There are all kinds of towns with unique or unusual names, be it Nameless, Tennessee, or Normal, Illinois. So, you might be wondering if the subject of the documentary Riotsville, USA is an unfortunately named town, it’s not, but it was a real place… kinda. Riotsville, USA is an archival documentary from director Sierra Pettengill and writer Tobi Haslett, and the Riotsville in question was actually stage towns (more than one) on US Army bases, where military personnel and police leadership trained by putting on performed/staged riots for audiences in stands as tactical training.
The film is all archival broadcast footage, primarily from PBS predecessor PBL and military archival footage. It focuses on the late 60s during the Vietnam War and the Kerner Commission and their report. Although this is archival, and therefore everything that plays out is hindsight for viewers, it doesn’t lessen the heartbreak of seeing those students optimistically sell the paperback copies of the Kerner Commission Report, convinced it was going to bring about great change. When instead of all the suggested spending that would have improved their lives, we know the only funding the government ever implemented from the report was from the addendum “Supplement on the Control of Disorder,” for extensive new federal funding for the police.
Using these Riotsvilles as the connective tissue for this piece was inspired because they are performative but had very real-world consequences. The commission report said snipers at riots were basically statistically unlikely, but the Riotsville training/performances emphasized them. Why? In all likelihood the drama of it all, because they were performing, it was a show. When I was a lifeguard, we would have training at least once a season (multiple times during the summer). At these training sessions, we would do rescue drills, some would be the common ones you would actually be likely to encounter at your job, but there were always dramatic ones, electrocutions, stabbings, and yes, shootings. However, if a lifeguard is armed with a weapon, its decent aim with a flutter board, so over-the-top training exercises (all of which centre trying to save lives) are unlikely to result in a body count. However, the kind of overzealous training imparted at Riotsvilles that makes respondents to protests do so in a heightened way, AKA anticipating sniper fire and therefore seeking it out, make for volatile unsafe situations.
The film made good use of its source material. There were lots of intertitles used in the film and while most worked well, buttoning or pivoting the idea, there were times when I wished they had been voiced by narrator Charlene Modeste. However, often the coldness of seeing the words in print just drove them home harder, it was a tough balance, and on the whole, I think Sierra Pettengill found a decent balance.
Additionally, to the archival footage, at times what appeared to be blown up photos from perhaps newspaper print was also used. I’m unsure of the source, but the images showed a lot of grain and dots I normally associate with printed photos. I thought this was utilized to great effect. I loved how the dots blurred and seemed to merge, the image becoming unrecognizable before it once again took form and became clear. It was almost like a black & white kaleidoscope, a fitting allusion for a film that looks at the 1960s protests.
Riotsville, USA had its World Premiere at the Sundance Film Festival as part of their Next program.