“Hellbound Train” (1930)
Evangelists James and Eloyce Gist didn’t truly know their way around a 16mm camera, but the budding filmmakers used this new tool as a means of spreading the Word as they traveled to churches and religious gatherings. This 1930 silent production, recently reconstituted from fragments stored at the Library of Congress, is a surreal allegory about sin, in which Satan himself drives a train carrying carloads of people drinking, dancing to jazz music and otherwise having a good time. And what is their fate? As the railroad ticket’s fine print declares, “No Round Trip Tickets – One-Way Only!” An early milestone in African American cinema, restored by Howard University professor and film producer S. Torriano Berry.
