The Great Debaters

The Great Debaters tells the story of a debate team at an all black college in the 1930s that made history by defeating white debate teams in a time when the Jim Crow south was oppressive as ever. Denzel Washington directed and stars as Melvin Tolson the famous poet. Don't feel bad if you don't know him but feel free to make me feel bad if you do. My first experience with Tolson was recently a piece he wrote on Gone With The Wind. It was actually quite a thought provoking writing. Suffice to say that Tolson is quite a fascinating figure in his own right.

The film follows his time at Wiley College where he taught and managed a debate team of young men and women who showed the world that black men and women were equals to whites in a time when that was not the majority opinion. As a story that is worth telling there is no doubt. It is quite pleasant to see a film about education and the power of education to effect change. I was pleased to hear real literary reference from Ghandi to Henry David Thoreau. I was happy to see a movie that wasn't afraid to give a etymology of denigrate.

Unfortunately a good story and a seemingly deep love of learning is muddled by a cookie cutter standard underdog story. You could replace debate here with any sport you can think of and you'd pretty much have the same movie. And that is really a shame because the film could be so much better if it ditched the cliches and went for a more interesting narrative. Despite that there are some powerfully moving scenes of racism that are horrible to watch and necessary because of course even if these specific things didn't happen to these characters, they certainly happened to countless others.

Washington in his second outing as a director does a fine job with the direction but the story seems torn between wanting to be inspirational and socially relevant. Not to say that it can't be both but it deserves better than the cliche underdog treatment it gets.