Written and directed by Ava DuVernay, adapted from Isabel Wilkerson’s book Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent, Origin attempts to explain the caste system (to Americans).
Using the 2012 murder of Trayvon Martin as an entry point into this story, we follow Wilkerson (played by Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor), a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist asked to write an article in response to the murder. At first, she declines, but after suffering a series of family tragedies, Wilkerson sets out to write a novel where she hypothesizes that racism in the United States is simply an aspect of caste. Her research/journey explores the Deep South during Jim Crow, the lead up to the Holocaust in Germany and the caste system in India. She attempts to tie the lives of some of the most persecuted people in history together through the idea that there is an imposed social hierarchy throughout the world, kept intact by violence, called the caste system.
Side Note: Origin, like many of DuVernay’s notable works,is a great introduction to history that has been shielded from many Americans (speaking as one). And this is where she shines, taking a historical event or idea and building an entire film exploring parts of the story not mentioned in text books. Her films give us a fuller history from the perspective of marginalized groups, rightfully documenting a more correct way of examining historical ideas we thought we knew.
The acting is excellent across the board. Especially from the supporting cast, including the likes of Jon Bernthal (who plays Wilkerson’s husband) and Niecy Nash (who plays Wilkerson’s sister), who are the clear standout performances of the movie. But it’s DuVernay’s direction that is the high point of this project. It is through well-constructed sequences that we are introduced to multiple stories of people living during watershed moments in history. These dramatizations succeed in invoking the necessary emotion needed to nail home the greater ideas at play. We witness a book burning in 1930’s Germany, a Black child told he can’t swim with his white friends because of Jim Crow laws and get a brief but powerful look at the history of the Dalit people in India (lead by Dalit scholar Suraj Yengde, who plays himself in the movie). DuVernay uses these and many other sequences to bring Wilkerson’s thesis to life.
There is also an attempt to tie Wilkerson’s own story into these events that doesn’t quite work as well as I want to believe it should have. The ideas DuVernay portrays and Wilkerson speaks to, translate into something so thought provoking, that when we are asked time and again to reenter Wilkerson’s personal life and/or witness another personal anecdote, these scenes come off as a mix between flat and at times forced. Wilkerson’s story is full of tragedy, but I found myself unable to invest in it as much as I did the rest of the film; and her story is probably half of the two hour and twenty-one-minute runtime. In my opinion, this problem stems from adapting a book like this into a theatrical narrative instead of a documentary. But again, the number of balls DuVernay keeps in the air throughout this film is impressive. The fact that not every aspect was nailed, transforms Origin from a potentially great movie, into a very good movie.
Final Thought: The ultimate goal of Origin is to bring people together. To unite in class struggle through knowledge of the systems we live in. And while I didn’t think it was as successful of a piece as 13th, Selma or When They See Us, this is clearly DuVernay’s most ambitious work due to its ideas of global connectivity, and really does deserve to be seen in a group or with your family. Origin is a communal movie. And for many it will be another step in breaking through the propaganda of our upbringing. And for that, I’m grateful Origin exists.
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