The following brief critique of "Farewell Uncle Tom" is meant only to inspire you to see it based not on it's greatness as a film (which it was not) but it's greatness as an experiment. This film succeeded in its attempt to portray the truth about the slave trade in the States. Do not be surprised if it leaves you speechless. Once you gather your thoughts and sift through the realizations that this film will wake up within you, will you be more aware of your social environment?This Italian-made film is an enigma. It will open your mind by horrifying you. It will leave you questioning your taste in film and your sense of values. At the end, the film's flaws show through in violence meant only as artificial shock value. Considering the attempt at realism of this fake documentary, unnecessary nudity and violence is an understatement. This is typical of Mondo cinema.When taking American History into account, nothing is black or white. We all know who wrote it, yet we depend on a learned sense to guide us to what is right. How do we prove how bad the slave trade was if we only acknowledge that it was bad. Before accepting something as bad, shouldn't we ask "How bad?" Imagine the not so distant past brought to life. The truth is that it was bad enough that we should still be enraged by it (regardless of our external skin color).Color was such an important factor in determining social rank. This point is something we must constantly remind ourselves of. It made the difference between being treated like a human or an animal. Expect to see repetitive examples of this. To illustrate another point about social rank we can consider using the colors Green and Blue: If we assign Green to the wealthy slave owners and Blue to the enslaved people, let's follow with the assumption that those Green people wouldn't give up power just because they wake up to a realization one day. But what if both Greens and Blues simultaneously realized how wrong it was to forbid a human's free will. In that time and place, the thought if confronted by either color (on a personal level) would have been dismissed almost immediately. Our ultimate human flaw must be our inability to confront the truth effectively. Conceptually though, most of us today are slaves (economically speaking). The separating factor is not color as much as it was. But now what do we do with our limited freedom together? How long will the invisible chains hold us back? Even if a socio-political change happens over night, wouldn't a power struggle exist on a personal level generations beyond initial independence? If history is flawed then perhaps it's not just the history books, but also the people who interpret them. This film should be viewed by anyone with a strong stomach seeking the truth. There is no tasteful coating, glossy package, or nastiness filter by the filmmakers. Be prepared.

Not exactly a "humanitarian masterpiece" as someone else said (yeah right!). More like cryptic super-exploitation. This is wildly, hilariously, rollickingly misguided pseudo-history at best. Outright race-baiting at worst. Made by the sleazoids who barfed up "Africa Addios" (giving Africans their own country back so soon just wasn't the right idea, was it!!), a film that featured the genuinely bizarre white South African girls on trampolines montage. A fervent call-to-arms for African-Americans made by white Europeans must inherently ring false, I am afraid. (we enslaved you. kill us!) Manages to be both numbing and completely, hideously insulting at the same time. The film is, under its very "SO racist it isn't being racist" exterior a sly work of racism. Presents blacks as nothing more than animals and savages, capable only of violence or submission to the will of whites. All the while remaining mute and mindless. No African-American in the film is presented as having a personality, substance, or intelligence. Every white all but glows. Every caucasian is a verbose, mercurial, immaculate sprite. That said, the film does (I would assume) approximate the way Africans were treated during the slave era more closely than other films. In that respect it deserves respect. The conditions are shown as filthy, disgusting, cruel. Every imaginable indignity is portrayed (and some you probably could not imagine). However, the film does have some power. The camera work is very inventive and the directors handle some of the chaotic scenes around the plantation very well. Some of the imagery is genuinely striking. There's a general feeling of chaos that comes through that's very effective. I'm not sure what the point is. But it's effective. Anyway, see the movie if you really want to be grossed out and insulted. File this one under SUPER exploitation. The directors may have had good intentions when they started out, but I think they just lost it when they got onto the set and decided to see how far out they could go. And no one, it seemed, was around to tell them to tone it down or put on the breaks. This is up there with Cannibal Holocaust and Men Behind the Sun. It's that sort of a deal. But don't kid yourselves, this AIN'T no humanitarian masterpiece.

This is an extraordinary piece of documentary cinema that is as fresh and cutting edge today as it was when it was first released and universally crucified. Directors Gualtiero Jacopetti and Franco Prosperi, who also made the two "Mondo Cane" films and the equally extraordinary "Africa Adios", were true originals. The fact that their methods were so questionable is what made them unique. In this brilliant staged "documentary", the filmmakers travel back in time, via helicopter, to the "golden age" of Slavery in America's Deep South. They "interview" white slavers, depict the degradation and humiliation of the blacks, recreate the transportation of slaves across the ocean and show white landowners enjoying the exploitation of people they considered for less than human. An early helicopter shot of the filmmakers arriving at a cotton plantation, the rotor blades whipping the fields into a frenzy, is absolutely mesmerizing. Riz Ortolani, the talented composer who scored "Cannibal Holocaust", the great American Western "The Hunting Party", and "House on the Edge of the Park", to name but a few of his achievements, enriches this production with a sweeping, majestic, searing score that acts as an ironic counterpoint to the film 's bold perspective. You really have to see and hear "Farewell Uncle Tom" to appreciate its incredible originality and courage.

MONDO CANE and AFRICA ADDIO creators Gualtiero Jacopetti and Franco E. Prosperi take us on a journey through time, back to the mid 1800's, not too long before the civil war. The movie is styled like one of their previous documentaries, with actors talking to the camera as though being interviewed, and just about every form of human cruelty being enacted on the Africans who have been dragged overseas to become slaves.The movie is certainly disturbing, and it did indeed enrage me that ancestors of mine took part in this treatment of fellow human beings. But the movie lost me whenever it tried to create a parallel between the climate between blacks and whites in the 1800s and the 1960s. Not that there weren't (and, unfortunately, still are) problems with racial tension in this country, but the movie seems to think that the average black person is still a savage at heart, just waiting for the right moment to break out an axe and slaughter the first white person he comes across. The movie climaxes with a radical black man reading The Diary of Nat Turner and imagining doing just that, including a horrific moment in which he smashes a baby's head against the wall.To me, the movie seems to have a negative opinion of just about everyone. Obviously, due to its decidedly anti-slavery stance, the slave traders are viewed as sick, inhuman monsters with only the faintest mask of civility on the surface. But the African characters are portrayed largely as ignorant buffoons, too dim-witted to understand what's happening to them.Later, during the modern day scenes, the sole black character is shown as having a major chip on his shoulder that has driven him nearly insane with rage, while the white people are a bunch of care-free bubble heads. Such generalizations and lack of depth or character development greatly lessens the power the movie may have had.But, as a purely gut-busting exercise in sleaze and disgusting imagery, GOODBYE UNCLE TOM sits confidently alongside other such gross-out movies as CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST, SALO and MEN BEHIND THE SUN. Also, like those movies, GUT (hmmm, interesting abbreviation) goes so outrageously over-the-top in depicting its atrocities, most of the movie's true power is lost, and it becomes little more than a freak show.I hesitantly recommend the movie for fans of sick cinema as a curiosity. I warn pretty much everyone else to stay far, far away.