The Arte site makes available free of charge and until December 13 its documentary “Black Far West – a counter-history of the West” centered on African-Americans erased from the history of the conquest of the West.
Arte has made available a striking documentary entitled Black Far West: A counter-history of the West, by Cécile Denjean, free of charge. The film travels through the legends of the African-American West that History and the fantasy narratives of this era (like the western genre) have erased for many years. Already available on the site arte.tvthe documentary is broadcast tonight on Arte.
Whether they are called Nat Love (cowboy), Bass Reeves (gunslinger turned marshall but whom segregationist laws will force him to resign), Mary Fields (and his link with Gary Cooper) or even Henry Bibb (writer), all have largely forgotten by the history books which either simply mentioned them or ignored them entirely.
For film and television fans, the film also highlights some little-known facts such as the fact that The Prisoner of the Desert, classic of western classics, is in fact a blatant whitewashing or that the Lone Ranger is actually inspired by the Bass Reeves supra.
We also discover that there were black slaves among the Amerindians, estimated at 40,000, that there were about fifty black towns, that the abolition of slavery only plunged many African-Americans back into another submission, economical this time, and more.