The film had no screenplay and was instead composed in the director’s mind before shooting.

It was easily the longest film ever made at the time of release, running at 190 minutes with an interval.  It was also the most successful, taking over $10 million.

The film premiered as The Clansman – the title of Thomas Dixon’s novel on which the film is based – in February 1915.  The title was changed to The Birth of a Nation before the film went on public release, as Griffiths felt that the North’s victory in the Civil War had bound the states together once and for all.

The 'National Association for the Advancement of Colored People' insisted (unsuccessfully) that racist footage – 169 shots – be excised, and there were riots at premieres in Boston, Chicago and Atlanta.  Wisconsin banned the picture altogether, and the Nation called it ‘improper, immoral and injurious – a deliberate attempt to humiliate ten million American citizens and portray them as nothing but beasts.’

The film was also blamed for the revival of the Ku Klux Klan, the modern version of which began its clandestine activity on Thanksgiving Night, 1915 – five months after the release of Birth.  Their recruitment poster chillingly resembled that of the movie.