Banned film The Spook Who Sat by The Door, based on "the first black nationalist novel

[African American] [Film] Banned film The Spook Who Sat by the Door. United Artists, 1973. Archive of 3 original vintage lobby cards. All measure 8" x 10". Matte and in color. The Spook Who Sat by the Door is a 1973 action crime-drama based on the 1969 novel of the same name by Sam Greenlee, which was first published in the United Kingdom after being rejected by American publishers. The film is both a satire of the civil rights struggle in the US of the late 1960s and a serious attempt to focus on the issue of Black militancy. Dan Freeman, the protagonist, is enlisted by the CIA in its elitist espionage program, becoming its token Black person. After mastering agency tactics, he becomes disillusioned and drops out to train young Black people in Chicago to become "Freedom Fighters". Soon after its release, with the facilitation of FBI suppression, as author Sam Greenlee believed, the film was removed from theaters as a result of its politically controversial message. Nina Metz wrote in the Chicago Tribune: "For years it was only available on bootleg video. In 2004, the actor Tim Reid tracked down a remaining negative stored in a vault under a different name and released it on DVD." In a 2004 feature for NPR, Karen Bates reported that the director of the film, Ivan Dixon, admitted that United Artists would not show the film in a way that would allow its political message to come through when clips were viewed prior to the film's public release. "Dixon says when United Artists screened the finished product and saw a Panavision version of political Armageddon, they were stunned." Lobby cards feature action sequences from the film including a still image of an exploding car, along with images of Lawrence Cook and Janet League. All Lobby cards have title of film and United Artists copyright in lower neon-green margin. One lobby card has small scratches at the top, but overall, archive is in very good condition.