The Great Debaters

Strongly recommended to bring up, expose and liberate many young but oppressed and subjugated minds. Denigrate should now mean to "remove the rich value of being original" whilst Nigrate should mean to "realise, discover, recover or rediscover lost richness, originality or original values..." On the other hand, LYNCH and LYNCHING should be reclassified as "acting brutally and criminally against the wellbeing and respectability of humanity. A crime against humanity!

What came phrasing out of my mind as I watched the credits to this deeply troubling and intellectually rousing movie was: "The tragedy of humanity!" And so, I conclude that humans are tragic troubled souls. Our development and history as a species is a constant confrontation with deep conflicts eternally needing resolutions. When shall we resolve this self-afflicting illness of racism, permanently? This movie reminds and requests resolutions. What if the conflicts that confront us or are confronted by us no longer existed? Wouldn't we create new ones? Wouldn't we desire to reaffirm our tragedies?

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The Great Debaters, taking place 1935 in Texas, is about a young debate team of Wiley College, a school which became famous as it won many debates against schools of any background in the 30's. Denzel Washington, playing professor Melvin Tolson, coaches this team to finally debate against Harvard University. Tolsen selects four young people who he trains in debating and who he strengthens in their resolve to fight for the civil rights. Melvin Tolsen also organizes the Southern Tenant Farmers Union, which contributes to him coming into constant conflict with the town's sheriff. The Great Debaters allows you to gain a great insight view of the lives of these four debaters (not to mention Tolson's life) and their family circumstances: For instance Hamilton Burgess (played by J. Williams) quits the team because his parents are too worried about the radical actions of Tolson and possible consequences of those. The actors were perfect. Especially Denzel Whitaker (as James Farmer Jr.) who catches your attention when debating about the cruel conditions to be faced by blacks, delivers an outstanding performance. J. Smollett (as Samantha Booke) is chosen the first woman to ever debate and N. Parker (as Henry Lowe) is sort of the leader of the debaters yet plays a surprisingly small role in the showdown in Harvard. Overall this movie is a masterpiece of the drama genre and definitely a milestone of Denzel Washington as Director. Hence, I am looking forward to more movies to come with him directing.

I saw this at the WGA Theatre and Robert Eisele, a white man, Polish-German, if I remember right was in the house. Being a white American myself, I very drawn to race conscious stories, though I strongly believe the only race is the human race. Eisele the screenwriter has teamed up with Oprah Winfrey, producer, and Denzel Washington, star-director, and the result is one of the best inspirational movies I've seen. I was impressed with Director Denzel before when I saw "Antoine Fisher." Very thought provoking that was and this one has multiple characters to root for. In 1935, Jim Crow was still in effect and blacks were clearly living as second class citizens. Based on historical characters and events, a debate team from the South went on to become the undefeated champs for the next ten years. Washington plays the college professor who coached and even wrote for the team but also was an agitator who used blacks and poor whites to join an union. Forest Whitaker plays a genius level minister who must cow down to whites to protect his family. It's fun to see the two Academy Award winners on the same screen. While everybody is good in this period piece, special mention must go to Denzel Whitaker, the one who has visual daydreams for the female but it's unrequited but still able to raise above that to win the debate at the end. Even more important, he's the one who failed the first time which makes the final victory so sweet. As the debate team is traveling, they narrowly escape whites when they witness a burning lynching from their car. Very believable done. I highly recommend this movie and hope it has great success.

I had the privilege to be a part of this movie . ( Sheriff Deputy -The Barn Scene - Supporter in the Oklahoma Scene). I was very impressed with all the professionals in the film. Denzel Washington is a not only a fantastic director .but was a real pleasure to work around. He always thought of the the comfort and well being of the principle actors and background actors . I look forward to seeing it myself. This will prove to be a must see film ! I also had the pleasure of meeting John Heard and Ritchie Montgomery . Although it was around 3 or 4 in the morning , they were remarkably nice people.

Simply spectacular movie with every single cast member worthy of an Oscar. Be it Denzel Washington to Forest Whitaker to the entire debating team of fine young actors. Each is worthy of an Academy Award nomination. The Movie was well directed by Denzel. This period piece set in the 1930's had great costume and set designs that were done very very well. I would expect great things from this movie for all of the new young people and another notch in his belt for Denzel and more appreciation for Forest Whitaker. Don't miss it. Kids over 8 yrs old will also enjoy it. We have seen 71 movies this year and consider this to be one of the best. It surely is among our top 5 for 2007.

The movie was exactly what I had expected: a compelling story, strong actors and a great message. However, while Denzel delivers another stellar performance, you can't help notice that it has been seen several times before. You can mix the racial tensions of "Remember the Titans" with the underdog vibe of "Hoosiers," "Freedom Writers," and "Stand and Deliver" to understand where this is going. The story has solid pacing, a great cast and an easy to understand plot; a few minor side steps (talented but tormented student, first female student fighting both racism and gender issues, a younger than average student fighting for a father's love/respect while coming of age) but the message holds up and delivers an appropriate but completely unsurprising conclusion. A few frightening images for children need to be balanced with the powerful messages those images represent but overall an enjoyable movie but you will see the third act coming from a mile away....