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CSA Scoop

A multiple choice quiz...

You're the MPAA, in charge of ensuring that parents and moviegoers have a reasonable guide to what content a movie contains. What do you find so objectionable, you refuse to rate the movie, or allow a trailer for the movie to be shown?

A. Sexual nudity between unmarried heterosexual characters
B. Multiple beheadings and rampant mysogyny
C. A gay kiss
D. A frank look at the history of slavery in the United States

That's right. In our present movie culture, D is the most incendiary. In some ways, the MPAA's actions regarding the pseudo-doc CSA only guarantees publicity for the movie. But I'm sure IFC Films, the distributor, is not happy that they can't advertise to intelligent adult moviegoers with a simple trailer.

I saw CSA: The Confederate States of America two years ago at Sundance and have been eagerly awaiting its wide release. The movie narrates, Ken Burns-style, an alternative history of the United States, one where the Confederacy won the Civil War. Scrupulously documented elements of Southern society that have been swept under the rug in our reality, flourish in the alterna-history of CSA. It's a world where slaves are sold on the Home Shopping Network and sceintists work round the clock to "cure" slaves of the "illness" that makes them want to be free. What is probably most controversial about this alternative history, however, is how much it resembles our real history. In one the racism is open, in the other it's sublimated. But the results are quite similar.

CSA will premiere Oct. 2nd in Memphis, not far from where Martin Luther King was assassinated.

About J. Ott

John Ott is a writer, filmmaker and futurist. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Google+.