White Harlem

Directed by Mike Hoolboom

The March of Time produced 200 newsreels from 1935-1951, shown in movie theatres once per month. In an 18-minute film from August 1939 film called Metropolis, cameramen travelled across New York City, gathering scenes of its 7.5 million people. This short stitches together scenes shot in Harlem, along with outtakes from that shoot, preserved at the National Archives and Records Administration in Washington. This footage has been “restored” using AI, image resolution is HD, frame rate 60 fps, colour and grain added. The voice-over offers reflections on the way these images were framed through an apartheid lens, a reflection of the white men who ran and staffed the company. W.E.B. Du Bois, James Baldwin and Christina Sharpe offered second thoughts. How many movies are made without any pictures in them? [Overview courtesy of Mike Hoolboom]