Hi, Mom!

Infobox Film
name = Hi, Mom!

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image_size =
caption =
director = Brian De Palma
producer = Charles Hirsch
writer = Brian De Palma
Charles Hirsch
starring = Robert DeNiro
Allen Garfield
Jennifer Salt
Lara Parker
Paul Bartel
Charles Durning
Gerrit Graham
music = Eric Kaz
cinematography = Robert Elfstrom
editing = Paul Hirsch
distributor = Sigma III Corp.
released = flagicon|USA April 27, 1970
runtime = 87 min.
country = USA
language = English
budget =
gross =
preceded_by = "Greetings"
followed_by =
website =
amg_id = 1:22305
imdb_id = 0065836

"Hi, Mom!" (1970) is a black comedy film by Brian De Palma, and is one of Robert De Niro's first movies. De Niro reprises his role of Jon Rubin from "Greetings". In this film, Rubin is a fledgling "adult filmmaker" who has an idea to post cameras at his window and video tape his neighbors, à la Hitchcock's "Rear Window". De Niro's character, as well as the movie overall, may be seen as a kind of comic precursor to the later De Niro film, "Taxi Driver".

Be Black, Baby

Its most memorable sequence is one where a black radical group invite a group of WASPs to feel what it's like to be black, in a sequence called "Be Black, Baby". It is both a satire and an example of the experimental theatre and cinéma vérité movements. Shot in the style of a documentary film, it features a theater group of African American actors interviewing Caucasians on the streets of New York City, asking them if the whites know what it is like to be black in America.

Later, a group of theater patrons attend a performance by the troupe, wherein soul food is served. The white audience is then subjected to wearing shoe polish on their faces, while the African American actors sport whiteface and terrorize the people in blackface. Robert De Niro shows up as an actor playing an NYPD policeman, arresting members of the white audience under the pretense that they are black. The entire sequence plays with natural sound, and is "unrehearsed" and in "real time." De Palma's familiarity and collaboration with experimental theatre informs the sequence and ratchets up the emotional impact of those who view it, simultaneously engaging their personal responses to racism and commenting on the deceptive and manipulative power of cinema. "If truth itself is plastic," the sequence asks, "then filmed truth is deeply flawed."

The sequence concludes with a thoroughly battered and abused audience raving about the show, showering praise on the black actors, crowing "Clive Barnes ["New York Times" theater critic] was right!"

"Be Black, Baby" remains one of the most challenging and intriguing sequences from its era, and its use of an audience's willingness to become emotional accomplices sheds light on De Palma's subsequent career.

MPAA Rating Board

According to the book "The Movie Rating Game" by Stephen Farber (Public Affairs Press, 1972), the film was originally given an "X" rating by the MPAA, but after a few minor trims, it was approved for an R. The main cut occurred during the scene where Gerrit Graham paints his entire body for the "Be Black Baby" performance. He hesitated for a moment about painting his penis, and then finally finished the job. The actual painting of the penis was deleted to get the R. (The first film, "Greetings", was released with an X after losing an appeal to change it to an R.)

External links

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* [http://www.cultfilmfreak.com/jennifersalt Jennifer Salt Interview]