Riotsville, U.S.A.
Using American footage from the 1960s, Sierra Pettengill’s documentary turns to the past to illuminate the present.
The powerful effect made by Riotsville, U.S.A. stems from the fact that it has all the impact of a time capsule. Sierra Pettengill’s documentary was made between 2015 and 2021 but its focus is on America in the second half of the 1960s. Her approach to her subject is unusual in that she has opted to shoot no new footage but instead to build her film exclusively out of archive material from that period. The source of what we see is footage specially shot by the US military combined with clips of what was aired on television. A commentary is provided at intervals spoken by Charlene Modeste, but by eliminating any new footage Pettengill truly immerses us in the zeitgeist of that era.
Even without that commentary (which is arguably rather more high-flown than was needed), it is obvious that Riotsville, U.S.A. is delivering a message, that being inherent in the choice of material from the archive. Nevertheless, one is confident that the film is revealing rather than distorting. That is illustrated by the footage which has given this documentary its title and which shows how Fort Belvoir in Virginia was used by the military as the site of a specially constructed model town named Riotsville. This was a training ground for the police and for the military itself in how to respond to civil disorder and the film shot there which showed soldiers taking on roles as citizens was made to emphasise the need for firm force. It was all part and parcel of a policy by those in power to adopt a tough stance against protesters by painting them as criminals and thereby justifying harsh measures against them, this being absolutely necessary they said if law and order were to be maintained.
Their major concern here was with those who took to the streets as part of the Civil Rights Movement but the authorities had another target too, namely those who turned out to protest against the war in Vietnam. In the opening scenes of Riotsville, U.S.A. reference is made to the race riots which produced this response, disturbances in Watts (1965), in Chicago (1966) and then in other places including Detroit in 1967. But crucial to the view that the film encourages us to take is the history of the Kerner commission set up by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1967 to look into these urban riots and to report. Their findings announced the following year covered the question of the causes behind the riots and their verdict was highly critical of federal and state government and of the media. However, their recommendations were almost entirely ignored. The inequality in American society was fully acknowledged in that report, but this was a society unwilling to listen. For a while genuine debate and criticism could be found on at least one television service, PBL (Public Broadcast Laboratory), as clips shown here reveal but by 1969 its liberal outlook and its support for equality for African-Americans led to it losing funding and being taken off air.
There is, of course, a paradox at the heart of this new film. It may plunge us into the America of the late 1960s by showing us directly how the government and the media chose to present what these protesters represented but viewed today it also prompts comparisons with the present and with how such movements as Black Lives Matter are seen. In doing so it brings out both how things have changed (there is now a much wider recognition of social conditions justifying protests) and the extent to which they remain the same (at a time when acts of racial violence continue to make appalling headlines the refusal to listen on the part of those who, openly or otherwise, believe in and endorse white supremacy is as strong as ever). What viewers know of the current situation adds considerably to our awareness that the slant on the 1960s found in Pettengill’s film is well justified.
At 91 minutes Riotsville, U.S.A. is a standard-length documentary, but it is perhaps unfortunate that it does not build. By that I mean that its impact is evident from early on in a way that results in its last quarter having nothing significant in reserve. Pettengill opts to concentrate in this final segment on the Democratic and Republican National Conventions held in August 1968. Admittedly the issues around these events, including confrontations with Miami city officials and violence in the streets, are by no means insignificant. There are too some nice incidentals (commenting on what needs to be done to create a decent society Spiro Agnew promotes Richard Nixon praising him as a man who is moral and fair). But, even so, nothing here has that extra power that would have given the film a sense of climax and made it even more compelling. That left me slightly disappointed, but Riotsville, U.S.A. offers striking lessons about the past and about the present too.
MANSEL STIMPSON
Featuring the voice of Charlene Modeste.
Dir Sierra Pettengill, Pro Sara Archambault and Jamila Wignot, Screenplay Tobi Haslett, Ed Nels Bangerter, Music Jace Clayton.
Field of Vision/LinLay Productions/Arch + Bow Films/XRM Media-Dogwoof Releasing.
91 mins. USA. 2022. UK Rel: 31 March 2023. Cert. 12.
