiered in 2007 directed by Denzel Washington and produced by Oprah Winfrey. It stars Academy Award winners Denzel Washington and Forrest Whitaker, two of the best Hollywood actors today. Based on a true story, the plot revolves around the efforts of debate coach Melvin B. Tolson (Denzel Washington) at historically black Wiley College to place his team on equal footing with whites in the American South during the 1930s, when Jim Crow laws were common and lynch mobs were a pervasive fear for blacks. In the movie, the Wiley team eventually succeeds to the point where they are able to debate Harvard University. This was their 47th annual debate team. The movie also explores the social constructs in Texas during the Great Depression including not only the day-to-day insults and slights African Americans endured, but also a lynching. Also depicted is James L. Farmer Jr.(Denzel Whitaker), who, at 14 years old, was on Wileys debate team after completing high school (and who later went on to co-found C.O.R.E., the Congress of Racial Equality). According to the Houston Chronicle, another character depicted on the team, Samantha Booke, is based on the real individual Henrietta Bell Wells, the only female member of the 1930 debate team from Wiley College who participated in the first collegiate interracial debate in the United States. Wells also happened to be a minor African American poet whose papers are housed at the Library of Congress. The key line of dialogue, used several times, is a famous paraphrase of Augustine of Hippo: An unjust law is no law at all. Another major line, repeated in slightly different versions according to context, concerns doing what you have to do in order that we can do what we want to do. In all instances, these vital lines are spoken by the James L. Farmer Sr. and James L. Farmer Jr. characters. I dont want to give too much of the plot away, but I give it a four stars, thumbs up, must see rating. Others on my favorites list (in no particular order) Glory Giant The Godfather Dr. Strangelove Rebel Without A Cause Bridge On The River Kwai The Godfather Part II Battleground A Beautiful Mind Stalag 17 Patton In The Heat of The Night The Great Escape Gandhi The Last King of Scotland Ten North Frederick To qualify as a favorite I would have watched it at least three or more times. P.S. Im biased on any movie starring Forrest Whitaker (my favorite actor), George C. Scott, Russell Crowe, James Dean and Rod Steiger. See you next Sunday. Bob Fettes is a semi-retired Cambridge businessman and Columnist for The Sunday Daily Jeffersonian. He can be reached at nancopiz@yahoo.
Posted on: Sun, 04 Jan 2015 13:58:40 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015