What You Gonna Do When the World’s on Fire? (2018)

Directed by: Roberto Minervini | 123 minutes | documentary | Starring: Kevin Goodman, Dorothy Hill, Judy Hill, Ashlei King, Ronaldo King, Michael Nelson, Titus Turner

African Americans have been fighting for equal rights for decades. On paper they seem to have achieved a lot, but in practice it seems that they have not made any progress. Afro- and other colored Americans are still arrested earlier by the police and demonstrably more severely convicted by the judiciary. Black parents are terrified that their child will be shot in the street; a real fear, because African Americans are more likely to be victims of violent crime than whites. And even though we have now had a black president, equality is further away than ever. We saw this, for example, during the summer of 2017, when demonstrations by the American alt-right movement Unite the Right in Charlottesville, Virginia, got out of hand after a protester drove a vehicle into a group of counter-protesters. One was killed and several injured. It was the umpteenth racist incident in this decade. During that particular summer of 2017, Italian-American filmmaker Roberto Minervini, who often focuses on the downside of ‘The American Dream’ and the underbelly of society, especially in The Deep South, with his camera in Louisiana and Mississippi . In ‘What You Gonna Do When The World is on Fire’ (2018) he follows a number of black people in their own personal struggle against injustice. The title of the film is a reference to a song by blues pioneer Lead Belly.

Minervini weaves together four different stories/approaches. We follow Kevin Goodman, a Mardi Gras Indian Chief who we see preparing for the annual parade through the streets of New Orleans. The exuberant, often colorful (although we don’t see that in this black-and-white film) outfits are made by hand, a job that takes months. Anyone who has seen the television series ‘Treme’ will learn much more about this special cultural phenomenon, which is in danger of being lost in modern times. In ‘What You Gonna Do…’ the scenes with Kevin mainly serve as a local color and an expression of cultural heritage that the black population does not want to be taken away from them. Much more specific are the scenes with Krystal Muhammad, leader of The New Black Panther Movement. She leads the protests in the street, following the death of black young people, often as a result of illegal acts by the (white) police. These scenes need little commentary, as each time the protesters call for justice for yet another victim. Jerome Jackson, Alton Sterling, Phillip Carroll – the fact that the list is so long is telling and underlines the importance of the protests and the battle fought here. Muhammad seems to tolerate Minervini; he is allowed to film her, because she is looking for the largest possible audience for her message. But he can’t interfere with anything else.

It gets more personal with Judy Hill, a woman of about fifty who knows the ropes. She is the prototype of a survivor: after years of abuse and abuse, which turned into a serious drug addiction, she has recovered from a deep valley and shows her resilience. She now owns a bar, which also serves as a community center, where people can come together to talk about everything that interests them (again a wonderful parallel to the ‘Treme’ series by the way). Judy is a warm, powerful and connecting personality, a woman who also knows how to play the camera in an excellent way and who attracts attention like a magnet. But her bar is in financial trouble. It would be a disaster for unity and social control in the neighborhood when Judy’s bar is closed. Also very endearing are the two half-brothers Ronaldo (14) and Titus (9), whose mother repeatedly presses them to be home before the streetlights come on. Had the film only consisted of footage of these two boys, it might have been even more effective, because they show what it is like to grow up as a black child in a world where racial inequality and ‘racial profiling’ are such a huge stamp. pressures on society. Go play outside with peace of mind if you have just been told that a neighbor and her six-year-old child have been shot. Yet they cycle through the streets brotherly; the dreamy, expectant and introverted Titus and the already more tried and tested Ronaldo. The eldest tries to prepare his brother for what is to come and teaches him, among other things, boxing. Because, as he says: ‘It still has something to do with you. When you’re my age they use guns.”

‘What You Gonna Do When the World is on Fire’ is on the long side with its more than two hours, which means that a repetition of moves is lurking. Minervini should have been allowed to cut in his film, which now makes a somewhat messy impression. Not least because not every main character gets the same amount of attention. The filmmaker’s choice to shoot in black and white is probably an aesthetic one – and perhaps also to emphasize the contrasts between white and black on a stylistic level as well – but actually that artful way of filming distracts from the message, which is dead serious. . For the African American population of the US, life is better than ever, but at the same time it is worse than ever. Minervini only partially exposes this contradiction in his film. Most impressive are the personal stories of Judy and the brothers Ronaldo and Titus; they make the impotence tangible and tangible. The question remains: what kind of film would this have become if an African-American director had made it?