Nationtime — Gary

1972. 2024.

In 1972, state delegations for the recently-formed Congressional Black Caucus decamped to Gary, Indiana, for a convention (hosted by a Gary high school) that sought to unify the disparate factions of the Black Power movement in the wake of the barrage of late-60s assassinations and the push against a Nixon presidency. 

Nationtime — Gary [1972] serves as a potent example of Greaves' aptitude for empathy and conciliation, inseparable, as witnessed in his direction of the actors in the earlier 1968 Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One. Presiding over the event as main MC is a figure less integrationist than Greaves (who's just there to observe) — the poet-activist Amiri Baraka, né LeRoi Jones, author of Dutchman.

The original cut of Nationtime — Gary ran 58 minutes in black and white, prints of which were struck for viewing at the institutional level. This restored version assembled by Greaves's widow Louise and the heroic IndieCollect runs 80 minutes uncut and from 2020 restores the film to its intended color version. (A 4K restoration has been carried out on the black and white iteration too.) William Greaves' instinctive artistry aside, Nationtime — Gary exemplifies one of the great American historical documents and for this pivotal moment we are there •

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Other writing at Cinemasparagus on the films of William Greaves:

Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One [1968]

Nationtime — Gary {Restored Uncut Color Version} [1972]

Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take 2-1/2 [2005]

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