Within Our Gates
(1920)

Director: Oscar Micheaux

Key Cast: Evelyn Preer, Flo Clements, James D. Ruffin, Jack Chenault, William Smith, Charles D. Lucas, Bernice Ladd, Mrs. Evelyn, William Stark, Mattie Edwards, Ralph Johnson, E.G. Tatum, Grant Edwards, Grant Gorman

Rating: Not Rated, but this film has graphic scenes that should be seen by mature audiences only.

Genre(s): Drama, Silent

"Within Our Gates" is the oldest known African-American film to be in existence today.

Famous African-American film director, Oscar Micheaux, directed "Within Our Gates" and this is his earliest film available. The movie was controversial because it shows graphic scenes of lynchings in the South. Because of this, some cities would not allow "Within Our Gates" to be shown.

The movie is about a woman named Sylvia Landry (Evelyn Preer) who moves back to the South because she and her fiancee have broken up. While in the South, she starts helping a minister who has a school for poor Black children. Desperately in need of money, Sylvia decides to go back to the North to try to raise funds for the school.

While there, she meets Dr. Vivian (Charles D. Lucas) who falls in love with her.  As he probes to find out more about Sylvia, the horrors of her past unfolds.

∙  "Within Our Gates" is a silent film and is the oldest known surviving film made by an African-American director.

∙  For many years, Within Our Gates, was considered a lost film.  Then in the early 1990s, it was found in Madrid, Spain.  By the time the film had been found, it had not been seen for over 70 years.

∙  In 1993, the Library of Congress Motion Picture Conservancy Center restored this "Within Our Gates".  Unfortunately, some sections of the film are still missing.

∙  Oscar Micheaux made this film in reaction to D. W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation (which showed the Klu Klux Klan as heroes of the South) and the Chicago Race Riot of 1919. 

∙  Within Our Gates was censored because it graphically showed lynchings and an attempted rape scene.  Some cities feared that these scenes in the movie would incite race riots so they would not allow the film to be shown.

∙  Oscar Micheaux only had $15,000 to make Within Our Gates, so he borrowed costumes and props as much as he could.  He could not afford to reshoot scenes so they had to be done in one take.

∙  Within Our Gates is also considered an important film because it provides a glimpse of African-American life after World War I when racism was still rampant in America.
 
∙ Oscar Micheaux also directed Body and Soul, another Top 100 Black Classic Movies.

∙  Selected to the Library of Congress National Film Registry in 1992.

Within Our Gates Movie DVD

Buy the Within Our Gates Movie DVD
"Within Our Gates" is the oldest known surviving
African-American film today. It was released in 1920
after the Chicago race riots of 1919.

This is the earliest film available that was directed by
African-American film director, Oscar Micheaux.

 
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