The disastrous mess of a movie named "Suburbicon" brought me to this old documentary. While covering a similar scenario revolving a black family who faced adversity and
prejudice while movie to a predominantly white suburban, there's a brief a clip of this film in there which raiseed important questions about social and racial equality in the American
society of the 1950's. It's the same story of George Clooney's movie but this one actually happened and that's what we follow in a more light progression of events.
The African-American Myers family moved to Levittown, Pennsylvania, a white suburban town recently formed at the time of this film and a whole controversy ensued since one half of
the white folks there didn't want there while another half didn't had any problem in accepting them and they welcomed their new neighbors. Our guide/host in this journey
Dan W. Dodson presents the dilema faced by Levittown residents showing why they are favorable or opposed to the presence of the Myers family. While the supporters are all
lovely, respectful and had all the valid reasoning in accepting the Myers, the heart of the matter comes from the hateful, bigoted and prejudicial folks on the opposite side.
It was tough to watch those bits even though I've seen countless films on similar topics on racism and prejudice, but even so it felt so surreal and idiotic each time those
people went by showing their point of view which goes through the level of absurdidty.
I know deep down inside those close-minded people the overall thought was one of superiority and how could a black man afford such housing (Fact is he was a WWII military
veteran and an engineer). But on face value all we get is: with their presence there'll be mixed marriages or the house prices will be reduced on the market. You get the
picture from here, and it was painfully disturbing seeing one, two, three, several times the same ill-informed opinion. But thankfully Mr. Dodson makes the case weighdown the
issues on both parts and reaches to an enlightened conclusion which works to debunk all the rumours heard by the community.
I'm not sure if the documentary was sugarcoating certain things because there was some violent act that happened there but the images aren't so bright in giving us a
response as to what happened but we get to see the police making some intervention (we hear a story about a stone being thrown at the Myers window). The riot presented in
the fictional "Suburbicon" theorizes a whole more violent attack.
It's a typical case of those educational projects of the first half of the 20th Century and early 1960's, there isn't much to learn with it but there's plenty that can
be analyzed through its images, its testimonies and to see how society was back in the late 1950's - in some places around the world it hadn't changed much from here. It got
better in some ways, but time in again I can hear similar stories in the media, blatant display of racism among neighbors. I salute the makers of this film in giving some
positive reaction against prejudice and all, it felt like things went out good for the black family but...I was severely disappointed that the Myers family does not appear
in the film to present their facts, why they moved to Levittown or even their "intentions" which we already know are the best possible. But I think the 1950's audience who
watched this back in the day and had similar views from the prejudicial people they would have a first hand account on what it is to be black in America and to see that the
so-called NAACP or Communist infiltration of blacks in white neighborhoods and the propaganda of mixed marriages and relations are a clear hoax coming from derranged minds.
If seeing that family in true honesty why they were moving there just as a form to be part of the American Way of Life in the land of opportunity, folks wouldn't be so opposed to their presence. 7/10.
