| ‘Sweethearts” is a swinging
documentary
By Scott Cain, Atlanta Journal and Constitution
“International Sweethearts of Rhythm” makes
you glad that documentaries were invented. The film offers
toe-tapping selections by the 1940s band interspersed with
lively reminiscences by the participants, who have aged gracefully
in the intervening 40 years.
The all-women’s, multiracial band got its start in Mississippi
in the late ‘30s, when anything multiracial faced innumerable
problems in the South. The musicians often ate and slept on
the band’s bus rather than face the hurdles of seeking
restaurant and hotel accommodations. Most of their engagements
were played in all-black theaters and, sometimes, the white
players wore make-up to darken their complexion.
Yet, in the up-to-date interviews, none of them expresses
bitterness. Perhaps time really does cure all things. They
give the impression that they had a blast.
Directors Greta Schiller and Andrea Weiss place the International
Sweethearts of Rhythm in the context of the times. With
men at war, women filled places in society that had previously
been denied to them. When the war ended and soldiers returned
home, women were asked to step aside. In peacetime, the International
Sweethearts of Rhythm found there was too much competition
and the group folded.
This film is a tribute to the years when the band was flying
high. To see them roaring through a jazzy number is to understand
the joy of music. You wonder if Benny Goodman, Count Basie
and Louis Armstrong were trembling on their thrones.
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