This important story about black seaman given dangerous duty loading bombs aboard ships is most definitely one that should be told. Although the script and acting are certainly adequate, the story would be better told as an hour-long documentary rather than a two-hour, commercial filled made-for-tv movie. I'm glad I was exposed to the story.
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RWR20 April 1999
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view_and_review9 December 2020On July 17, 1944 an explosion at Port Chicago in California killed over 300 men and wounded over 300 others. "Mutiny" is about the Naval seamen who opted not to continue loading ammunition in the dangerous fashion they were loading it in light of the explosion that had just occurred.
1944 wasn't the safest time for African Americans in this country, even in California. As "Mutiny" details, many of the sailors wanted to participate in the war beyond just doing grunt work, but grunt work is all they were allowed to do regardless of their talents. When the men, led by Ben Cooper (Michael Jai White), refused to obey orders to load ammunition in their new port, they were all court marshalled.
The movie lacks the grit and intensity it would have if it weren't a TV movie, but the point was still conveyed. The Navy cut corners and generally didn't care when it came to their Black sailors. They were probably forcing everyone, Black and White, to work harder, faster, and less safely, but it was doubly so for the Black sailors. This is a movie to appreciate if only for its educational value. How many people even know about this tragic explosion at Port Chicago? I didn't know about it and I live about 45 minutes away! I liked the movie even if the outcome wasn't the happiest, but that's life; especially in 1944. -
(Some Spoilers) True historical event with a number of fictional characters thrown in for effect of the disastrous Port Chicago explosion in 1944 that killed some 320 US sailors and civilians. With most if not all of the victims of the explosion being black.
The movie follows the lives of three black US Sailors Big Ben Cooper, Michael Jai White, B.J Teach, Duane Martin, and collage educated Vernon Nettles, David Ramsey, who were in some way connected to the explosion with B.J who switched places with his friend Big Ben, so he can go out on a date, being blown to pieces in the blast.
The men working at the loading docks at Port Chicago were given the most dangerous jobs by the US Navy in that no one else were willing to do them. And being black they were felt to be expendable by their superior officers who were exclusively,due to the segregation policies of the US Navy at the time, white. In fact even black seaman Nettles who had two years of collage and a 147 IQ was not considered officer grade material in that he wasn't white. With the naval officers in charge of the loading ammunition on he supply ships taking bets on who's loaders, the black seamen, would load the most ammunition on to their perspective ships safety was put behind the back burner in exchange to putting them and those at the port in mortal danger of an ammunition explosion that was just waiting to happen. And on the evening of July 17, 1944 it did and with devastating results!
Not even giving the survivors of the blast any leave time to see their families and loved ones the Navy brass, after all the dust cleared, sent them back to the docks to do the same dangerous work as before! But this time they handed them US Navy issued gloves, in them not having them buy the gloves with their own money, to do it!
This was the last straw for the black seamen who in mass decided not to go back to work on the docks and thus face disciplinary action in doing it. Heart wrenching final with the black seamen put on trial for mutiny in wartime for not wanting to put their lives in unnecessary danger and called cowards by those, their superiors, who wouldn't do the job of loading ammunitions, with out proper equipment and training, themselves!
***SPOILER*** Despite the military court not having any evidence that the so-called mutiny was planned in advance those on trial were still convicted of it and faced as much as 15 years behind bars. They in a way were lucky in that the charge, mutiny in war time, carried with it the death penalty. It was two years later, in 1946, that President Truman commuted their sentences to time served which still didn't exonerate the black seamen and upheld their dishonorable discharges from the US Navy. Still it was also President Truman who four years after the Port Chicago disaster desegregated, by executive order, the US Armed Forces making for the most part it impossible that another Port Chicago, in how the black sailors were treated there, would ever happen again!