Ben's Summer Field Report

Production Process for The Black Collar Worker

The production process for The Black Collar Worker was a great first experience for me. There were highs and lows, as with any project, but overall I had a great time. I learned a great deal and my project developed in a way that I could not have been foreseen.  My thesis film documents an individuals experiences in a private prison.

Towards the end of our Spring 2014 quarter, Jennifer had suggested that I fly out to my film location to scope out potential characters and get a layout of the land. I left in mid-June for Tutwiler, Mississippi and spent a little less than 4 days there. Prior to arriving in Mississippi I made a stop in Austin, Texas to interview an expert on the prison industry. Bob Libal is the president of a non-profit I’ve been working with and they happened to be having a conference during my initial trip. I met all those involved with research and activism against private prisons. The purpose of Texas was more to make connections, so I did not do a whole lot of shooting.

When I arrived in Mississippi, I immediately travelled to the Tallahatchie County Correctional Facility, where my main collaborator is incarcerated. Tutwiler is about 25 minutes outside of Clarksdale, where I was staying. The drive down was interesting. This area of the delta is very green and lush, consisting of large farm fields. In the middle of the fields is the very large prison. On the drive, it became much more apparent that one of the reasons T.C.C.F. is able to get away with some of the Human Rights violations that I’ve heard so much about is because of its isolation. I feel like one of most powerful images will be my establishing shots of the prison, it’s fences, barbed wire and lookout towers in contrast to the beautiful country.

The town of Tutwiler is very small, rural and consists of a mostly low earning black population. There is a large water tower next to the prison that reads: “TUTWILER, MS – WHERE THE BLUES WAS BORN.” Though many towns around the delta boast being the birthplace of the blues, Tutwiler seems to be the actual location. For many years in the mid-1900’s there was a train station in the middle of town that serviced travellers from all over the south. A famous bandleader overheard a townsperson playing the guitar using a knife as a slide and became intrigued by this foreign sound. He wrote a hit song in the style, which spread the blues around the south and then the rest of the nation. The origins of this genre of music will be talked about by some of the townspeople I followed in Tutwiler and will be used extensively throughout the film. 

For my first few days there, my sole intention was to walk around town and let my presence be known. I very much did not fit the common profile of the population there, so there was no hiding. I decided to own the fact that was an outsider trying to make a film about the town and the prison.  I walked every street, in the blazing heat, multiple times with my camera in hand. I did not have to initiate too many conversations during my scouting. Many people would just stop what the were doing, even if they were driving down the middle of the street, to ask me, “hey who are you? Where are you from? What are you doing?” The energy and interest of almost everyone that I talked to was very warming. I felt at home almost immediately as I spent time in “juke joints” (illegal bars that play blues music), on porches eating southern barbeque, and in various families homes as they talked story. 

After that week of June in Mississippi, I flew back to California for the month of July. In August, I left again for Mississippi and spent twenty days there, staying at a house with individuals that run a non-profit in the region. My field time in August was extremely busy. It felt like I was always running around either trying to find leads or running to do shoots. As a result, I was not able to spend the appropriate time to watch my dailies. Looking back at my footage now, I wish I made more of an effort to do so because there were small mistakes I made that could have been overcome if I were more aware. For example, dust was a problem that plagued my field shooting. Often tiny particles would find their way onto the lens without my being aware. I had a 7” monitor and the eyepiece for the FS 100, but did not always utilize them. After reviewing my footage it was a costly mistake. Dust did not ruin too many shoots, but it was an ongoing problem that had to be addressed. I was not totally aware of some of the more little details that I should have been working in the country.

Another issue I had while shooting was the ever-present cicata. Cicata, large bugs that make a loud hissing sound, were all over the place in this region. Most of my interviews took place outside, usually around sunset, which is when bugs are the most present. Somehow during my packing for the trip I had accidentally left my external audio device for backup sound. So almost all of my audio went straight into the camera. Which isn’t at all ideal, but what I worked with. I always had a lav running on my characters and a shotgun on the camera. The lav should cut out most of the cicatas loud hissing. I also feel that this hissing gives a sense of location. I don’t think it’s something some stellar audio editing can’t fix. 

The biggest obstacle I faced actually changed the entire approach to the entire film. I had an ally for this project in the prison chaplain, a former AP reporter that recognized some of the atrocities that are occurring in the prison. She teamed up with my main collaborator (Anthony) to help him with some legal work to try and get attention on the situation inside private prisons. In fact, her collaboration with some of the prisons was resulting in pressure from the warden and other administrators to leave her position or be fired. Despite the risks involved, the chaplain was willing to have me enter the facility with the camera and work as her “assistant,” in some documentation work she was doing, at least that was how it would seem. In fact, she was going to allow me to film my thesis and capture important footage that no one else would have been able to get. 

On my first day in Mississippi, I called the chaplain on the prison phone line. She was quick to get off the line, suggesting the phone was tapped. She said that she would call me back on her cell phone that night. She never called. I tried calling her back everyday for my entire stay without hearing anything from her. While I was stationed there in Tutwiler, the prison was also on lockdown, so Anthony could not report me what was happening with the chaplain, as he was confined only to certain spaces. We both found out on my last day that the chaplain suffered a heart attack on the day that I called her due to the stress of her job. She has yet to return. 

As a result of the lack of access to the prison, I’ve decided to use audio interviews with Anthony as a form of narration in the film. Using parts of his poetry, essays, and conversations to carry the film. I have not decided yet, but I will probably use a mix of animation, location shots, and black screens under his voice at different points of his narration. These specifics will be decided, as I get further into the editing process. Another possibility would be to reenact interviews with an actor (kind of like how actors are used in The Arbor).  I’ve been recording our conversations over the phone right now using a very good mic. The sound is rough right now, but I feel like I can edit them to make them sound good. I kind of like using his voice over the phone, because it gives a sort of Mumia Abu-Jamal, “Live from death row” effect.

Though I did not get to film Anthony in the prison I was able to visit him. We spent about twenty-four hours all together discussing politics, prison, Ferguson, and my film. In fact, his input has been so great that he has become more than a character, but a co-producer of the film. During our visitations, we discussed some common observations from his point of view on the inside and my point of view on the outside. There seemed to be a cultural theme of racism, accepted subjugation, poverty, and unprofessionalism throughout the town.  Due to the lack of opportunity in the isolated town, many of the guards engaged in the sale of illegal contraband, prostitution, and other forms of making money. Keep in mind most guards make about minimum wage. Some of the prison employees’ use there limited authority to take advantage and take unnecessary force against the prisoners, often throwing the word “nigger” around. In fact, it was here at T.C.C.F. that Anthony first heard the term directed at him. 

In town, I could observe some similar themes taking place. For example, many of the men in the town still work in the cotton fields in Mississippi, an occupation that is reminiscent of the regions slave and sharecropping past. The people that work the fields are fully aware of the significance of their work and still feel enslaved by white landowners. I hope that in the film viewers will recognize that black men are both enslaved or under some form of subjugation in prison as well as in the fields directly on the opposite sides of the walls. The most memorable and exciting scenes to shoot were following day laborers “choppin’ cane” in the cotton fields. We woke up at 4 in the morning to work. The crews worked in the hot sun with venomous snakes slithering around and crop dusting planes overhead. I also had one scene with a hidden camera capturing the financial transaction between a white landowner and the black “boss lady” that dispersed pay unequally. I got a lot of great footage in the cotton fields. 

So the premise of the film has changed slightly, in that prison is the modern day cotton field. Inside there are field slaves (prisoners) and house slaves (guards). Both are subjugated to a predestined position of servitude and poverty. They fulfill the roles prescribed to them hundreds of years ago. Anthony will speak to this servitude from his cell, but with images of the “free” black men of Tutwiler displaying and speaking to their subjugation. They express how their isolation, poverty, and lack of opportunity has left them to engage in criminal behavior or be taken advantage of by a historically racist system, all things that Anthony has plenty of experience with. Using blues music as a common musical theme, viewers will understand how the environment of oppression allowed a corporation to come in, promising jobs and opportunity, and take advantage of a small, poor town. The corporation is the new slave owner. 

Cast of Characters:

(they will not all make the final film)

1)   Shun Grier: 15 yr old boy that works in cotton fields and wants to join army after high school.

2)   Tommy Jones: An old timer that recollects a thriving Tutwiler and the origins of the blues. Remembers the promises CCA made before arriving to town. Also, talks about how his ancestors have always lived in Tutwiler.

3)   Lee Arthur Martin: Another old-timer that has been jailed in the T.C.C.F. facility and can speak about his experiences. Also speaks to how Tutwiler used to be and how there is little to no opportunity in this region.

4)   Renelle Martin: Lee Arthur’s son. Actively participates in criminal behavior and works in the cotton fields. Has scenes in the field as well as a lively day in a courthouse after a landlord illegally stole and demolished his car. Vocal about how young black men are still enslaved.

5)   Lee Martin: Lee Arthur’s other son. Works in the fields.

6)   Cassandra Wilson: Former teacher at T.C.C.F. Gives a first hand account to the struggles and hardships of both employees and prisoners. Ally of Anthony’s.

7)   Tupac: Townsperson that was incarcerated at T.C.C.F. and speaks to the struggle of black men in Mississippi and across the country.

8)   Bob Libal: expert on the private prison industry. Runs Grassroots Leadership and non-profit committed to the eradication of for-profit prisons.

9)   Anthony Robinson Jr.: Current T.C.C.F. inmate from California.

I feel like I got an early start on some of work. I am about half way through transcoding and over halfway through my logging. I also am about a little than halfway through with my transcriptions. I will be completely finished with transcoding in the next few days (Tristan helped me immensely with transcoding earlier this week) and logging and transcriptions should be finished in about two weeks.