Django Unchained vs. Boss Nigger

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This essay compares two Western genre films and the historical eras in which they were produced. The films are Django Unchained (Tarantino 2012) and Boss Nigger (Arnold 1975). The essay will focus on three main elements regarding each of these films: the American movie industry at the time of their production, the audiences that received them upon release, and the authorship of each movie and its effect on marketing. Through this analysis the essay will not only thoroughly compare the two films but also discuss the changes and continuity in filmmaking and the Western genre over time.

The films chosen for this comparison are primarily Westerns and this can be identified by observing the thematic conventions contained in the visuals, characters, and plot lines. Each employs common visual conventions of the Western genre [4] such as:

• predominantly outdoor settings, wide angle shots of landscape
• indoor settings of saloons, ranches, brothels
• clothing - wide brimmed hats, shirts and gun belts for the men, long skirts and blouses for women
• weapons of guns, knives, and whips
• horse as the main method of transport

This combination of iconography provides a framework for the audience as to what kind of story to expect and how it will be told. We then have further similarities in Western tropes between the two such as the anti-hero, the action duo, and improbable aiming skills of the protagonist. There are also similarities to be drawn between the two plotlines, each deals with retribution, each portrays violence as the solution to obstacles, and both the characters of Django and Boss are motivated to protect the woman they love. Both mix genres and using the genre of Western as part of their recipe rather than taxonomy. Using this well-worn genre also works as reading cues for the audience. They know the formula well and can concentrate on the differences. It is within these differences that each film makes

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its socio-political statements.

Despite the long list of similarities, the way each film uses these conventions sets them apart. Visually, Boss Nigger is highly stylised mixing seventies apparel and decor amongst Western genre conventions. Django Unchained is also stylised, but less so, as the film intends for its audience to engage with the reality of American history. Increasing the level of stylisation moves a film further toward the realm of fantasy, which in turn can break the audiences ability to associate the storyline and meanings with the real world. In his book on the Western genre, Kitses' [14] claims that American history is the most fundamental convention of the Western. While this rings true of Django Unchained, which aims to address issues of American slavery, this theory is not applicable to Boss Nigger. If anything, the latter is an attempt to rewrite American history by making a Western film where characters that were denigrated at this time are instead in an equal or superior role. The high stylisation of Boss Nigger creates a fantasy world, an alternate history for audience entertainment. Django Unchained, while still aiming to entertain, also intends for it's audience to reflect on the real-world history of American slavery.

Cawelti [6] describes the Western as "the point where savagery and lawlessness are in decline before the advancing wave of law and order, but are still strong enough to pose a local and monumentally significant challenge". Django Unchained works with this idea by placing the story two years before the civil war. The audience is aware that soon enough slavery will end and the villains of the film, and the form of violence they conduct, will be eliminated. Yet, the desire for Django to have his personal retribution remains.

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Links between Boss Nigger and Django Unchained arise in multiple reviews and articles [10][18][26] as film critics draw comparisons between the two film's uses of genre. Both mix Western with Blaxploitation: Boss Nigger did this at the height of productions of exploitation films, while Django Unchained has adopted the mix for purposes of nostalgia and revisionist art. Some argue that using the same mix of genres puts the two films into one linear timeline of film evolution [26]. Others say that Django Unchained merely copies Boss Nigger, regurgitating the same images and meanings of the original [10]. Undoubtedly there is much discourse around the relationship between these two films, which makes them apt choices for the in-depth comparison of this essay.

By the standards of Wyatt's formula for high concept films [28], Boss Nigger is quintessential. It is based on a simply stated, one-liner premise and has greater purpose as a marketing ploy than as a piece of art. The star power of Fred Williamson is the film's main selling point, known as "King of the black B-flicks" [21] and the "godfather of Blaxploitation films" [27]. As Williamson himself said when reflecting on his career, "I've always been aware of marketability. Everything I did on the field was calculated to market myself" [17]. This is not surprising when considering the historical context within which Boss Nigger was released, which saw a flux in independent filmmaking companies relying on niche marketing and the production of genre films.

For most of the seventies, major film production companies focused on making fewer films with a higher profit margin [2], this left a gap in the market, which was filled by independent companies producing low budget genre films, such as Dimension Pictures, who released Boss Nigger in 1975. Lawrence Woolner, co-founder of Dimension Pictures said at the time "the majors have lost control to

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the extent that we can come in and demand and get preferred playing time" [15]. Although Dimension Pictures was an independent film company running small-scale productions, the labour was still divided along studio lines. Fred Williamson as writer, producer, and main actor had considerable control over the film. Like many independents at the time, financing came from European sources [2] and Williamson was known overseas for his negotiating skills as a producer [27]. The combination of low-budget filmmaking without relying exclusively on U.S. investors gave Dimension Pictures the flexibility to produce such controversial films as Boss Nigger and target a youth market interested in high levels of violence and sex, mixed with pop culture, fashion, slang language and music.

Eventually, the majors responded by absorbing the elements that gave such independent films their edge [23], which over time has led to an auteur like Tarantino producing big budget b-movies such as Django Unchained through the major Weinstein Company. This film is less high concept and more towards the analogous end of Wyatt's scale. While its marketing contains all the staples of a high concept film e.g. star power, soundtrack, merchandise, and taglines, the high-concept story is used to enable discourse around an implicit subtext: that of slavery in America.

The Weinstein Company is a conglomeration of filmmaking and distribution run by the renowned Weinstein brothers. They also started up big Hollywood names Miramax and Dimension Films, and worked with Disney for a time [11]. This is the other end of the scale from the small, independent, 1970s Dimension Pictures. The aforementioned Dimension Films, owned by The Weinstein Company, is the label for their low-concept exploitation films, which follow on the tradition that companies like

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Dimension Pictures developed through the sixties and seventies. At times these lower budget films have worked to carry the business through the financial losses of a high budget flop, and in 2000, Dimension Films accounted for around 75% of Miramax's box office revenue [20]. Company practices like these, of conglomerating the operations of both low-budget low-concept studios and high-budget high concept, demonstrate how the changes in industry of the 1970s have had a lasting effect on the way American filmmakers do business.

Dimension Pictures marketed to a niche audience of young drive-in cinema-goers who were primarily interested in R-rated films containing nudity and violence [15] the rise of which was in part thanks to the demise of the production code in the 1960s [26]. The low budget of such independent films meant that they did not require a large audience to repay costs allowing them to be more controversial and personal [2]. Dimension Pictures opened up opportunities for female filmmakers [24] and African-American filmmakers like Fred Williamson. The exploitation films they were produced were an alternative to mainstream that defied bureaucratic practices and dominant ideologies of filmmaking [15] however some argue they also exploited talent, women's bodies, violence, and racial stereotypes as commodities. In the case of Boss Nigger the target audience was also African-American. As Williamson has confidently stated, "In the 1970s I came along at the right time. I came along when black people were looking for a hero. I was that hero" [21]. Jameson [12] agrees that the seventies were a time for a new representation of black masculinity to contrast the more mild-mannered roles of actors like Sidney Poitier. He says of the 70s African-American movie audience,

"They celebrated the antihero, the person who was getting over the system. It didn't matter so much that the person was a drug dealer, was a pimp. What mattered was that they were getting over the system, the system that almost necessitated both violence and criminality. They [70s films with role of the super-negro] created a public argument about how whites and blacks should get along in society, trying to make white Americans understand the way African Americans had been oppressed, socially

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and psychologically" [12]

Django Unchained is targeted at a more integrated audience but seems to aim at the same public discourse and understanding that Jameson mentions. However, the fact that writer/director Quentin Tarantino is white seems to have raised an argument about whether slavery in America is a taboo topic for Caucasian American filmmakers. Most notably, director Spike Lee spoke out against the film stating that, "American slavery was not a Sergio Leone spaghetti western. It was a holocaust" and labelled Django Unchained as disrespectful to his ancestors [25]. In line with this thinking, American civil rights activist W.E.B. du Bois once said that play produced for a black audience must be "about us, by us, for us, and near us" [26]. Fellerath [10] asks if American history is too important to be left to "pulp filmmakers" yet Buscombe [4] says of the Western genre that "it's usually assumed that it sprang, fully armed, from pulp fiction". Bernstein's review [1] even divides the cast by race describing the film succinctly as, "white cast members spoke in horribly racist language and proceeded to get shot and dismembered to rapturous applause". These quotes all show how much debate has arisen amongst the audience of Django Unchained, but this last one also shows how the audience of such films are sometimes depicted as favouring violence.

Westerns are traditionally filled with racist stereotypes [2] and are known for violating the historical record [10], which may be why this genre was so attractive for the purposes of both these films to make statements about race in America. To do this the Western genre is a useful tool because of its longevity and prolific body of work. Audiences in 1975 and today are very familiar with all the conventions, tropes, and idioms of the Western. These audiences arrive with a bevy of expectations about how the film will be structured and presented. Boss Nigger and Django Unchained each use this

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resigned familiarity of the audience to create originality and surprise, to make the differences matter and work for the purpose and meaning of the film. They also use Western genre's tradition of violence to target a young audience, and the tradition of racism to broach the topic of America's racist history.

The market audience of youths desiring controversial levels of violence, sex, controversy, and sensationalism has been in consistent existence ever since such films started being made. What has changed is the level of intelligence with which both audience and filmmakers engage with such subjects.

Prior to the conception of auteur theory in the 1950s, films were most commonly advertised via the fame of their actors. Interestingly, Boss Nigger follows this antiquated line of marketing as lead actor Fred Williamson is used as the main draw card, which is demonstrated in the layout and wording of the film's only promotional poster (see Image no.1). Williamson's role as writer and producer is announced in small font at the base of the poster, alongside a mention of director Jack Arnold.

Today auteur theory is taken for granted and has become the dominant method of looking at films and how they are marketed and interpreted. This is evident when looking at the variety of promotional posters for Django Unchained (see Images no.2-9) some of which carry no more information than the film title and Tarantino's name. Discussion of this film is inextricably intertwined with discussion of Tarantino himself: his personality, intentions, tastes, upbringing, political views, his previous works etc. [9][10][13][16][25]. Perhaps this is the cult of personality that Brazin warned would come [14] from such a narrow approach to film critique.

To evaluate Tarantino by the standards of auteur theory allows an insight into the diversities, complexities, flaws, and merits of auteur theory. For example, Tarantino not only directed Django Unchained but also wrote the screenplay and acted in minor parts. This spread allowed him to dominate proceedings in a way that Sarris states is essential to enable the auteur to develop coherent meaning [5].

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Measured by Sarris' framework for judging potential auteurs [22], Tarantino's lowest rate would be as a metteur-en-scene with clout enough to realise his own artistic vision despite the constraints of the American filmmaking industry. Marshall refers to this by saying "there are a handful of film-makers in each generation who both inspire a loyal following and have the power to break out of the conventions of common or garden genre pictures. Quentin Tarantino is one such film-maker" [16]. High praise indeed.

The bulk of auteur theory, from Cahiers du Cinema to Andrew Sarris, maintains that the work of an auteur should be original, thoughtful, and reflect the author's emotions or outlook in the same way as the painting does for the painter. This assumption that art must be profound means kitsch, pop culture style artists like Tarantino are immediately excluded. Buscombe [4] reasons that auteur theory is ill equipped for dealing with popular art, and further argues that "even in its less extreme forms, it cannot really make room for the contribution of the tradition in which the film was made". It is true that despite an author's personal style they inevitably rely on the conventions created by past works to relay their story in an effective and entertaining manner. Arguably, true originality does not exist. Auteur theory does not seem to cater for the ways in which an author like Tarantino mixes time-worn genres and well-known conventions, to create something new and unexpected for his audience.

At best, auteur theory works to give a systematic examination of an author's work, allowing patterns and themes to emerge. At worst, it has permeated film theory to the point at which it is impossible to discuss film without discussing auteurism.

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By way of comparing the Westerns Boss Nigger and Django Unchained this essay has revealed and examined a variety of elements regarding genre and the history of film. Through exploring the category of industry it has noted changes in how the systems of operations in movie making have changed with time from the flood of low-budget, high-concept, genre films of the 70s to the evolution of the high-budget b-flicks produced by major studios today. In looking at audience the essay has demonstrated how cultural changes can affect the types of films being made. It also looked at the continuous discourse around how race, violence, and language are used in films, showing that although ratings may have changed, the concerns of the audience and critics has been somewhat consistent over time. In discussing the role and history of auteur theory, the essay has endeavoured to address enduring film theory questions about what makes films art, and what makes a film artist.

References

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2. Bordwell, D. & Thompson, K. 2010, Film Art: An Introduction, Ninth Edition, McGraw-Hill, Singapore.
3. Boss Nigger 1975, feature film, Dimension Pictures, Santa Fe.
4. Buscombe, E. 1986, 'The idea of genre in the American cinema', Grant, B. K. (ed.), Film Genre Reader, University of Texas Press, Austin, pp.11-25.
5. Caughie, J. 1981, Theories of Authorship: a Reader, BFI, London.
6. Cawelti, J. G. 1974, 'Savagery, civilization and the western hero', Nachbar, J. G. (ed.), Focus on the Western, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, pp.57-63.
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8. Django Unchained 2012, feature film, Weinstein Company, Los Angeles.
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18. Patterson, J. 2013, 'Is Django Unchained and American classic? John Patterson is unsure, but it doesn't stint in its determination to show the full horrors of slavery', The Guardian, 12 Jan 2013, p.19.
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