Roots

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Roots - The Next Generations

Actor(s):

Georg Stanford Brown, Kathleen Doyle, Ja'net DuBois, Henry Fonda, Slim Gaillard

Director(s):

Georg Stanford Brown, Dubin, Charles S., Erman, John, Richards (II), Lloyd

Label: Warner Home Video
Publisher(s):

Warner Home Video

Studio: Warner Home Video
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
Binding: DVD
Brand: Warner Brothers
MPN: WARD112535D
Format(s): Box set, Closed-captioned, Color, DVD-Video, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
Rating: NR (Not Rated)
List Price: $59.98
Our Price: $32.99
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours

Editorial Reviews

Description

Could there be a worthy follow-up to the most-watched miniseries ever? "We felt the other did so well," Alex Haley said, "that we should just let it hang there." But Haley began carrying around a tape recorder, dictating more of his family's tales as they came to his memory. Those remembrances filled a 1,000-page transcript: raw material for Roots: The Next Generations. Winner of the Emmy for Best Limited Series, this landmark continuation of a landmark event - with 53 stars and 235 speaking parts - "is in many respects a superior achievement," Newsweek said in comparing this to Roots. Twenty-five years later, it has lost none of its dramatic and emotional power to make us confront history and examine ourselves. One man's family remains everyone's!

Amazon.com

Roots rocked the cultural landscape in the late '70s, creating a new wave of awareness of black history. That wave opened the door for its sequel, Roots: The Next Generations, even more of a star-studded event than the original, with stars like Olivia de Havilland, Henry Fonda, Marlon Brando, and James Earl Jones eager to partake in the tale. The sequel follows the rest of the saga of the family of author Alex Haley, from where Roots ended at the Civil War, up to the 1970s when Haley was researching and writing his earth-shattering family story.

While nothing can rival the power of the original Roots' unflinching look at the slave trade and slave life in the early years of this country, the sequel is still full of rich African American history, from Reconstruction, to Jim Crow, to the civil rights movement and the early rumblings of black power. Fonda and de Havilland are respectable in their period-piece roles, but the real power of this sequel is in the more immediate concerns of Haley and his own experience of prejudice while building a stellar reputation as a writer and journalist in the '60s and '70s. One of the most unsettling scenes takes place then, when Haley interviews the head of the American Nazi Party, played with chilling diffidence by Brando. (Brando won an Emmy for this performance.) Haley is also challenged by his fractious interview with Malcolm X (a gripping Al Freeman Jr.). Jones launches his acting career playing Haley with nuance and heart, but with a humanizing set of his own demons.

The four-disc set includes all seven episodes plus a compelling documentary, Roots: The Next Generations--The Legacy Continues, with interviews with Jones, costar and episode director Georg Stanford Brown and a still starry-eyed David L. Wolper, who understands the cultural impact of the two miniseries he helped bring to the screen. --A.T. Hurley

Customer Reviews

Used this series in classroom with junior high students. Drew up my own guide and questions for reflection and discussion. Excellent-most excellent-even better than that! I should now buy it on DVD but I have retired and will just have to watch on video in my retirement.

finally on dvd

And about time. Alex Haley's "factional" story is as powerful today as when first released. With the current political goings on in this country, Roots and Roots TNG should be required viewing for every single American.

Roots - The Next Generation

I've looked for over a year trying to find this collection. I was shocked and amazed at the clarity and quality of this video collection. It looks like the movie was just made. I highly recommend this video to everyone.

Informative and long

I recently watched ROOTS, the original because when I saw it as a child, I really didn't understand what I was watching. After I watched it, I was deeply moved by what black people had gone through. I was anxious to learn of the lives of Chicken George and the family, AFTER they were set free so I purchased ROOTS: The Next Generations.

I wasn't as impressed with this version. I found the casting to be questionable. A child would have coarse hair and dark skin and 20 years later would grow up with "good hair" and light skin. Haley, as a child was cast as a light skinned boy with "good hair" and grew up to be a dark-skinned man with coarse hair. The casting was distracting.

Because of poor casting, I found it difficult to keep up with the story of various individuals. You go to watch the next segment and ask yourself: who the heck is that and HOW can that person be the same person as before. Another prime example is Bertha Palmer. As a child, she was dark-skinned with coarse hair. She grew up to be light-skinned with "good hair."

Another problem I had with the movie is the number of characters and storylines. There were entirely too many. Although many of the characters connected to the Palmers/Haleys/Kintes in some way, there simply was not enough time to address everybody. For instance, the Warners really were a family I was interested in, but after Frank Warner became a doctor, we never heard from the family again. Did Ms. Warner (the mother-in-law) ever come to accept Frank? Was there a relationship at all with the Warners and Carey (the black wife) or her husband? Why introduce us to the Warners and not follow up? Well, the answer to the question is here:

Basically, Haley then started to discuss Simon Haley's involvement in the military. I didn't find this part of the story interesting at all. The point was to show the lack of racial separation in the military. Instead, it came across as filler.

Another character I liked and who was not fully explored was Elizabeth. Elizabeth Palmer was Bertha Palmer's sister. She ended up unmarried because her father forbade her from marrying a mulatto. I heard them say she was teaching in Arkansas and then Oklahoma, but the depth of her life was largely left unaddressed.

My point is that he introduced us to these characters, we took an interest, just when the interest peaks, he stops all mention of these people to introduce filler to the storyline. Among this filler, however, he failed to tell us what Bertha Palmer Haley did with her college degree. I assumed she just was a stay at home mom. Other reviewers seem to indicate that she was a teacher in Henning, TN.

Anyway, after a while the story just seemed too long and because it concentrated so much on Alex Haley it really should have been separated out. Basically, it should have been ROOTS, ROOTS post-slavery, THEN the biography OF ALEX HALEY.

I will keep ROOTS for my future generations, but I don't think I will be watching or keeping ROOTS, the next generations.

Kunta Kinte - The Second Century

Roots - The Next Generations
Having just finished watching the first series of Roots, I was looking forward to watching the sequel, having last seen it on TV in New Zealand around thirty years ago. While I would hesitate in saying it is better than the original, it holds your attention while covering "less dramatic" times in the Haley family history. The DVD box set totals 688 minutes of viewing, which equates to good value for money. The series follows closely the family history after the move to Henning, Tennessee. The spectre of racism is still there in each episode, although the actual incidents seem quite mild compared to what viewers were confronted with in the first series. I would seriously recommend anyone considering watching Roots and Roots - The Next Generations to read the book as well. All in all a very good watch, and well worth while purchasing. Richard Parsons, Christchurch, New Zealand.

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