''A Place of Rage'' is a 1991 film by

Pratibha Parmar Pratibha Parmar is a British writer and filmmaker. She has made feminist documentaries such as '' Alice Walker: Beauty in Truth'' and '' My Name is Andrea'' about Andrea Dworkin. Early life Parmar was born in Nairobi, Kenya to Indian parents and ...

. The film includes interviews of

Angela Davis Angela Yvonne Davis (born January 26, 1944) is an American political activist, philosopher, academic, scholar, and author. She is a professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz. A feminist and a Marxist, Davis was a longtime member of ...

June Jordan June Millicent Jordan (July 9, 1936 – June 14, 2002) was an American poet, essayist, teacher, and activist. In her writing she explored issues of gender, race, immigration, and representation. Jordan was passionate about using Black English ...

, Trinh T. Minh-ha, and

Alice Walker Alice Malsenior Tallulah-Kate Walker (born February 9, 1944) is an American novelist, short story writer, poet, and social activist. In 1982, she became the first African-American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, which she was awa ...

.Foster, Gwendolyn Audrey. ''Women Film Directors: An International Bio-critical Dictionary''.

Greenwood Publishing Group Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. (GPG), also known as ABC-Clio/Greenwood (stylized ABC-CLIO/Greenwood), is an educational and academic publisher (middle school through university level) which is today part of ABC-Clio. Established in 1967 as Gr ...

, January 1, 1995. , 9780313289729. p
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It discusses and asks for political action regarding racism and homophobia, linking the two issues together.Foster, Gwendolyn Audrey. ''Women Film Directors: An International Bio-critical Dictionary''.

, January 1, 1995. , 9780313289729. p
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It was created to be aired on British television and it is 52 minutes long.Baumgarten, Marjorie.
Two by Pratibha Parmar: A Place of Rage, Khush

Archive
. ''

Austin Chronicle ''The Austin Chronicle'' is an alternative weekly newspaper published every Thursday in Austin, Texas, United States. The paper is distributed through free news-stands, often at local eateries or coffee houses frequented by its targeted demogra ...

''. Friday February 21, 1992. Retrieved on August 28, 2015. The main interviews of Davis, Jordan, and Walker were filmed in the present day. Davis and Jordan discuss the effects of

Rosa Parks Rosa Louise McCauley Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was an American activist in the civil rights movement best known for her pivotal role in the Montgomery bus boycott. The United States Congress has honored her as "th ...

Fannie Lou Hamer Fannie Lou Hamer (; Townsend; October 6, 1917 – March 14, 1977) was an American voting and women's rights activist, community organizer, and a leader in the civil rights movement. She was the co-founder and vice-chair of the Freedom De ...

, and other activists; as well as women's roles in black churches during the

Civil Rights Movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement throughout the Unite ...

and the outcome of the 1960s Black Power movement. Parmar took a 1970 prison interview of Davis and intercuts scenes of poetry of

. The documentary also uses music from the

Staple Singers The Staple Singers were an American gospel, soul, and R&B singing group. Roebuck "Pops" Staples (December 28, 1914 – December 19, 2000), the patriarch of the family, formed the group with his children Cleotha (April 11, 1934 – February ...

, Neville Brothers, and Janet Jackson as well as documentary scenes of the 1960s. The film title originates from how the interview subjects say there was a "place of rage" within black people in the 1960s where they collected anger from being oppressed and released it against the persons oppressing them. The interview subjects stated that by the 1990s this shifted to a sense of defeatism and internal repression characterized by drug use and resignation.

Release and reception

It had been screened at various gay and lesbian international film festivals. It won the 1992 National Black Programming Consortium "Best Historical Documentary" award. Marjorie Baumgarten of the ''

'' rated the film and '' Khush'', another one of Parmar's films, as three out of five stars. Baumgarten stated that "whatever its forum, ''A Place of Rage'''s testimony, wisdom, compassion and renewal are nuggets that stay with you long after the images fade" and that "it is not quite fair to judge 'A Place of Rage''as a feature film due to its length and purpose of airing on UK television.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Place of Rage 1991 films British LGBT-related documentary films 1991 LGBT-related films Angela Davis Alice Walker 1990s British films