‘Centennial Collection’ Showcases Paul Robeson

Kino on Video is celebrating Black History Month with “The Paul Robeson Centennial Collection” ($25 each), a fascinating set featuring four films starring the legendary and controversial African American performer, concert singer and political activist.

Born in 1898, Robeson was a Rutgers University football hero, Phi Beta Kappa member, Columbia Law School graduate and the star of such Broadway plays as Eugene O’Neill’s “The Emperor Jones” and “All God’s Chillun Got Wings.”

As Big Jim in the original cast of “Show Boat,” Robeson introduced “Old Man River” to the world. Robeson made 10 films between 1933 and 1942, including “Emperor Jones” and “Show Boat.”

In 1934, Robeson made the first of many excursions to the Soviet Union and he came to believe that socialism was a way to end racism in America. But as the Cold War intensified after World War II and anti-communist fever set in, his views were considered more and more anti-American and eventually led to his passport being revoked in 1950.

Robeson was finally allowed to leave the country in 1958 to travel to the Soviet Union, where he received the Stalin Peace Prize in 1952. He died in 1976 in near-total seclusion in Harlem.

The “Centennial Collection” includes three films Robeson made in England in the mid-’30s. None are very good, but each film showcases Robeson’s magnetic personality, intelligence and extraordinary baritone voice.

In “Song of Freedom,” from 1936, Robeson plays a British-born stevedore who yearns to learn more about his African roots. He becomes a famous opera singer after being discovered by a wealthy impresario. With his wealth and prestige, Robeson is able to return to Africa, only to discover his people have fallen under the spell of corrupt spiritualists. Songs include “Sleepy River,” “Lonely Road” and “Song of Freedom.”

The 1937 musical “Big Fella” has been virtually unseen in America until this restored Kino edition. Based on a 1929 novel, “Bango,” the happy-go-lucky flick finds Robeson playing a Marseilles dockworker who is asked by the police to help find a young, rich British youth (Eldon Grant) who’s missing from an ocean liner. Songs include “Lazin’ ” and “River Steals My Folks From Me.”

In “Jericho,” also from 1937, Robeson plays a colonel in an African American unit of the American Expeditionary Force in World War I who is court-martialed and sentenced to death after accidentally killing his command sergeant. Before punishment is carried out, though, he escapes and flees to North Africa, where he eventually becomes a sheik. Robeson performs “Shortnin’ Bread” and “My Way.” Wallace Ford is the very unfunny comic relief. Released in the U.S. as “Dark Sands.”

Unavailable for preview is the controversial 1924 silent drama “Body and Soul,” directed by Oscar Micheaux. Robeson plays a thief and a womanizer, who, after having escaped from prison, poses as a pastor in a small Southern town. This edition features a prologue chronicling Micheaux’s problems with the New York Censor Board over the film and a new score by the modern jazz quintet Honk, Wail and Moan.

For more information or to order any of the Robeson films, call (800) 562-6880.

Also for Black History Month, FoxVideo has just released two films ($15) from the 1950s starring Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte.

Poitier made his impressive film debut in Joseph Mankiewicz’s powerful, thought-provoking 1950 racial drama, “No Way Out.” Poitier plays a young doctor working in a county hospital; Richard Widmark plays a bigot who is brought into the hospital’s prison ward with a gunshot wound. Widmark blames Poitier for the death of his pal and ends up instigating race riots. Linda Darnell, Stephen McNally and Ruby Dee also star.

Belafonte headlines 1957’s “Island in the Sun,” a turgid adaptation of Alec Waugh’s book about racial difficulties in the Caribbean. James Mason, Joan Fontaine and Dorothy Dandridge also star. The film raised eyebrows when it was released over the on-screen romance between Belafonte and Fontaine.