What better subject for historical multimedia treatment than one with a multiple-media core to begin with? Salt of the Earth, a unique film made by blacklisted Hollywood leftists in 1953, offers a key work around which interactive producers Emily Kaufman and Aleen Stein have built a portrait of an era on CD-ROM.
Closely based on the real history of a 1950 strike at a zinc mine in New Mexico, the film's plot turns on a shift in traditional roles when the strike must be taken over by the miners' wives. Though hardly the most nuanced film ever made, it is an earnest and at times touching story of the struggle for racial, political, and sexual equality. The black-and-white film is included on this disc in its entirety, in a choice of two window sizes.
A wide range of ancillary material sets this work in the context of this country's worst period of political repression. The filmmakers braved incredible difficulties to make this movie, including the cruelly timed deportation of the Mexican lead actress, violent attempts at sabotage, and the refusal of professional services (themselves under pressure) to process the film. The soundtrack had to be recorded clandestinely in New York under the pretense that it was for a Mexican adventure story. It's hard to believe that a film espousing such homey values could once have been considered so radical. Today, Salt of the Earth is on the short list of films selected by the Library of Congress for the National Film Registry.
Included are excerpts from the work of director Herbert Biberman, interviews with screenwriter Michael Wilson and the other filmmakers, as well as their biographies, transcripts of their defiant appearances before the red-baiting House Un-American Activities Committee, photographs and histories of the real strikers (many of whom played themselves in the film), critical essays, and early reviews (including a vile, hysterically anti-communist screed by Pauline Kael).
Some will object to watching any film in a small, slightly jerky video window on a computer. The format works well for a work important for the window it provides on history rather than for its quite-good-under-the-circumstances cinematography. Improvements in digital video should eventually make a wider range of works appropriate for such illuminating treatment.
Salt of the Earth for Mac: US$49.95. Voyager: (800) 446 2001, +1 (212) 431 5199.
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