|
||||||
|
|
Flashback – “One Potato, Two Potato” (Miscegenation-Influenced Custody Battle In 1960s USA)
Anyone seen this film? Flipping through TV channels this evening, and landed on TCM (Turner Classic Movies) after a black man sighting – a rarity on TV these days, especially on a channel like TCM. Further checking revealed that the film on my screen was called One Potato, Two Potato – a title unfamiliar to me. So, as I always do, I looked it up, and learned that the black and white movie is centered on the relationship between a white mid-western woman, in 1964 Ohio, and the black man she remarries, after her white husband leaves her and their child, a young daughter. When her ex-husband discovers that she’s married a black man, he fights her for custody of their child. I caught the tail end of the film, but there was enough there to captivate me. The climax of the story is a highly emotional courtroom sequence in which the woman’s angry ex-husband charges that the child’s welfare is threatened by the environment created by her marriage to a black man.
The film screened at the Cannes Film Festival in 1964, and I read one review from someone who was actually present for that screening, who stated that when it ended, the entire audience sat in silence, speechless, because they were emotionally drained! Sounds heavy, although I couldn’t really tell from the few minutes of it that I watched. The film’s star Barbara Barrie, won the Cannes award for Best Actress. Co-starring along with Barrie were Harry Bellaver, Bernie Hamilton (who played the black man she remarries), and Robert Earl Jones – James Earl Jones’ father! I didn’t know his father was also in the biz. Then again, I didn’t know anything about his father at all! Bernie Hamilton, whom I wasn’t at all familiar with before today, would go on to co-star in many more films, as well as TV shows, into the 1980s. He died in 2008. Has anyone seen this film in full? Too bad I missed it, because, by all accounts, it’s not available on any home video format; and TCM doesn’t have any future screenings of it planned. I was able to grab a scene from TCM’s website, and upload to YouTube to share here, which I’ve embedded below. It’s a courtroom scene in which the judge gives his final verdict, and the reaction that follows. 8 comments to Flashback – “One Potato, Two Potato” (Miscegenation-Influenced Custody Battle In 1960s USA) |
  
|
||||
|
Copyright © 2010 Shadow And Act - All Rights Reserved  View in: Mobile | Standard
|
||||||
I saw this film a couple of times as a child in the 1970’s. They used to play it at the annual Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame film festival in Oakland, California. Screenings of it would always be packed.
I can’t recall anything about the quality of the filmmaking, but I do remember it having a really deep impression on me as a child. I haven’t seen it since those days, but I remember being really moved by it (and disturbed by the ending). I actually think of this film every now and then.
It’s pretty historical, given its subject matter at the time it was made and its success at Cannes. It deserves to be released on DVD. I wish I’d have known it was on TCM…I’d have recorded it.
Ooh, this has piqued my interest. Too bad its not available. Barbara Barrie is still alive and working by the way. She has had quite the career on stage . . . nominated for a Tony for her performance in Company . . . but did not win.
I saw it last night. Wow. I also had never heard of it.
Great find, Tambay! There’s got to be a way to get this film in its entirety. Did you try the open source archive? There are a lot of old films stored on that site and many gems buried among the bunch.
Can’t find it anywhere. It’s not in the public domain. But I’m digging…
Found an interesting quote:
http://www.apakistannews.com/one-potato-two-potato-movie-148028
“At the time of its release, a Potato, Two Potato was praised out of all proportion to its realistic and progressive dissection of race relations. Only a few critics like Judith Crist renegade dared to point out that sociologically, the movie is still mired in the era of Pinky condescending. Instead of focusing on the injustices heaped upon black Bernie Hamilton, the film’s sympathies are almost entirely directed toward the poor, put-on, white as snow Barbara Barrie.”
Tambay, TCM will do it. They do air these black unheard of gems. I love the channel. They aired Nothin’ But A Man a million times. They recently aired this flick about a young brother facing “discrimination.”. It was a bit corny and earnest — but TCM is also a place to get a shot of the Bailey, Horne, Belafonte, Dandridge, etc. the old ’40’s ’30’s guard; in those race movies u have to hold your nose to watch, and you do just to see thesfolks like Ms. Ethel Waters do their damn thing. TCM has a catalogue; check there? I don’t kno.
WOW, THIS Film brings back stardust memories, i saw this gem back in the day, at Rainey Institute, a black recreational enclave, they would show diverse black movies ranging from oscar micheux to the jackson 5 t.v. specials.