Review – America Beyond the Color Line

This is actually a four-part series originally produced for PBS, but it all fits on one DVD and works well as a single piece of documentary film-making. Harvard professor Henry Louis “Skip” Gates Jr. roams across America examining issues facing black Americans in the 21st century. To tell the truth, after the first episode I almost quit watching it. Gates’s interviews with middle class black people weren’t bad, but they were very PBS (safe, comfortable beauty-of-diversity stuff). But then it got better. Episode two did a solid job of covering the class distinctions so intimately linked with racism. Episode three examined the success of black people who’ve “made it” in the mainstream. The portraits of programs designed to provide opportunities were interesting, but questions about loss of culture resulting from integration into “white America” went largely unanswered. The final episode focused on black celebrities in Hollywood, where it proved funny that a town famous for being all about fake artifice appeared to be one of the only places in the country where an honest conversation about racism was taking place. Though far from comprehensive, this was an interesting picture of the highs and lows of the current black experience. Mildly amusing