Filmmaker Ava DuVernay’s Oscar-nominated documentary “13TH” will be screened free at Cal State San Bernardino on Monday, Feb. 27.
Presented by the CSUSB University Diversity Committee and the John M. Pfau Library, the film will be shown beginning at 2 p.m. in Pfau Library room PL-5005. Seating is limited.
A discussion will follow its showing.
“13TH” takes its title from the U.S. Constitution’s 13th Amendment: “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”
According to Netflix’s synopsis of the film: “The progression from that second qualifying clause to the horrors of mass criminalization and the sprawling American prison industry is laid out by DuVernay with bracing lucidity. With a potent mixture of archival footage and testimony from a dazzling array of activists, politicians, historians, and formerly incarcerated women and men, DuVernay creates a work of grand historical synthesis.”
Wrote Los Angeles Times film critic Kenneth Turan, “Offering a brisk, cogently argued alternative to the conventionally taught American story, allied in that sense to Howard Zinn’s ‘A People’s History of the United States,’ DuVernay gives us a documentary that systematically covers a lot of territory, a century and a half of race relations in this country in fact.
“If it is packed with facts, statistics and on-camera thoughts — from top-drawer academics like Henry Louis Gates, Michelle Alexander (author of the groundbreaking “The New Jim Crow”) and Angela Davis as well as assorted notables including Sen. Cory Booker, Newt Gingrich and Grover Norquist — it is because there is so much to deal with,” Turan wrote.
DuVernay has been recognized for her critically acclaimed films, 'Middle of Nowhere' (winner of the John Cassavetes Award), and 'Selma,' (nominated for an Oscar, winner of a Golden Globe).
Though also being shown on Netflix, the streaming service is making the film available to community and campus groups free for a limited time.
View the official trailer at “13TH | Official Trailer [HD] | Netflix” on YouTube.