“Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not be Televised)” is a documentary that uses never before seen footage from a Harlem Cultural Festival that spanned June 29 through August 24, 1969 in then Mount Morris Park, now known as Marcus Garvey Park. The festival was a direct response to the iconic turmoil of 1968, including a series of high profile assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. The film is available in theaters and streaming on Hulu.
Questlove, aka Ahmir Khalib Thompson, brandishes his experience and skills as a musician, entertainer and journalist to direct his first film, a combination of the direct cinema genre and more traditional expository, participatory documentaries. Viewers may be familiar with direct cinema from recent popular entries such as “Apollo 11” (2019) and “Amazing Grace” (2018). A director takes raw, unused film footage from a historic event, restores the film and sound quality, edits the footage to a digestible length then releases it as a feature. Direct cinema creates the illusion of a viewer experiencing history as a real time observer. The film director creates the story through editing because he was not present when the actual footage was shot. “Apollo 11” deviated with some animated graphics. “Amazing Grace” strictly adheres to the standard, but is only classified as a concert film. More familiar documentary genres include exposition from talking heads, bystanders, and participants to expand on the context of the footage.
“Summer of Soul” strikes a balance between appreciating the performances by Stevie Wonder, BB King, The Fifth Dimension, Mahalia Jackson and Sly and the Family Stone while using the footage as an entry point for examining broader African diaspora issues such as history, politics, culture, trauma. Questlove treats performers, talking head experts and festival attendees equally as experts on the era.
“Summer of Soul” is reminiscent of a substantial pop-up video without the graphics. The pacing between concert footage and exposition mimics the rhythm of an internet search. Clicking on a link leads you down the rabbit hole until you find an equilibrium between learning more about what you just observed and returning to the original task. Questlove took a huge risk by structuring the narrative this way instead of simply showing the concert, but even during didactic tangents, the music never gets lost. Black music inherently has a deeper significance than entertainment.
“Summer of Soul” feels as if it is the wistful answer to a question that viewers had after watching “Black Panther” (2018), “Where is our Wakanda?” For a moment, it was Harlem. Through the draw of the live performances, the site of the concert and the enthusiasm of the audience, performers and fans create a temporary ideal home in a hostile land. They become the majority, not the “other.” For example, because the NYPD initially refused to provide security, the Black Panther used uniform and plainclothes members to patrol the grounds while the occasional cross-armed, sulky beat cop is shown in a black and white photo begrudgingly doing his job.
While white people participated, performed in, and attended the festival, they were in the minority. The invite to the cookout becomes literal, and most people with sense accepted an invitation, but the point was blackness. Without support from the establishment behind the scenes, the festival could not exist, but once it became real, the point was relaxing in the warm bath of blackness, not packaging it into something palatable for a broader audience. People finally get to be themselves. Questlove frames the documentary through the eyes of a black man who was a child when he attended. This festival changes the lives of all the black people who are there by redefining blackness as the majority, the standard. “Summer of Soul” moves from traditional, radical to international definitions of who is black, from respectability politics to revolutionary politics, from majority acceptance and assimilation to pride and experimentation. Though the roles of performer and concertgoer are rigid, they accept each other. Through embracing the broad definition of blackness, they get to be people and cultivate a unique identity and freedom of expression.
Enough with the intellectualizing. “Summer of Soul” is also an amazing concert film. I did not know or forgot that Stevie Wonder played the drums! Seeing Sly & the Family Stone perform “Everyday People” was better than any recording. I never really appreciated the backup singers, especially the one pulling double duty on the trumpet. When a festival attendee describes Nina Simone as an African princess, it is not hyperbole. It made me want to rewatch “What Happened Miss Simone?” Sometimes a movie is just cool to watch. I am unfamiliar with Hugh Masekela, but he looked like a rock star in his leather vest on a summer day in New York. Also stay for the post credits scene. If you are not into gospel, a huge, early portion of the film features such memorable acts as Papa Staple & the Staple Singers and Edwin Hawkin Singers. If you enjoyed “Amazing Grace,” then this feature is required viewing.
Even if none of acts impress you, which may mean that you are dead inside, unlike “Amazing Grace,” the people who shot this footage knew what they were doing. Hal Tulchin, a television director, had hoped to market the footage and draw the same audience as “Woodstock” (1970) by marketing it as Black Woodstock, but no one was interested until now. How?!? The vibrant colors and gorgeous clothes are enough to keep audiences entertained.
Lin-Manuel Miranda of “Hamilton” (2020) and “In the Heights” (2021) fame appears briefly with his dad to school the audience on intersectionality of race and Latin culture in Harlem. “Summer of Soul” has interviewees who seem less germane to the topic, but are famous enough to attract an audience such as Chris Rock discussing the trajectory of Stevie Wonder’s career. Rock’s insights are enlightening, but huh? I was also surprised that Questlove waited until later in the film to place a recent interview with Wonder. He probably wanted to end on a high note.
Let’s say you hate music and are color blind. “Summer of Soul” will still resonate with viewers as it parallels the turmoil of that time with ours from a seemingly indulgent space race to Presidon’t’s first coming as Nixon. Black people were stunned at the return of overt, explicit racism. An opioid drug crisis was crippling a community in the form of heroin.
If I had to criticize “Summer of Soul,” I’m disappointed that Questlove did not make it a television miniseries. I want to see all the performances and do a deep dive into Black history, but I hate to admit that wanting to see more and watching a forty-hour television miniseries are two very different things. Questlove was right to make a film to ensure that more people, including me, would see it. His film is family friendly and would appeal to all ages. If mom did not already have a rigorous all day television viewing schedule, I know that she would have loved to see it.
