Riotsville, U.S.A.

The trailer for this movie focused on the fake towns - they look like movie sets - that were built in the 1960s so that the Army could practice dealing with "race riots."

As it turns out in the movie, there were only two such Riotsvilles, and they play only a very small roll in this movie. That's very unfortunate, imo. I would have liked to know how they were financed - did Congress know about them? - how the soldiers were chosen to stage crowd control in them, etc. In other words, I would have appreciated it if the movie had concentrated on the riotsvilles.

Instead, most of the movie deals with the Civil Rights Movement and white reaction to it in the 1960s. That's interesting, of course, but nothing new. Sometimes it really seemed like filler for a movie that should have been a short rather than a feature-length film.

The narration got a little shrill at times for my tastes. The images and newsreel footage that are the basis of this movie are already powerful, and speak for themselves Since no one opposed to the Civil Rights Movement is going to watch this movie, there's no point in preaching to the already converted.

An ok movie, in short, but not enough new material to warrant its 91 minute run time.

An in depth review of the true nature of police escalation during civil unrest. All of which is remains painfully relevant even to this day.

I was able to view this during the virtual Sundance Festival.

The blatant and heavily institutionalized discrimination that exists from of birth of police is well displayed throughout this film.

It's unfortunate that this is still a problem today.

Only critique is the editing did feel a bit choppy intermixed with the quotes. Maybe could use another round of editing before wide distribution.

This film struggles with some fascinating archival footage and trying to stretch both the length and message of the film too broadly around that.

This country struggles with civil rights sadly over and over again, now to the point where the one thing uniting far too many citizens is an unwavering distrust of the government. Documenting protests is important in understanding both the strength and vulnerability of the not-always-so-United States. That said I feel like any assembly of mobs...protesters (also I guess anti-protesters generally few but vociferous) and then the police force can bring out the mob mentality on both sides.

In general color me wary of both, but especially the ones where everyone in the mob has a gun.

Anyways this film might best be served by watching the trailer or a sped-up or excerpted version of it. I assume the abridged version won't have the slow zoom and defocus on pixelated faces. Although that would do a disservice to DJ Rupture's excellent soundtrack work.

Looking forward... 1) Well I do think for all of the struggles, the arc or the USA does bend towards a better country...often painfully and painfully slowly.

2) The notion of test cities for police exercises is still going on afaik, didn't the former Blackwater corporation utilize them recently before they re-branded or whatever?

3) Sierra Pettengill might be an excellent resource for gathering archival footage for other directors' projects. I see she was part of the team for the Jarmusch documentary on the The Stooges (with Iggy that is, not Curly).

I struggle to recommend this, but with expectations lowered for less of an expose and more of an art collage meditation with occasional Gulf advertisements - it might be worth an hour of your time, although the running time is 1.5 hours.

Violent police repression as a first response tactic against protests, still seems to dominate todays American society as much as it did during the sixties.

This eyeopening documentary gives us a surprisingly detailed insight into how authorities reacted to the first mass race riots and civil rights protests during the sixties.

This documentary has got lots of interesting LIVE public television footage about racism and inequality and police brutality and it uses a police training video for how to handle riots as a red line through this entire movie about how the goverment responded to civil rights protests and race riots during the sixties.

In general the government did 2 things to "respond" to the protests and race riots:

1.

The authorities investigated the cause of race riots during the sixties by appointing a commision of conservatives who came to a similar conclusion as the African American people who were protesting, namely that American society was brutally split and full of inequality and racism.

2.

Shocked by this unwelcome outcome of the conservative comission the government only accepted one tiny subconclusion out of the entire comission's report and that was to give the police more weapons to repress riots...

This documentaries' strength lies in the abstract narration and style. Because of that style the total oblivion of goverment officials becomes even more painfully clear for all to see...

I have seen several documentaries about racism and police brutality lately and this is the one that got me thinking the most about the world of total oblivion that politicians are wallowing in...

Originally premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival in the NEXT selection.

Director Sierra Pettengill makes a documentary about a fictional town named Riotsville which was built by the US military and explores the militarization of the police and creates a counter-narrative to the nation's reaction to the uprisings of the late '60s. The issues of police and riots are still a very common theme in the modern days. This documentary may be considered relevant in todays time because of all the political things happening at this very moment.

The music choice to create an uneven tension really helps to make you feel uneasy of what you are learning, the narration from Charlene Modeste does really help to add an feeling of uneasiness while you are witnessing archival footage of riots and insane things happening. There are some really good conversations from political members, citizens, news people, and others that are presented in this documentary to capture a realistic point of view.

However, the editing becomes really sloppy and some of the technical moments are noticeably bad. As if there are some errors during post-production when making this movie. Overall, a good documentary.

Rating: B.