I just saw this in Paris, they seem to get films before the UK. It's
about the legacy of slavery in the Deep South, USA. Set in Alabama in
the 1930s, it stars Bryce Dallas Howard (the blind girl in M Night
Shyamalan's laughable The Village) as the daughter of a gangster
(Willem Dafoe) who finds herself running a cotton plantation and trying
to empower the black workers, after the owner (Lauren Bacall) dies.
Danny Glover plays one of the 'slaves' and Chloe Sevigny is also in
there somewhere - quite a cast.
All the action takes place on an indoor film set with minimal stage-
type props and scenery; the actors even mime opening non-existent
doors. It's an audacious film about relations between oppressor and
oppressed, with a tongue-in-cheek narration and chapter titles. The
tone changes with a closing montage of photos of black America,
including lynchings, set to David Bowie's Young Americans.
I'm still not sure what I thought of it - would be very interested to
hear from anyone else who's seen it.
Catriona