The Ambitions of William Foster by Allyson Field reflects on the career of a Chicago-based African-American filmmaking entrepreneur who was always interested in the possibility of race filmmaking in an interracial context. William Foster was the first black filmmaker to visit the offices of any motion picture trade journal, and sought a venture in the motion picture industry. In the early 1910s, Foster’s visit triggered tripartite view from white producers: novelty, something to be dismissed out of hand, and a potential profit making vehicle. Foster, on the other hand, was able to respond to and take advantage of these assumptions: he tried to create a cinema that would be interracial from its origins by making a filmmaking venture around multiple and intersecting kinds of practices such as comedy, drama, actuality, local film and official public record. Since he achieved a unique combination of an active advocate of the uplift movement and entrepreneur who also sought profit when practicing its tenets, the eventual failure of Foster deserves a careful evaluation. According to the author, it was not only a result of Foster’s personal struggles, but also suggested the limitations of uplift cinema itself.
In the beginning of his filmmaking venture, Foster focused on running the Foster Photo Play Company – a local company that he bought up to produce generally positive images of contemporary black urban culture in Chicago. After receiving strong support from the black audiences, he also screened several films for the white population. With the huge popularity, Foster was convinced that the moving pictures could be held for black entrepreneurs and for race uplift. He published multiple columns on African American journals, attempting to rally support by appealing to race pride. However, behind the initial success, the struggle to translate enthusiasm into profits began to haunt Foster’s venture, which turned out to be a fatal threat throughout his career. To expand the market into other northern cities with concentrated black communities.
To expand into markets in other cities with concentrated black communities, Foster started his Southern Tour during the winter of 1913. In Jacksonville, Florida, he was able to set up a connection with the Warner studios and produce films for them. Unfortunately, after realizing that Warner was merely trying to procuring African-American talents, he denounced a Warner movie for “only appeals to the ignorant class and race hating whites”. Returning to Chicago after the unsuccessful Southern Tour, Foster was faced with intensified financial struggle. Trying to expand sales within and beyond the black community, he produced more films that featured black lives. While advertising his motion pictures as a solution to the lack of positive black figures on screen, he made films that directly countered the Dixon’s/ Griffth’s films. With support from the most successful African-American cafe owner in Chicago, Foster produced multiple comedies, and later a patriotic drama with funding from an interracial partnership.
The apex of Foster’s career could have been the production of Smile Film, a project that dedicated to film the smiling faces of relatives & lovers of Chicago African American troopers fighting overseas, and screen the film in front of the soldiers to boost their morale. Supported by Rex Weber (a white politician), Foster’s plan was approved by the Chicago administration and his films delivered with the help from the US Committee of Public Information. However, by the time this 2668- feet-long film was sent to France, the war was almost over and there were no documentation of it ever being actually screened. Weber also passed away a month later due to severe pneumonia: since then Foster never found a stable funding for his filmmaking ventures. After WWI, Foster attempted to sell his studios in Florida, along with his other peripheral industries, meanwhile trying to introduce uplifting films into rural settlements and small towns. Eventually he moved to the rising scene of Hollywood, where he was never able to make a significant impact in the uplift movement again.
As Foster himself admitted, there was an important lack of African American economic participation – “dim commercial vision” – which made Black entrepreneurs unable to offer stable funding. Reflecting on Foster’s career, the main theme was about a broad ambition clashing with compromised reality. As suggested in the essay, lack of funding and resources was essentially not only a threat to Foster’s interracial project, but also a limitation of uplift cinema itself.
I also read about William Foster in my chapter! This was a very detailed summary of his life, obstacles and achievements. He was definitely a key player in uplift cinema. I’m actually surprised that the author didn’t mention the “Foster Movement” in the passage.
Fosters contributions to the uplift movement should definitely not go unnoticed. His drive and ambition to create an interracial project showcases the impact that he was trying to make in the film industry. Although this attempt was unsuccessful I think that its important to realize that all it takes is one person to change their way of thinking to create something that is bigger than the constraints and limitations placed by society.
It’s interesting (and frustrating) to me that Foster struggled so hard to find financing of his film ventures that he had to seek investment from as obscurely far as a cafe owner. Without a preexisting desire for a collective cultural identity among African Americas, who knows if these sorts of films would have taken off when they did, thanks to the interests key influence of established African Americans in the community.
Foster was a critical figure in early film because he actively worked to demonstrate what life was actually like for Black Americans during this time period. It is a good contrasting voice that should have been able to be heard more, but as it goes the time period preferred the more comedic and stupid portrayals of blacks in order to keep viewing them as lesser. His drive to get his work seen was also admirable, like no obstacle could stop him. Unfortunately the lack of funding hindered his work from being seen, it was still amazing what he was able to accomplish.