Riverbend is a 1989 American independent action-drama film directed by Sam Firstenberg.[1] It was written and produced by Samuel Vance and Valerie Coleman Vance (uncredited).[citation needed] Set in the segregated South during the Civil Rights era, it stars Steve James. The film follows three Black Vietnam War soldiers who, after escaping a corrupt court-martial, arrive in a small Georgia town terrorized by a racist sheriff and lead the Black residents in an armed uprising for justice and self-determination.
Shot on location in Texas, Riverbend was independently financed and distributed on VHS by Paramount’s Prism label. A 6K restoration, produced by Reelblack Renaissance and supervised by Firstenberg and Valerie Vance premiered theatrically in 2025, followed by a Blu-ray release.
Plot
Set in 1966, Riverbend opens with Major Samuel Quinton (Steve James) and fellow Black Vietnam soldiers Tony Marx (Julius Tennon) and Butch Turner (Alex Morris) being transported to face a military court-martial for disobeying an order to destroy a village filled with civilians. Knowing they will not receive a fair trial, the men escape and make their way across the South. They eventually find refuge in Riverbend, Georgia, a small segregated town ruled by a brutal sheriff (Tony Frank) and a corrupt judge.
Hiding in the home of Bell Coleman (Margaret Avery), a widowed teacher raising her son, the fugitives learn that the town’s Black residents live in fear of constant abuse and violence. Quinton convinces his men to stay and help. Using their military training, they organize and train the townspeople in secret to defend themselves and stand up to their oppressors.
When the time comes, the Black townspeople take over the town, capturing the sheriff and his deputies and demanding national attention to the injustice they’ve endured. In the end, they defeat the National Guard. The townspeople unite in the center of town in a demonstration of peace, unity and reconciliation.
Riverbend screened at the Cannes Film Festival Market in 1990 and had a brief theatrical run in February 1990 before being released on VHS and Betamax through Paramount’s Prism Entertainment label. It never played Cable TV or had any official DVD edition. For decades, the film circulated only in secondhand VHS copies and was considered an orphan film. In 2021, a privately funded 2K “grindhouse restoration” was completed by Reelblack using a truncated 35mm print sourced from South Africa, leading to a limited festival screening at the 2024 Denton Black Film Festival. A full 6K restoration from the original 35mm interpositive and sound elements—supervised by director Sam Firstenberg and producer Valerie Vanceis being released by Reelblack Renaissance, with a theatrical premiere at the Aero Theatre in Santa Monica on October 14, 2025, followed by a Blu-ray release on June 19, 2026.
Rediscovery
After its limited VHS release through Paramount’s Prism label in 1989, Riverbend largely disappeared from public view and became a little-known entry in late-1980s Black independent cinema.[citation needed]
In the early 1990s, filmmaker and Reelblack founder Michael J. Dennis first encountered the film while working at a Philadelphia video store but overlooked it at the time. Decades later, film historian Charles Woods reintroduced him to the title, emphasizing its significance as a story of Black resistance and self-determination. When Dennis later uploaded the film to his Reelblack YouTube channel, it attracted renewed attention and even a note of appreciation from director Sam Firstenberg, sparking the idea to pursue a restoration.[citation needed]
In 2021, Dennis located a 35mm print of Riverbend from a seller in South Africa and began what he called the film’s first “grindhouse restoration.” The heavily worn reels were scanned in 2K and digitally cleaned by preservationist Craig Rogers of Deaf Crocodile, with missing footage replaced using VHS material under Firstenberg’s supervision. This version premiered at the 2024 Denton Black Film Festival in Texas, marking the film’s first public screening in more than three decades. The event reunited surviving members of the cast and crew, including producer Valerie Vance.
Following the festival, Dennis, with the help of MissingMovies.org, discovered the original 35mm negative and sound elements stored at FotoKem in Los Angeles. With the rights cleared and materials secured from Amazon/MGM, he launched a full 6K restoration through his label Reelblack Renaissance, in collaboration with preservationist Austin Squitieri of Reel Revival and with supervision by Firstenberg and Vance. The restored version premiered on October 14, 2025, at the Aero Theatre in Santa Monica, followed by a June 19, 2026 Blu-ray release.[citation needed]
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