Made in 1915, Birth of a Nation was America’s first feature-length motion picture and a box-office smash… It popularized countless filmmaking techniques that remain central to the art today. However, because of its explicit racism and glorification of the KKK, Birth of a Nation is also regarded as one of the most offensive films ever made. Actually titled The Clansman for its first month of release, the film promotes a subjective history of the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the rise of the Ku Klux Klan. Studied today as a masterpiece of political propaganda, Birth of a Nation caused riots in several cities and was seen by millions.
– edited from HISTORY,
published by A&E Television Networks