Silver Dollar Road (2023)
SHOULD I SEE IT?
YES
Silver Dollar Road is timely and of the moment, documenting a striking example of the racial wealth gap which persists in this country.
Oscar nominated filmmaker Raoul Peck is a powerful storyteller and he taps into the heartwrenching story of a family who are nearly impossible to not feel a connection to.
Nails the juxtaposition of family tragedy and resolve powerfully.
NO
Silver Dollar Road does present its story in a rather one-sided way, which makes for something of an invisible antagonist.
For a film which almost demands outrage, Peck’s film feels rather subdued and hushed in how it presents the Reels family’s story.
At times, you cannot help but want more from Peck and the story.
OUR REVIEW
Raoul Peck continues his incisive, visceral approach to documentary filmmaking with Silver Dollar Road, a film that tells the story of a Black family desperately trying to hold on to waterfront land in Carteret County, North Carolina; land that has existed in their family since the days of slavery.
Based on a 2019 ProPublica piece by Lizzie Presser, Peck’s film, named after the road which bisects through the 65 acres of land owned by the Reels family, speaks to racially motivated jurisprudence and a number of decisions which have left a devastating impact on a family attempting to salvage land they have long called home.
In the film’s opening half, Peck shares the background around the conflict. The Reels family bought the land in the early 1900s and generations of family members were raised there. We first meet matriarch Gertrude, celebrating her 95th birthday early on in the film, serving as a bastion of strength and resolve. The family is tight, close, but soon we start to hear of fractures which led to the dilemma the family finds itself trying to rectify.
As ownership transferred through lineal descendents, legal troubles mounted in the absence of a will. When Shedrick (a/k/a “Shade”), Gertrude’s uncle, secretly sells the property to a development group through a claim of “adverse possession” - where someone who does not have ownership of a piece of property can claim it as their own through occupation or continuous possession or use of said property - 13 acres of waterfront land were gone in a snap of a finger.
Adverse possession and the ownership rights which come from dying intestate, or without a will, have wreaked havoc on Black people’s ownership of land in this country. With the ProPublica piece sharing that 76% of Black Americans do not have a will or estate planning arranged, you can see how property transfers and ownership rights can become very tenuous to say the least. In addition, from 1910 to 1997, Black Americans lost about 90% ownership of their farmland.
In sit down interview after sit down interview, Peck captures the family’s story. When the deal is done and developers face opposition from brothers Melvin and Licurtis, who refuse to give up their parcels of land, the brothers are arrested and each serve eight year prison terms for trespassing.
In Silver Dollar Road’s second half, we see a mix of home video footage and a broader scope of people weighing in on the situation. With astute visuals and cutaways, Peck reminds us that a public park is named after family patriarch Elijah Reels and family members are buried in three separate cemetaries along Silver Dollar Road. Voiceover readings of letters written to the brothers while incarcerated are moving and a collage of audio and video through the years underscores the significance of the loss the Reels have suffered.
If the film lacks anything, it is perhaps the need for a richer and deeper context behind the overall claims made in the film. Peck is a master at creating context, using James Baldwin’s own words to reflect the past to inform the present in the Oscar-nominated 2016 film I Am Not Your Negro. He next created an immersive viewing experience in his 2021 docuseries Exterminating All the Brutes, taking a powerful look at colonization and the mental and physical violence of racism on a worldwide scale.
As a result, it is surprising we are left with more than a few unanswered questions. Because without a doubt, the Reels family story represents a tragedy on many fronts - a family who watched in real time their estate and property rights seized by the very “white people” they were warned would one day take control.
And even if we perhaps want more details and information, the Reels’ resilience is inspiring, their story aggravating and reflective of institutional racist practices which persist for Black and Brown Americans to this very day.
CAST & CREW
Starring: Gertrude Reels, Kim Duhon, Mamie Ellison, Billy Reels, Licurtis Reels, Melvin Davis, James Hairston, Anita Earls, Roderick Ellison, Nate Ellison
Director: Raoul Peck
Written by: Raoul Peck
Based on the ProPublica article, “Their Family Bought Land One Generation After Slavery, The Reels Brothers Spent Eight Years in Jail for Refusing to Leave It” by Lizzie Presser
Release Date: October 13, 2023 (theatrical); October 20, 2023 (Amazon Prime)
Amazon Studios