Egalite for All. Toussaint Louverture

¶ … Egalite for All. Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian Revolution

What sort of film is this? Does it portray a certain period of history, a series of events or the life of an important historical figure?

It does deal with the stated period and the history of the times -- 1780's. But the director has taken the viewer for granted in many issues. For example the slave system of Haiti is simply stated as 'black slaves and white owners. Secondly the film has downplayed the efforts of the blacks as they were then called, in the revolution. It appears to be made that the city got independence more by chance rather than by their struggle. The history and the settings have not been made clear. Opinions of the commentators are too garishly underlined more than the necessary facts. The viewer would never know if the slaves were brought to the island from Africa, or where they natives who were enslaved? If they were brought from Arica, at a time when the U.S. was promoting slavery and Napoleon was supposed to promote liberty, equality and fraternity that were the slave system like? What role did the constitution that was made by Toussaint play in the later day declaration of independence? What is the position now? Whose interests were and are being protected?

Haiti is still a slave-colony and that is what the film lets us believe. For so many years there was no progress. The role of Toussaint Louverture was played down, and the whole film appears to have been created with the white person's sentiment in mind. Bias can be seen in the fact that the butchery and later turn the attitudes of the government of France and that of the U.S. are played down. In short the film failed to produce the intended effects, namely educate people on the plight of slaves, the coloured people, and/or the contribution of Toussaint Louverture who was the first freedom fighter for the slaves. The film though impressively produced with excellent photography and narration and expert comments -- the experts dominating and taking the issue here and there and mystifying them. Overall the film neither did justice to the cause of Haiti nor to the man on whose life it was based. Why was the issue of the slavery and their suffering made to look so simple? And why was the reaction -- hanging of the white owners shown so many times? Is not there a bias, and is not the film playing down the contribution of Toussaint Louverture? These are the questions that nag the critic after watching the film.

2) - Who is the director, where was the film produced, and what is its nationality and date of issue?

Egalite for All: Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian Revolution were produced by Patricia Aste. It is a sixty minute documentary with great photography and action with slick editing. The cast and crew include the Director -- Edwidge Danticat, and the narrators are Noland Walker and many historians like.. The script writers were Margaret Koval and Noland Walker. IMDbPro.com offers representation listings for over 120,000 individuals, including actors, directors, and producers, as well as company and employee contact details for over 50,000 companies in the entertainment industry. These were available from the film credits and to answer the entire question, searches on the internet revealed the following information:

The film was directed by Noland Walker, and music composer was Eric Amdahl with the cinematography by Michael Chin. The film editing was done by Michael W. Andrews, with Michael Farnan, re-recording mixer, Karl Sandin music score mixer and Pedro J. Lope location production manager. (IMBD, 2013a) to examine the nationality of the film the nationality of the producer is to be looked into. It can be found that the producer is no novice to film production and has produced work like Mysteries of the Bible, 2003,and Empires: Peter & Paul and the Christian Revolution which is a TV documentary and Empires: The Roman Empire in the First Century, a TV series documentary of which the coordinating producer - 4 episodes and many more. The producer Patricia Aste is from Buenos Aires, Argentina, and was educated at Colegio Internacional de Carabobo, at Class of 1975 San Jose, Carabobo, Venezuela. That background shows in the works of the producer, a rebel stand in the documentary cinema.

3) - Does that give us any clues as to its possible biases or ideology?

No, on the other hand we must have expected a much more explosive picture with in depth analysis of slavery and the present situation given the background of the producer. The film is subdued and takes great care not to hurt sentiments of the white population and also avoids the probable civil unrest that may be caused with the coloured community watching it, if it was to be made in depth. The director has stopped with pointing to the facts rather than explore the possibilities as a film. Therefore there has been no bias except that there was a tighter reign in exploring the issues.

4) - What are the director's visible goals? What did he/she try to do with this movie? What might be his/her thesis?

She probably wanted to highlight the plight of the Haitians and their history and that was sought to be done through their hero -- a person who gave them the constitution and stood up to Napoleon. However the thesis failed because neither was she able to present us the personality of the central character in full, nor was she able to explore the theme in which she wanted it to be set- issue of racial discrimination and the slavery.

5) - if there is a thesis, does he/she prove his point to your satisfaction? How well?:

It was answered above in the 4th question. In my opinion there were two objectives,, bring about the life and times of Toussaint Louverture, through which the greater issue of the island's current and past history of the coloured people were sought to be explored. Since it took on too vast a subject justice was not done to both.

6) - Does the documentary have any noticeable biases? Is it fair and objective to the subject? Does it portray its subject in a negative or positive light? How can you tell?

No there are no biases noticed in the film and it is fair to all the involved characters. The portrayal is normal without any negative or positive bias. It did not mess the issue of race, slavery, life of the hero all into a puddle but was straight and unbiased over the issues that were addressed.

7) - Is the documentary based on a written work of history? Did it have any historical advisors? (Look carefully at the credits).