About the Film
With all the native wit, rib-tickling humor, and ability to see what makes the South, documentary filmmaker Stan Woodward helps us discover a common thread that connects the South’s people across social, economic, political, and racial boundaries—grits! “Grits is us”—or, if we are to be grammatically correct, “Grits are us”—could easily be the title of this uproariously funny and, at the same time, insightful and poignant personal documentary.
Woodward used what was, at the time, a highly unconventional camera style and interviewing technique called “direct cinema”—a style of handheld, spontaneous, first-person storytelling in which the cameraman becomes an active participant and interlocutor in the story. Having learned this handheld camera style from the New York filmmakers who developed the crystal-sync system that freed the 16mm camera from the tripod in the 1960s, Woodward uses the camera to initiate interactions with people as he explores grits and their place in Southern culture. We travel with him through the Southern cultural landscape, encountering people unrehearsed and asking a simple, story-unfolding question: “Excuse me…do you eat grits?” Then, in one of the surprises that punctuate Woodward’s journey, the same question is posed on the streets of New York, eventually leading to the creation of a grits soufflé by New York Times food writer Craig Claiborne.
A film that started out to be a 10-minute short became a 44-minute Southern documentary classic. In its first year, Woodward personally showed the film more than 100 times throughout the South. It was the keynote film at the Margaret Mead Film Festival at the American Museum of Natural History in New York and won top honors at major non-theatrical film festivals after it appeared in 1980. It continues to be shown in museums, public libraries, schools, and universities throughout the South.
In 2002, however, it was discovered that the film’s 16mm printing elements had deteriorated, leading to a campaign to preserve and restore the film. Supporters contributed funds that, together with an NEA film preservation grant, made possible the digital restoration of It’s Grits.
At the time of the film’s release in 1980, it received a national PBS broadcast. New York Times food editor Craig Claiborne praised the film:
“An engaging, sometimes hilarious celebration of one of America’s most interesting and singular (or is it plural?) foods. This is a film to be taken seriously by anyone who cares about America’s culinary heritage.”
—Craig Claiborne, Food Editor, The New York Times
