Goodbye Uncle Tom (1971)

I can't believe I actually watched this entire movie. After having seen the ambitious yet controversial Africa Addio, I had a morbid interest in seeing this gem. WOW! There are too many words I can use to describe this brave and wanton achievement. Goodbye Uncle Tom is a historical tour de force that is offensive, shocking, bizarre, seditious, realistic, hilarious, outrageous and brilliant. All of this is achieved in a campy and carnival style of representation. Blaxploitation had hit the theaters at this time, but Jacopetti and Prosperi are truly due credit for bringing so much more depth to this genre than any other B-movie hack in history.Goodbye Uncle Tom Begins as a journey through early 19th century America during the height of the slave trades. The purpose is to glean as much information into the realities and issues revolving around slavery in a pseudo documentary format. It's a very ingenious idea and far exceeds the bland dramas like Amistad and Roots. So the film makers are traveling in time as the actors of that colonial era interact with each other for the camera. You will see and witness the opinions of historical figures as they give their views on slavery while interacting and subjugating the black slaves. It's easy to be disturbed by this film due to its brutally realistic portrayal of slavery and torture. I often wondered if this was meant for satire or indictment. It gets confusing, because with all of the sickness going on you can't help but laugh at the unabashed racial epithets. Is this meant to provoke laughter, shock? I think Jacopetti and Prosperi are combining elements of hyperbole, shock, brutality and tragedy in order to paint a grim picture.The film entails a stark contrast between whites and blacks. The people who were directly involved with the blacks were the oppressive, mean and callous slave traders and slave owners. Then we have the aristocrats who are completely detached from all this madness as they gallivant about in their beautiful Victorian attire looking pristine, beautiful and noble. They clearly illustrate the dichotomy between the civilized whites and the abject nature of the Negro slaves.Does all of this seem real? In an odd way it does. It looks very realistic despite its campy delivery. But Goodbye Uncle Tom is not only an indictment of slavery, its also an indictment of integration. These arguments are presented a couple times throughout the movie. One aristocrat mentioned, "I have no desire for the institution of slavery. I got rid of my slaves. They were foul, stinky and bothersome. So I set them free. I believe in freedom, but I don't believe in equality." This is a statement that sets the tone and resonates throughout the film as we are constantly questioning the purpose of importing slaves.Some detractors of this film dislike it for shallow and ad hominem reasons. They get offended by the content and its provocative delivery. These people fail to understand the message here. You cannot take such a controversial issue without offending someone. People are going to be shocked. 19th century America was hardly benevolent and this movie doesn't have to sugarcoat it's grisly reality. So deal with it and judge afterward.There is no way a movie like this could ever be made today and shown to the public. As we live in a world where political correctness corrupts our natural instincts and judgement, Goodbye Uncle Tom supersedes those constraints. This is why it is such a rare cinematic gem. If you can deal with all the scurrility, violence and grotesque imagery, goodbye Uncle Tom is a must see.

I saw GOODBYE UNCLE TOM in a cinema in Sydney in 1972, and I would assess that if being released in 2011, it would not get a film classification today and be shelved or banned. The entire purpose of this fake documentary about back slavery in the 19th century in America, is simply to show as much cruelty towards Black men and women as possible. This is like XXX AMISTAD or ROOTS XXX but with extreme distressing gore and astonishing brutality. The two scenes that have stayed with me horribly for 40 years are of a baby being swung into a wall head first and its face smashed to bleeding pulp, and a row of black men having their front teeth knocked out with a chisel, one by one. These two scenes are two of many similar in a film that is a shopping list of cruel images thought up by the producers, not from any other source. So degrading and so bleak, this is a film that really ought to be destroyed. It serves no purpose other than depict bleeding crying distress meted out to young black people of varying ages.

Goodbye Uncle Tom is one of the sickest films that can be seen. It's about the trade slavery in America and Europe in the previous centuries. Watching Goodbye Uncle Tom, I viewed some of the nastiest and most unbelievable scenes that can be seen. Seeing the white men abuses, rapes, humiliates and does everything that comes to his twisted mind was unbelievably shocking, however , the film was boring too and had some moments that made me feel like turning it off, but i didn't, i watched it all the way. The most shocking thing about this film was that all of this has actually happened! It seemed even sicker than those holocaust stories and movies, In those holocaust stories and movies the Jewish people were slaughtered, but they weren't treated like animals that are kept in cages just for profit like the black man were. This film actually shows how the white empires are disgustingly cruel and careless. I can only recommend it to people who like being shocked or like watching shocking historical facts that have happened in the "developing" countries by the "developed" countries. 5/10

Addio Zio Tom: 7/10: Well they don't make them like this anymore and lets face it they never really did. This is really three separate films brought together in a blender set on random. The first film is a highly effective expose on slave treatment and the slave trade in the old south (the slave ship scenes blows Hollywood fare like Armistad out of the water). Using a cast of thousands and exposing practices such as selective breeding that are politely not discussed on American shores (just ask Jimmy the Greek) it simply is one of the most realistic display's of 18th and 19th century slave life ever shown on film. Then there is a second film which is a dated, and looking back rather silly collection, of news footage from the late sixties and early seventies that documents race riots with all the participants speaking in Italian creating an almost Woody Allen feel to the dub (It gives What's up Tiger Lilly a run for its money complete with ragtime music cementing the silliness of what should be serious proceedings.) The last movie is a sexploitation film dealing largely with Mandingo fantasies and containing a copious amount of child porn. (I guess National Geographic rules apply when showing thirteen year old black children naked). Needless to say tasteful does not enter into the conversation. Political correctness is shattered so badly one must feel for those sensitive souls that can't laugh at ridiculousness of the manipulation.Making matters worse the three films are intertwined together seemingly at random with comic buffoonery breaking out during serious scenes (A slave auction is apt to turn into a Benny Hill episode for no apparent reason) and poorly done black revenge fantasies coming, narratively at least, out of nowhere. Anti-white, anti-black and for the sake of inclusion anti-Semitic they once again simply don't make them like this anymore. (It's highly illegal for one thing) Overlong by at least an hour and very poorly thought out in places Addio Zio Tom wears out its welcome but for a short while at least it exposes the truth and makes one think.