Content warning: this article discusses violent hate crimes.  

How do we decide which stories get remembered, and which get pushed to the wayside? 

It’s a question that has existed in historical debate for years, and is ever-present in the arts. If you are interested in film history, you are likely keenly aware of this.   

Consider the first film with synchronised recorded sound, often just described as the first film with sound, The Jazz Singer – a film that is only recently being pushed out of film history studies, due to its racist song titles and the entire plot centring on performances in blackface. 

While Al Jolson, the lead actor, was an advocate for black performers and even pushed for their inclusion in many of his films, this film does not showcase this and instead forefronts racism.   

Even defenders of the film, who claim it helped to prevent antisemitism given Jolson’s and the lead character’s Jewish faith, overlook the fact that Jolson was frequently treated as an “exception.”  

Yes, the synchronised sound is impressive, but many overlook that prior to this film, there was the release of Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans, which also included synchronised sound but no dialogue.   

Something odd is that The Jazz Singer always ranks highly on ‘Most influential films of all time’ lists, even though its influence is less to do with the film itself and largely to do with the technology.

So, why do we still praise this film? Why is it still studied in many film schools?

It’s largely because it is defended as being an attitude of the past, something that we can look at from a technical perspective – but this is an idea that only seems to fit if you are not a part of the group being attacked in the media.   

On a more recent note, Boys Don’t Cry, a 1999 film based on the real story of Brandon Teena, a transgender man who was murdered in a hate crime motivated by his gender identity.

This film has received criticism since Teena was played by a woman who went on to win Best Actress for her performance.

Many claim this criticism is more modern, and that, at the time, people didn’t care, but that is probably due to the lack of trans voices being highlighted.  

Peirce, the director, has argued against these claims on account of being genderqueer. However, this does not change their explicit choice and search for a ‘masculine woman’ to play a trans man, and not even a fictional one.

There may have been fewer openly trans actors, but it still feels harmful to have a woman essentially dressing up as a man and implying that this is what trans people are.   

Furthermore, there is also the exclusion of one of the victims of the hate crime, Phillip DeVine, who was black and disabled.

As Peirce has stated, this film made people more interested in the case and trans justice, but it also meant that DeVine, who also lost his life, was forgotten about as a victim. 

This may not have been done with intentional malice, but the issue is that the film helped set a precedent for the depiction of trans people in media, given how influential it was.   

So, what do these two case studies actually tell us about the stories that get remembered?  

People will value something and continue to present it because of its technological or societal value, and forget the harm it caused, and may even still cause, to marginalised communities.

We can understand the value these films had without needing to watch them. Even if criticism is based on how ‘times have changed’, it is still valid.

We need to stop watching and celebrating films that misrepresent and harm marginalised groups, and are often created by people who do not understand said groups. Watch Do the Right Thing, Moonlight, Something You Said Last Night, instead.   

And, if you want a list of the best films that doesn’t just focus on Western films by white men, look at the BFI’s top 100, which is voted on every ten years, and whose current number one is a non-English language film directed by a woman, Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles.   

Image credit: Parker Job