Civil
Brand, directed by Neema Barnette, asks us to believe that
twenty-five African American female inmates of a racially
segregated Tennessee prison won a lawsuit against administrators
to end a reign of terror. The prison is maximum security
Whitehead Correctional Institute, which is managed by a
corporation in the private sector that makes up rules without
public accountability. (The name appears to be an anagram
of the L.A. County women's prison, the Sybil Brand Institute
for Women.) In addition to sporadic narration by Sabrina
(played by DaBrat), who talks directly to the camera in
the style of the television series Oz, filmviewers witness
the depth of the mental and physical brutality, the slave
labor to make clothes for department stores, and forced
sex enjoyed by Captain Dees (played by Clifton Powell)
as well as efforts to collect evidence so that part-time
guard and law student Michael (played by Mos Def) can support
the legal action. Some of the mildest prisoners become
violent, and some of the most violent are shrewd enough
to remain alive to pursue the mythical successful lawsuit.
Although the women-in-prison scenario is far less dramatic
than The Last Castle (2001), the collective mobilization
of prisoners in both stories is too fantastic to have any
credibility, thus puncturing the possibility that either
would invite a serious examination of badly needed prison
reform and an end to the Prison/Industrial Complex. MH
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