Early in the film (which debuted last summer on "P.O.V."), Browne surveys the DeWolf legacy in Bristol with the help of historical documents, old photos, and home movies. The DeWolf mansion is now a museum of period style. We see the filmmaker as a little girl waving an American flag on July 4. But horror lurks just under the surface. The sight of a pair of real DeWolf slave shackles stuns some of the family group. Sickeningly, a local nursery rhyme turns out to be about a pair of child slaves given by an early DeWolf as a Christmas present to his wife. Browne's deadpan narration lets the evil speak for itself.
The group journeys to Ghana, where Rhode Island rum was traded for slaves, who were in turn traded for Cuban sugar and molasses. They visit the Gate of No Return and dungeons where the slaves were kept. They also find that the current-day Africans are mostly indifferent and sometimes downright hostile to their mission.
The Cuban leg of their journey deteriorates into group discussions about what they're trying to accomplish and what they ought to be feeling. This continues when they get home and begin to channel their emotions into action - supporting a reparations resolution at a national Episcopal convention.
Their own self-involvement is clear. One DeWolf descendant says he's concerned that Browne will caricature him as a privileged Harvard grad - his plaint accomplishing exactly that. And Browne, herself, makes certain to clarify that none of these individuals inherited any slave-trading profits - that money was squandered, and their wealth came from elsewhere. Phew.
It would be as funny as a Christopher Guest mockumentary if it weren't also so sad. On camera, at least, none of these people proposes, say, tutoring poor children in their hometowns or creating a scholarship for a kid from Ghana. After everything they've been through, what they decide to do is support a resolution. One does not picture Africa rejoicing.
