![]() When the director found out, he wrote to Wright in Paris: “They made terrific cuts. Cuts were made by the film’s American distributor Walter Gould in order to get past state censor boards, which in turn intervened to make further cuts, reducing the nearly two-hour film’s running time by over 30 minutes, according to Chenal. The restoration presents the most complete version of the film ever shown in the US, where it originally appeared only in a heavily censored version that received limited distribution. Deeply oppressed and driven by intense fear, Bigger quickly becomes ensnared in a true American tragedy. In addition to co-adapting his own novel for the screen, Richard Wright performed the lead role as the ill-fated Bigger Thomas, a poor young black man in Chicago. Shot primarily in Buenos Aires, Argentina with some exterior location shots done in Chicago, the movie was directed and co-written by Pierre Chenal, a Belgian-born director associated with French poetic realism. ![]() ![]() ![]() The film was also aired by Turner Classic Movies (TCM) this past weekend. The suppressed 1951 film version of Richard Wright’s 1940 novel Native Son was released in virtual cinemas recently in a restoration presented by Kino Lorber in association with the Library of Congress, Fernando Martín Peña, and Argentina Sono Film. ![]()
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