What We Want, What We Believe: The Black Panther Party Library

Anyone seeking a polished documentary on the Black Panthers and their role in the Black Power movement and broader American radicalism will have to look elsewhere, since what this four-disc set offers is a compilation of source material. The first disc begins with several of the contemporary shorts produced by Newsreel Films, a cooperative of activist filmmakers who banded together in the late 1960s, establishing volunteer units in major cities to produce pieces critical of U.S. domestic and foreign policies that could be used as organizing tools for progressive groups. The three films included here all focus on the Panthers, with footage of demonstrations as well as snippets of interviews with key figures such as Huey Newton, Eldridge Cleaver, and Bobby Seale. Also contained on this disc is a rambling, nearly two-hour session with Donald Cox, a former Field Marshal in the party, as well as footage of a 2001 Panther reunion featuring discussions among the participants—some on film, others audio only—about various aspects of party history. The second disc opens with footage of a conference featuring Roz Payne, the founding Newsreel member responsible for most of the material included here, followed by interviews she conducted with two FBI agents involved in surveillance of the Panthers. Disc three compiles interviews with lawyers who defended Panthers accused of crimes, as well as the organizer of a defense fund for the Panthers, while the final disc consists of interviews with Newsreel members (including Payne), as well as DVD extras such as a photo gallery and a collection of print documents in DVD-ROM-accessible PDF format. What We Want, What We Believe serves up an interesting collection of source material, mostly in the form of oral history, that could be employed in constructing works of historical synthesis, but is also important in its own right (if sometimes longwinded). A must for Black Studies and modern American history collections, this is also recommended for larger general collections. Aud: C, P. (F. Swietek)