Black Lives, Black Stories

Black Lives, Black Stories

REWIND AND PLAY
REWIND AND PLAY
In 1969, at the end of a European tour, Thelonious Monk was invited to appear on a television program, where he would perform and answer questions in an intimate studio stage. Using newly discovered footage, filmmaker Alain Gomis reveals the troubling dynamic between Monk and his white interviewer. Gomis’s gripping film is a fascinating behind-the-scenes documentary; a subtle yet searing exposé of casual racism; and, above all, a chance to see one of the monumental geniuses of 20th-century music at work.
ANGOLA DO YOU HEAR US? VOICES FROM A PLANTATION PRISON
ANGOLA DO YOU HEAR US? VOICES FROM A PLANTATION PRISON
This acclaimed documentary tells the story of playwright Liza Jessie Peterson, whose celebrated play "The Peculiar Patriot" was shut down mid-performance at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, commonly known as Angola Prison. It examines how one woman's play challenged the country's largest plantation prison and impacted the incarcerated men long after the record of her visit was erased by the institution's administration.
IWOW: I WALK ON WATER
IWOW: I WALK ON WATER
Since 2011, Khalik Allah (Black Mother) has attracted global attention for his radiant portraits of the denizens of 125th and Lexington in East Harlem. In IWOW, Allah returns to the intersection to explore narratives of intimacy, voice, identity and personal transformation. Sometimes painful in its vulnerability, often extremely funny in its candor, and always visually extraordinary, Allah’s one-of-a-kind epic is a contemporary rethinking of the diary film: Gordon Parks meets Jonas Mekas. 
LYNCHING POSTCARDS: TOKEN OF A GREAT DAY
LYNCHING POSTCARDS: TOKEN OF A GREAT DAY
From 1880 to 1968, over 4000 African Americans were lynched in the United States. Like picnics or parties, lynchings were often carnival-like events commemorated through photos and postcards. This film tells the story of how Black activists subverted these souvenirs, which were celebrations of white supremacy, in the fight against lynching.
ST. LOUIS SUPERMAN
ST. LOUIS SUPERMAN
2020 Academy Award Nominee for Best Documentary Short Subject. Bruce Franks Jr., a Ferguson activist and battle rapper who was elected to the overwhelmingly white and Republican Missouri House of Representatives, must overcome both personal trauma and political obstacles to pass a bill critical for his community.
R.I.P. T-SHIRTS
R.I.P. T-SHIRTS
Through the lens of a small t-shirt shop outside Washington D.C. and its young customers, R.I.P. T-SHIRTS intimately portrays the current spike in urban gun violence and its effect on Black youth in America.
BREE WAYY: PROMISE WITNESS REMEMBRANCE
BREE WAYY: PROMISE WITNESS REMEMBRANCE
A film by award-winning director Dawn Porter (John Lewis: Good Trouble, Rise Again: Tulsa and the Red Summer) that looks at how the art world responded to the death of Breonna Taylor by using art not only as a form of protest, but as a space to heal.
17 BLOCKS
17 BLOCKS
In 1999, filmmaker Davy Rothbart met Emmanuel Sanford-Durant and his older brother, Smurf, during a pickup basketball game in Southeast Washington, D.C. Davy began filming their lives, and soon the two brothers and other family members began to use the camera themselves. Spanning 20 years, this story illuminates a national, ongoing crisis through one family's raw, stirring and deeply personal saga. 
MAURICE HINES: BRING THEM BACK
MAURICE HINES: BRING THEM BACK
An intimate portrait of an outspoken showman who with humor and grace navigates the highs and lows of a seven-decade career, and a complex relationship with his superstar brother, Gregory Hines. Maurice and friends — Chita Rivera, Mercedes Ellington and Debbie Allen — tell tales from his seven-decade career, while reflecting on the ever-present challenges of being a gay, black man in show biz.
THE INHERITANCE
THE INHERITANCE
Pennsylvania-born filmmaker Ephraim Asili has been exploring different facets of the African diaspora—and his own place within it—for nearly a decade. His feature-length debut, The Inheritance, is a vibrant, engaging ensemble work, a re-enactment of his own experience, that takes place almost entirely within the walls of a West Philadelphia house where a community of young people have come together to form a collective of Black artists and activists. 
THE DIASPORA SUITE
THE DIASPORA SUITE
From the director of The Inheritance, Ephraim Asili's five-part series The Diaspora Suite is a personal and global study of the African diaspora. Made over the course of seven years and shot in Brazil, Canada, Ethiopia, Ghana, Jamaica, and the United States, this revelatory cycle of five short films collapses time and space to reveal the hidden resonances that connect the black American experience to the greater African diaspora.
UNLADYLIKE2020
UNLADYLIKE2020
Illuminating the stories of extraordinary American heroines from the early years of feminism, Unladylike2020 is an essential series consisting of 26 episodes, between 9 and 12 minutes in length, that profile courageous, little-known and diverse female trailblazers. The series utilizes original artwork and animation, rare archival footage, and interviews with descendants, historians and accomplished modern women who reflect upon the influence of these pioneers.
BLUE NOTE RECORDS: Beyond the Notes
BLUE NOTE RECORDS: Beyond the Notes
One of the most important record labels in the history of jazz — and, by extension, that of American music — Blue Note Records has been home to such groundbreaking artists as Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane, and Art Blakey. Through rare archival footage, current recording sessions and conversations with jazz icons and today’s groundbreaking musicians, this thrilling documentary reveals a powerful mission and illuminates the vital connections between jazz and hip hop.

LIFE AND NOTHING MORE
LIFE AND NOTHING MORE
Winner of the Independent Spirit John Cassavetes Award, Antonio Méndez Esparza's (Aquí y allá) powerful second feature presents another sensitive portrait of a struggling family - a single mother raising her two children when her 14-year-old son has a brush with the law. Life and Nothing More employs documentary-style realism in this snapshot of race, class and the bonds of family in contemporary America.
BLACK MOTHER
BLACK MOTHER
A visionary filmmaker and photographer, Khalik Allah exploded onto the scene with Field Niggas (2015), a grassroots production which went from a YouTube upload to a sensation on the festival circuit. In his celebrated follow-up, Black Mother, Allah brings us on a spiritual journey through Jamaica, the land of his mother's birth, informed by the island's turbulent history yet existing in the urgent present.
TRIPLE CONSCIOUSNESS: Films by Akosua Adoma Owusu
TRIPLE CONSCIOUSNESS: Films by Akosua Adoma Owusu
Akosua Adoma Owusu is a Ghanaian-American filmmaker, producer and cinematographer whose award-winning work addresses the collision of identities, and themes such as feminism, queerness and African immigrants interacting in African, white American, and black American culture. This edition presents thirteen of her short films.
DID YOU WONDER WHO FIRED THE GUN?
DID YOU WONDER WHO FIRED THE GUN?
“In 1946, my great-grandfather murdered a black man named Bill Spann and got away with it.” So begins this acclaimed documentary which takes us on a journey through the American South – interweaving scenes from To Kill a Mockingbird and Rosa Parks’ investigation into the Recy Taylor case – to uncover the truth behind a horrific incident and the societal mores that empowered it.
AND WHEN I DIE, I WON'T STAY DEAD
AND WHEN I DIE, I WON'T STAY DEAD
Embodying the spirit of his poems, the new film from Billy Woodberry, director of Bless Their Little Hearts, is a vivid appreciation of Bob Kaufman, the legendary Beat figure, featuring interviews with his contemporaries, readings, rare photos and footage, and a soundtrack with the likes of Billie Holiday and Ornette Coleman.
BRONX GOTHIC
BRONX GOTHIC
From director Andrew Rossi (Page One: Inside the New York Times, Ivory Tower) comes an electrifying portrait of writer and performer Okwui Okpokwasili and her acclaimed one-woman show "Bronx Gothic," a story about two 12-year-old black girls coming of age in the 1980s.
NIGHT SCHOOL
NIGHT SCHOOL
Emmy-winning director Andrew Cohn’s absorbing documentary observes the individual pursuits of four adult learners seeking a high school diploma, fraught with the challenges of daily life and the broader systemic roadblocks faced by many low income Americans.
MILWAUKEE 53206
MILWAUKEE 53206
MILWAUKEE 53206 is America’s most incarcerated zip code; 62% of adult males in this mostly African-American community have spent time in a correctional facility. This urgent documentary examines how decades of poverty, unemployment, and a lack of opportunity has contributed to the crisis of mass incarceration in this and other communities across the nation.
JUKE
JUKE
A remarkable record of black life in the 1940s, as found in the films of Spencer Williams, the pioneering African American filmmaker. A new essay by Thom Andersen, director of Los Angeles Plays Itself.
SAPPHIRE OF ST. LOUIS
SAPPHIRE OF ST. LOUIS
In this wondrous documentary, celebrated filmmaker Jose Luis Guerin peers inside an 18th century painting hidden away in a French cathedral to vividly recount a little-known, but pivotal slave revolt on the high seas.
LAST DAY OF FREEDOM
LAST DAY OF FREEDOM
2016 Academy Award nominee for Best Documentary Short Subject, an extraordinary, animated documentary exploring some of the most pressing social issues of our day - racial bias, veteran’s care, mental health and criminal justice.