Red Hollywood
Director:
Thom Andersen
Year: 1996
Rating: 6.0
I have a bit of an obsession with the period of our history in which we decided
to set aside some of our basic rights and basic decency and stoked the fears
of the American people during the Red Scares of the 1940's and then later
in the 50's. In 1938 Congress formed the House of Un-American Activities
Committee that went after organizations and people who were thought to have
Communist leanings, but with WWII and our alliance with the Soviet Union
this was put on the back burner. But after the war and the emerging Cold
War HUAC went into full steam with Hollywood being one of its main targets
- to root out all Communists from the industry.
They brought many actors, writers, directors to testify and to name names.
It was a chilling episode in our history and many people had their careers
ruined by being blacklisted or graylisted or being sent to jail. There was
of course a contingent of people who were members or ex-members (many dropped
out after the Soviet Union made a Non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany in
1939), but they were a drop in the bucket and their influence on the final
Hollywood product was nearly invisible. But Hollywood made a good political
target. This film isn't particularly political - it introduces the subject
of HUAC and those impacted and then pretty much just talks about many of
the films they were involved in showing clips of them. Interesting but not
a really insightful film.