Birth actor Gabrielle Union, who penned an emotional essay on September 2 about being the victim of rape, was the first person to mention the words “sexual violence” during the press conference. “It’s not mine, I don’t own it, it does not belong to me, so I definitely don’t want to hijack this with my personal life”.
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Director and actor Nate Parker, center, gestures to the crowd as he arrives on the red carpet for the film “Birth of a Nation” during the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival in Toronto on Friday, Sept. 9, 2016.
Parker was charged and later acquitted of raping an 18-year-old woman while he was a student and wrestler at Penn State in 1999; he was acquitted partially because he and the alleged victim had consensual sex before the purported rape.
That changed in mid-August, when the film became clouded with revelations that director/star Nate Parker and co-screenwriter Jean Celestin were tried for rape in college more than 15 years ago.
The Birth of a Nation screens again on Saturday Sept. 17. He went on for several minutes explaining that over 400 people had been involved with the project and had made sacrifices and put their lives on hold for it, and how it wasn’t fair to let that work go to waste. Not to mention the fact that his answers to this part of his personal history hasn’t really made people feel more comfortable about him either.
During a post-premiere Q&A, Union seems to have decided that promoting the film and sharing its messages about America’s deep-rooted history of racial violence is the priority, though she doesn’t shy away from talking about sexual violence: it’s just somewhat distanced from Nate Parker. But, he added, “from what I understand, we’re going forward”. And I think this film will be part of that education, showing someone that had the fortitude to fight back in the way they did then – and now we can fight back with art.
Union penned an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times earlier this month saying she could not take the Parker rape allegations lightly.
“The Birth of a Nation” has appeared poised for award season accolades well before its arrival in Toronto. “We’re not creating a movie, we’re creating a movement”, she said, claiming the speaks for everyone who has suffered every kind of injustice, including veterans who don’t get adequate health care, people who need mental care, and victims of “trans-violence”. However, as Nat Turner (Parker) and his alcoholic oppressor, Samuel Turner – played by the stellar Armie Hammer, who lends careful depth to the role, we never know if he’s truly disturbed by what he sees, or if he’s been tainted by the nest of wealthy evil – travel the smokey, decaying white fortresses check-marked throughout the Southern lands, we see them both transform. I didn’t know about the Nat Turner story.
He said it was a “no brainer” that he would choose to tell the story on film.
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Actress Penelope Ann Miller, who plays Elizabeth Turner, a slaveowner’s wife who helps teach Nat to read as a child, urged people to separate the art from the artist and focus on the undertold story of Nat Turner’s rebellion. “It’s not mine, I don’t own it, it’s not on me”, said Parker, who was joined by the cast of his film at a news conference at the festival. “And I think it’s an important story to learn about”.
