''Go Down, Death!'' is a 1944

race film The race film or race movie was a genre of film produced in the United States between about 1915 and the early 1950s, consisting of films produced for black audiences, and featuring black casts. Approximately five hundred race films were produce ...

directed by and starring

Spencer Williams Spencer Williams (October 14, 1889 – July 14, 1965) was an American jazz and popular music composer, pianist, and singer. He is best known for his hit songs " Basin Street Blues", "I Ain't Got Nobody", "Royal Garden Blues", "I've Found a New B ...

. The film's title derives from a poem by the

African-American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...

writer

James Weldon Johnson James Weldon Johnson (June 17, 1871June 26, 1938) was an American writer and civil rights activist. He was married to civil rights activist Grace Nail Johnson. Johnson was a leader of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored Peop ...

."Go Down Death," The Mystical Movie Guide

Plot

''Go Down Death'' takes place in an African-American community where the criminal boss Big Jim Bottoms (Spencer Williams) runs a successful

juke joint Juke joint (also jukejoint, jook house, jook, or juke) is the vernacular term for an informal establishment featuring music, dancing, gambling, and drinking, primarily operated by African Americans in the southeastern United States. A juke joint ...

. The arrival of a new preacher (Samuel H. James) to the town results in many of Big Jim's customers leaving the juke joint in favor of attending church. Big Jim arranges for the preacher to be photographed in staged compromising situations with three attractive women. Aunt Caroline, Big Jim's adoptive mother, becomes aware of the scheme and tries to prevent Big Jim from carrying out his scheme to discredit the preacher. There is a physical struggle between Aunt Caroline and Big Jim, resulting in Aunt Caroline collapsing after being struck. Aunt Caroline dies from her injuries, but Big Jim escapes arrest by claiming an unknown burglar was the culprit. But following Aunt Caroline's funeral, Big Jim's conscience haunts him with visions of eternal

damnation Damnation (from Latin '' damnatio'') is the concept of divine punishment and torment in an afterlife for actions that were committed, or in some cases, not committed on Earth. In Ancient Egyptian religious tradition, citizens would recite th ...

Hell In religion and folklore, hell is a location in the afterlife in which evil souls are subjected to punitive suffering, most often through torture, as eternal punishment after death. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hell ...

. His body is later discovered in a canyon and the photographs of the preacher are nowhere to be found.

Production

''Go Down Death'' was the third in a trilogy of religious oriented films directed by Spencer Williams, an African-American filmmaker and actor, for the production and distribution company. He previously directed ''

The Blood of Jesus ''The Blood of Jesus'' (also known as ''The Glory Road'') is a 1941 American fantasy drama race film written, directed by and starring Spencer Williams. The plot concerns a Baptist woman who, after being accidentally shot by her atheist husband ...

'' (1941) and the now-lost '' Brother Martin: Servant of Jesus'' (1942). Publicity material for the production listed the film's original title as ''Go Down, Death! The Story of Jesus and the Devil''. To depict the horrors of Hell, Williams used clips from the Italian

silent film A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, when ...

L'Inferno ''L'Inferno'' is a 1911 Italian silent film, loosely adapted from ''Inferno'', the first canticle of Dante Alighieri's ''Divine Comedy''. ''L'Inferno'' took over three years to make, and was the first full-length Italian feature film. Plot Da ...

'' (1911), which had been an international success. In the course of its distribution, ''Go Down Death'' ran into several censorship problems. The state censors for

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

, and

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

demanded that edits to the Hell sequence involving a brief exposure of a woman's bare

breast The breast is one of two prominences located on the upper ventral region of a primate's torso. Both females and males develop breasts from the same embryological tissues. In females, it serves as the mammary gland, which produces and secret ...

in a scene from ''L'Inferno'', and the action of a woman pulling up her dress. Ohio censors also requested removal of an image from the Hell sequence where a devil is seen chewing a man.

References

External links

* * {{Spencer Williams 1944 films American black-and-white films Films directed by Spencer Williams Race films Films about Christianity American drama films 1944 drama films 1940s English-language films 1940s American films

Plot

Production

See also

References

External links