Town Destroyer (2022)

Genre : Documentary

Runtime : 55M

Director : Alan Snitow, Deborah Kaufman

Synopsis

Is art’s role to provoke or placate? What happens when it no longer reflects current societal views? These questions and many more were the subject of hot debate when Victor Arnautoff’s thirteen-panel mural “The Life of Washington” became an object of local controversy, then a media firestorm. On display since San Francisco’s George Washington High School opened in 1936, it offers a view of the Founding Father both celebratory and critical, referencing his involvements in slavery and Native American genocide. (The Iroquois dubbed him “Town Destroyer.”) But some present-day students, parents, and observers found those depictions racially offensive, calling for the work to be removed or destroyed. Would doing so be a “redaction of history,” “identity politics gone off the rails”—or a justified blow to a lingering American “colonized mentality” as well as ongoing “traumatization” of young minds?

Actors

Dewey Crumpler
Dewey Crumpler
Judith Lowry
Judith Lowry
Barbara Mumby
Barbara Mumby
Robin Kelley
Robin Kelley
Jessica Young
Jessica Young
Paul Chaat Smith
Paul Chaat Smith

Crews

Alan Snitow
Alan Snitow
Director
Deborah Kaufman
Deborah Kaufman
Director
Alan Snitow
Alan Snitow
Producer
Deborah Kaufman
Deborah Kaufman
Producer
Ashley James
Ashley James
Cinematography
Ulli Bonnekamp
Ulli Bonnekamp
Cinematography
Marsha Kahm
Marsha Kahm
Cinematography
Vicente Franco
Vicente Franco
Cinematography
Phil Geyelin
Phil Geyelin
Cinematography
Gregory Scharpen
Gregory Scharpen
Editor

Trailers and other movies

MVFF45 - TOWN DESTROYER - Official Trailer

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