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The Black King (1932)
A Satire of Marcus Garvey
Black nationalists and those familiar with Black history will not like this film. Essentially, it's the tale of this con-artist named "Charcoal Johnson" who schemes poor and ignorant African Americans into giving up their loot for a phony "Back to Africa" movement. This is, of course, a satirization of the Marcus Garveymovement of the 1920s in which Garvey wanted to establish a Black settlement in Liberiaakin to Israel for the Jewish people and was arrested for mail fraud. Today, most who are familiar with Garvey's story feel that Garvey was framed and he is now considered a hero. So this film, with it's portrayal of Black leadership as incompetent clowns, will ruffle some feathers.
It is interesting to note that going through some old African American newspapers, Black audiences of 1932 actually enjoyed this film. It would be interesting to the what would happen now if you showed this at, say the Apollo Theater.
It would also be interesting to compare this to 1970s "Cotton Comes To Harlem," which had a similar theme with a contemporary spin.
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