Films Featuring Chapel Hill (Expanded to NC overall)

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"Two separate interviews. The first is more of a conversation between Hubert Samuel Robinson and Frank Porter Graham. Robinson, a Black man, worked for Graham, a white man, for many years as a driver, butler, and general assistant while Graham was president of the University of North Carolina. Topics covered include the admission of a Japanese student (Fukasato) fleeing his country, student loan drives during the Great Depression, the Public Works Administration buildings on campus, their travels around the state, and other staff members including Alice and young staff members and students. The interview also covers an anecdote about the famous Orson Welles' "War of the Worlds" broadcast. The second interview begins at 20:56 and features William B. "Bill" Aycock, who was University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Chancellor at the time, interviewing Frank Porter Graham. This interview covers Graham's service as a good officer for the United Nations. Graham talks about the distinction between various UN roles, followed by an extended discussion of his role as a mediator in the India-Pakistan dispute from the 1950s and 1960s. Graham gives an overview of the social and political history between the two countries and then specficially addresses the stalemate over Kashmir. The lines on the picture are due to scratches on the tape. After 00:49:00, the content appears to be images of parking areas and cars in Chapel Hill but it is upside down. There is also loud buzzing."

lib.digitalnc.org

Frank P. Graham and Hubert Robinson; William Aycock and Frank P. Graham

Two separate interviews. The first is more of a conversation between Hubert Samuel Robinson and Frank Porter Graham. Robinson, a Black man, worked for Graham, a white man, for many years as a driver, butler, and general assistant while Graham was president of the University of North Carolina...
lib.digitalnc.org
 
A silent short black and white film featuring a man in uniform exploring the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's campus after receiving his draft notice. He pauses at the grave of James Moore Tatum, University of North Carolina football coach.

[ Seems to be a silent dedication to Jim Tatum with scenes of the Bell Tower and inside Kenan Stadium in the 1960s (Tatum died in 1959) -- Pretty strange ]

lib.digitalnc.org

A Final Tribute

A silent short black and white film featuring a man in uniform exploring the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's campus after receiving his draft notice. He pauses at the grave of James...
lib.digitalnc.org
 
"The Siler City story - a town on the skids that stopped its slide and pulled itself into a prosperous, industrially diversivied, 20th Century town. The efforts of local businessmen in attracting new industry and expanding the old are shown as are their continuing efforts. The resulting effect on the town's total economy at the end of three years of growth is dramatic." Description taken from the North Carolina Public Library Film Service Catalog of 16mm films, 1972 edition. Features the following businesses and organizations: Boling Chair Company, Siler City Mills, Chatham Motors, Inc., Siler City Chamber of Commerce, Selig Corporation, Carolina Poultry, Inc., Siler City Manufacturing Corporation, Byrd's Supermarket, Belk-Yates, Company, and Siler City Motor Lodge. Alternative title: Welcome to Work.

lib.digitalnc.org

Affairs of State: Welcome to Work, the Siler City Story

"The Siler City story - a town on the skids that stopped its slide and pulled itself into a prosperous, industrially diversivied, 20th Century town. The efforts of local businessmen in attracting new...
lib.digitalnc.org
 
"Has Anyone Seen North Carolina Lately?"

1963

Concept and Content Robert E. Stipe, Institute of Government, UNC Chapel Hill and James Bramlett
Film and Production: James Bramlett
Supervision: Earl Wynn, Department of Radio, Television, and Motion Pictures, UNC Chapel Hill

"The film features shots in the following North Carolina towns: High Point, Asheville, Raleigh, Hillsborough, and Pittsboro. "Deals with variety of matters related to the environment in North Carolina. Emphasis is on visual aspects of urban and rural life. Plays up contrasts between what many people would regard as the 'best' and 'worst' aspects of the environment." Description taken from the North Carolina Public Library Film Service Catalog of 16mm films, 1972 Edition."

lib.digitalnc.org/record/24699?ln=en

Ironic, cynical, sarcastic as hell...There is even 11 seconds of film shot in my little home town of Bonlee at the 2:11 to 2:22 minute marks.
 
Short film that explores the life and struggles of the Hedgepeth family who lives with limited means during the Vietnam War. The film focuses primarily on Mrs. Hedgepeth, who works as a housekeeper and nanny.

No Handouts for Mrs. Hedgepeth

IMG_7539.jpeg


Unexpectedly intense.
 
Here's a documentary, 87 minutes long and made in 1995. A good bit of it takes place in North Carolina -- Belmont and Cooleemee in particular. Honea Path, South Carolina is prominently portrayed as well.

"How could such a pivotal moment in American history be kept a secret for 60 years? Textile workers recall with pride the long-supressed story of the General Textile Strike of 1934 when 500,000 Southern mill laborers walked off their jobs. George Stoney, Judith Helfand and Susanne Rostock's probing film explores how the strike still impacts labor, power and economics in the South today." The Uprising of ’34 - POV

The Uprising of '34 | Alexander Street, part of Clarivate

The Uprising of '34 is a startling documentary which tells the story of the General Strike of 1934, a massive but little-known strike by hundreds of thousands of Southern cotton mill workers during the Great Depression. Through the voices of those on all sides, The Uprising of '34 paints a rare...
search.alexanderstreet.com search.alexanderstreet.com
 
I highly recommend the documentary above...it was literally made 'just in time' and caught many of the participants and witnesses to The Great Textile Strike of '34 before they passed on.
 
There was an old thread on NC films here: https://zzlpolitics.com/threads/best-movies-filmed-in-nc.362/page-5#post-29011. Don't know if it makes sense to merge.

I was thinking about Alessandro Nivola after seeing The Brutalist. I thought he was great in that but his storyline kind of drops out of the film at one point, which seems a regretful narrative choice. But that movie is so stuffed, so something had to give.

But he was the male lead in Junebug, mentioned in the old thread. In that movie there's a moment where our boy goes back to his hometown church and his big city girlfriend hears him sing the gospel for the first time. There are sequences in movies where time stands still, this is one of them.

 
An old friend wrote a book “Soul City,” about a town that was being built in the 70s in NC to be “black owned.”
Ron Howard bought the rights to make a film about it, but it had a time limit that he would need to start and the time ran out.
Maybe one day.
Anyway, very good book by a UNC graduate. Check it out.
 
ChileG said:
An old friend wrote a book “Soul City,” about a town that was being built in the 70s in NC to be “black owned.”
Ron Howard bought the rights to make a film about it, but it had a time limit that he would need to start and the time ran out.
Maybe one day.
Anyway, very good book by a UNC graduate. Check it out.
Click to expand...
Read it
My sister used to run a State supported day care in Warrenton for mentally disadvantged kids (sorry don't know the right descriptor words today)
Couple times a year they would go to Soul City to use a public pool
 
mpaer said:
Read it
My sister used to run a State supported day care in Warrenton for mentally disadvantged kids (sorry don't know the right descriptor words today)
Couple times a year they would go to Soul City to use a public pool
Click to expand...
That’s awesome! The writer also wrote “The Great Dissent,” which won the Robert Kennedy non-fiction book of the year. It’s worth a read.
The author and I went to school together from Kindergarten through college.
 
ChileG said:
An old friend wrote a book “Soul City,” about a town that was being built in the 70s in NC to be “black owned.”
Ron Howard bought the rights to make a film about it, but it had a time limit that he would need to start and the time ran out.
Maybe one day.
Anyway, very good book by a UNC graduate. Check it out.
Click to expand...
One of the big movers and shakers (who shall not be named) behind Soul City built a house down the street from my parents not long after the money started flowing. Nothibg too extravagant. My parents deed and most of the original lots contained redlining clauses. The first AA family in the neighborhood. Nice people.
 
Years ago I often found myself driving in that northeastern corner of NC -- The Soul City radio station was going then...might still be today...but it was a great tune in.

Clearly different times. Different media.
 
Junebug reminded me (for some reason) of The Journey of August King. A very fine John Ehle novel set in the Antebellum backcountry of North Carolina, the film evidently had a tough time being released. It stars Jason Patric and Thandie Newton. Sam Waterston and Larry Drake are in it too.

The..."story of a lonely man, returning to his rural home from the market, who encounters an escaped slave woman and decides to help her. He tells her what he is doing is “against the law,” but he does it anyway, in part because of guilt over a dead wife he was unable to help, and in part because she is helpless and harmless, and he feels sorry for her. Later, there is an element of affection, although the film is over before we see what it might lead to."

The material culture (props, language, attitudes, context) in the film is excellent.



tv.apple.com

The Journey of August King

The Journey of August King · Trailer
tv.apple.com tv.apple.com
 
Ugly subject but a good piece of work in 87 minutes. Carries the viewer through a great deal of the political context in North Carolina that wrapped around Helms' life (1921-2008).



“Senator No: Jesse Helms” explores the origins of Jesse Helms's politics, from his Southern Baptist roots in the Jim Crow South to his political baptism in North Carolina's racially-charged 1950 U.S. Senate race. Trumpeting Old South values as an editorialist and politician, he crashed headlong into the civil rights movement, communism, abortion, gay rights--virtually every major issue of his time. Yet in the twilight of his career, Helms had a very public--and intriguing--reversal on international AIDS relief.Independent filmmaker John Wilson had unique access to Helms himself, vast archives spanning his 60 years in media and politics, and a diverse group of Helms's allies, opponents, and observers, from Jerry Falwell to Bono. Actor Will Patton narrates, with an original music score by Chris Frank of the Red Clay Ramblers. Wilson’s previous collaborations with UNC-TV include the Emmy Award-winning “Dr. Frank: The Life and Times of Frank Porter Graham,” narrated by Charles Kuralt."
 
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