Home of the Brave
Producer Stanley Kramer and director Mark Robson had two big hits in 1949; both were dramas noted for their jarring realism. Home of the Brave broke historic ground by being the first feature to deal directly with racial prejudice in the U.S. (It was also the first sound film in which the word “nigger” was used.) The story about racial antagonisms between GIs during World War II deals with a black soldier (James Edwards) who suffers from partial amnesia and hysterical paralysis following a perilous reconnaissance mission on a Japanese-held island, where he endured more hateful abuse from his fellow GIs than from the enemy. The story is told in flashback as a sympathetic psychiatrist attempts to help him relive the mission. If the film's resolution seems naive or stilted today, the scenes on the island still hit hard, and Home of the Brave remains, in context, a brave venture that in fact had an enormous impact on the public--and on producer Kramer, who made a career out of the social message film.