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1950-12-01
N/A
19 min
My Country 'Tis of Thee is a 1950 short documentary supervised by Gordon Hollingshead. It is a panoramic view of American history from the coming of the pilgrims all the way through to 1950. The film was nominated for an Oscar for Best Short Subject, Two-Reel.
Quite why anyone thought it was necessary, or a good idea, to try to condense a few hundred years of American colonisation into twenty minutes is anyone’s guess, but by cannibalising a few other movies and including a rousing score this has a go. We start with some disillusioned British pilgrims arriving before deciding they wanted to burn their tea and establish their own congrefs. Despite the protestations of the indigenous population, these interlopers spread themselves and their religion in all directions and that works for a while til the confederacy decides it doesn’t care much for Abe’s equality policies and a schism develops. Lots of bloodshed later we find ourselves finding an assassinated Austrian archduke’s death leads to even more and then, of course, there’s Pearl Harbor and Korea and, well you get the drift. As potted histories go, this is actually quite a dry and militaristic one that has no time for the subtleties or nuance of politics or personality. It’s emphasis is obviously designed more for jingoism and very selective factuality and it might be that given the current US attitudes to the “Monroe Doctrine” amongst other elements, it might still be being watched in Washington DC today?
