In 2008, DJ Spooky remixed Griffith's film as Rebirth of a Nation.

I think I watched part of it in a Mass Media class during my undergrad days, but I've never seen the film in its entirety.
I don't think I could sit through a silent film of that length and subject matter to be honest.

I see it in my mind everyday. No, I have not.

I watched most of it in a film apprec. class back in cOllage. Subject matter was on point for its time. Have to look up the dates, but prolly not too far from Plessy v. Ferguson.

It's interesting for what it did technically for film, invention of jump cuts, special effects, etc. I had to watch parts of it for a silent film class and it was well done. Obviously it's racist as hell, but that goes without saying.

jump cuts? that was french new wave, not griffith. griffith did pioneer a lot of "film grammar" but i think more during his one reel days, not this. but yeah, i've seen this. worth watching for its place in film history but, you know...

I think Intolerance is longer.

The Birth of a Nation pioneered such camera techniques as deep focus, jump-cut, and facial close-up, which are now considered integral to the industry. It also contains many new cinematic innovations, special effects, and artistic techniques. At the time, it shattered both box office and film-length records, running three hours and ten minutes. It was voted one of the "Top 100 American Films" (# 44) by the American Film Institute in 1998.

There were jump cuts before the French New Wave.

I don't get why every one hates on wikipedia, that shit's legit. It used to piss me off in college when I couldn't cite wikipedia, just had to find the exact same information elsewhere.

George Méliès is known as the father of the jump cut as a result of having discovered it accidentally, and then using it to simulate magical tricks; however, he tried to make the cut appear seamless to compliment his illusions. Contemporary use of the jump cut stems from its appearance in the work of Jean-Luc Godard and other filmmakers of the French New Wave of the late 1950s and 1960s. In Godard's ground-breaking Breathless (1960), for example, he cut together shots of Jean Seberg riding in a convertible (see right) in such a way that the discontinuity between shots is emphasized and its jarring effect deliberate. In the screen shots to the right, the first image comes from the very end of one shot and the second is the very beginning of the next shot — thus emphasizing the gap in action between the two (when Seberg picked up the mirror).

Jump cuts as originated in BotN were to present a narrative, increase pace, engage the viewer more deeply in the movement of the story.

Jump cuts in Godard were to prod the viewer, decouple viewing and viewed, make the visual turn in on itself to make the artifice apparent.