J Paul Johnson
It’s time Compensation gets its due. The independent drama written and directed by Zeinabu irene Davis began production in 1993, was not released until 1999, and then earned robust critical acclaim after festival appearances at TIFF and Sundance. But it never gained any wide theatrical nor even a home media release until The Criterion Channel brought it to streaming in 2021. Following its addition to the National Film Registry for Preservation, Compensation will release in a new 4K digital restoration in theaters, giving cinephiles once again the opportunity to see this landmark work of African American cinema on the big screen, exactly as its director intended it.
Compensation‘s complex story, set in two discrete but parallel timelines, grew from Paul Laurence Dunbar’s 1905 poem “Compensation,” written while he was dying from tuberculosis. Actor Asma Feyijinmi shared a journal response to the poem, contemplating its relevance to the AIDS crisis, with Davis, who began the story that would comprise Compensation. That it would feature a Deaf actor, characters, and crew came after Davis saw lead actor Michelle A. Banks in a Black Deaf production of Waiting for Godot and with screenwriter Marc Arthur Chéry began studying American Sign Language (ASL) and Black Deaf culture. Compensation was at the time of its production—and still may be to date—the only full-length feature film with Black Deaf lead characters.
Compensation‘s dual narratives each feature Banks as a young Deaf woman navigating the challenges of structural racism and a daunting pandemic at moments bookending the twentieth century. In the century’s first decade, Banks’ Malindy is an industrious, intelligent dressmaker who begins a hesitant, touching relationship with John Earl Jenks‘ Arthur, an illiterate young man from Mississippi who has migrated Northward to burgeoning, bustling Chicago. In the century’s final decade and on the same banks of Lake Michigan, Banks’s Malaika, a graphic artist and dancer, meets Jenks’ Nico, a children’s librarian. As the narrative subtly intertwines between the two timelines, the relationships developing between Banks’ and Jenks’ characters deepen but face mounting obstacles.
At both ends of the century, antiblackness is pervasive. So too is the privilege of the abled that Deaf Malindy and Malaika face, even from those whom they might characterize as friends and allies. Each of the two lives full, rewarding lives, balancing art and industry, self-improvement and community, friendship and romance, but neither can enjoy the privileges most others can take for granted. As each narrative develops, it becomes clear that the obstacles both couples face may in fact be too daunting for their relationships to endure.
Davis’ artistry in telling these two separate-but-parallel stories in ways that honor history, legacy, and culture is impressive. Much of the early-twentieth century timeline is presented in silent-era design, with no direct dialogue, only title cards, and frequently with a stunning use of photography that scans and pans across archival stills accompanied by ambient sounds and dialogue, then using these to frame her live actors in a richly drawn mise-en-scène. It’s an ambitious approach, but it gives the early timeline in Compensation both a historical verisimilitude and a unique visual aesthetic. The scenes shot with live actors follow, in black and white and silent-era’s squarish aspect ratio, a similar design so that they feel wholly integrated with Chicago’s rich past. Meanwhile, the original score by Reginald R. Robinson and Atiba Y. Jali features both ragtime piano and African percussion, and the subtle edits slyly connect the two timelines without gimmickry.
Part of what making half of Compensation resemble a silent film accomplishes is to foreground inclusion and diversity. The silent era was one when few Black filmmakers (aside from Oscar Micheaux, who did so wholly on his own dime) were able to direct; there was little room for Black actors, male or female, nor was there for the Deaf. Yet silent film was something of a lingua franca, an art form that did not require hearing to enjoy. A marvelous scene of illiterate Arthur and Deaf Malindy together enjoying, themselves, an early silent film makes for a reminder of art’s potential for inclusion. The film’s subtitles, even, are open rather than closed—a rare choice but one that integrates them fully into the visual aesthetic and equalizes the experience for hearing and hearing-impaired viewers.
In making the film, Davis enlisted other Black Deaf actors and technicians—actor-dancer Christopher Smith, filmmaker Jade Bryan, and photographer Devon Whitmore—alongside her students and other professionals in a predominantly female crew. Her doing so was intentional, to work to change the more typical representation of Black females in particular from the dominant paradigm, and to create a work of art that could be told from the singular perspective of its Black Deaf protagonist.
According to Janus Films, Compensation‘s new 4K digital restoration was undertaken by the The Criterion Collection, The UCLA Film and Television Archive, and Wimmin With a Mission Productions in conjunction with The Sundance Institute from a scan of the 16mm original camera negative. The 5.1 surround soundtrack was mastered from DAT tapes by the UCLA Film and Television Archive. Newly created open captions have been implemented, designed by Alison O’Daniel in collaboration with the Compensation Caption Creative Team.
It may have taken a quarter of a century, but with Compensation‘s remastering and rerelease from Janus Films—and its likely inclusion in The Criterion Collection, this important work of Black independent cinema will finally and fully get its due. Few other films so uniquely and intentionally capture the experience of Black and Deaf Americans, nor can one imagine others doing so with the intentionality and aesthetic of Compensation.
