city block
The Bombing of Osage Avenue
Posted May 8th, 2007 by Gretjen
Produced & Directed by Louis Massiah for WHYY-TV 12, Written & Narrated by Toni Cade Bambara
On Mother's Day, 1985, a virtual army of city and state police converged on a quiet block in historic Cobb's Creek, a blossoming neighborhood of parks and children, aluminum siding and basketball stars nestled in the heart of Philadelphia's African American community. By the next day, 61 homes were destroyed and 11 people were dead, all members of the communitarian MOVE organization. In this, the winner of 1987's Global Village Best Documentary Award, Massiah establishes the setting for the tragedy early on, and Toni Cade Bambara's poetic narration draws us deeper into the drama.
"...an excellent film which explores the social and politcal context in which the confrontation between MOVE and the City of Philadelphia developed." -- Bettye Collier-Thomas, Director, Center for African American History and Culture
"This extraordinary documentary is an intricately woven story of government overkill and its impact on the innocent." -- Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Women's Resource and Research Center, Spelman College
Louis Massiah is the founder and executive director of Scribe. He also produced and directed the documentary works Louise Thompson Patterson: In Her Own Words, two films for the Eyes on the Prize II series, and W.E.B. Du Bois: A Biography in Four Voices.
Toni Cade Bambara wrote several books of fiction, including The Salt Eaters, The Sea Birds Are Still Alive, Gorilla, My Love, and Those Bones are Not My Child: A Novel, and taught writing workshops at Scribe for many years and collaborated on numerous productions. She died in 1995.
