HIS MAJESTY’S.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1379, 28 September 1916, Page 32

HIS MAJESTY’S.

“THE BIRTH OF A NATION.”

“The Birth of a Nation,” Griffith’s great film, which is to be presented at His Majesty’s Theatre on Saturday by J. C. Williamson, Ltd., has occasioned more wonder in the picture world than anything that has yet been screened. It is a gigantic subject, handled in a big way. The story runs clearly along, with a background of violent happenings. Civil war is per-

haps the most disastrous evil that can afflict a people, and Griffiths depicts it with terrible directness. But to the average spectator the period of reconstruction is even more thrillingly illustrated. Here black and white are in conflict, and the blacks are the dominating force. They have the legislature in their command. By an overwhelming majority they can pass laws, which makes the white man regarding them grit his teeth, even at this late date. One of the bills enacted was the legalising of marriage

between blacks and whites; another, that the whites should salute negro officers in the streets. One generation removed from savagery, the power wielded by the negroes went to their heads. The organisation of the Ku Klux clan, of Scottish origin, resulted. Griffith shows the heroic doings of this body of whites banded together, assuming “the white man’s burden.” The clansmen, headed by Colonel Cameron, a young Scot, leads his forces against the negroes who have instituted a reign of terror. The

way the clansmen clean up the job is one of the most inspiring sights ever shown on the screen. Thousands of horsemen, clad in ghostly garments, race to the dangerous rescue work, and vindicate the superiority of the white man over the black. It is an historical fact that there were 400,000 Ku Klux clansmen. Griffith uses nearly 4000 night riders, and there is a thrill in their dashing horsemanship every time they make their appearance.