The first ever studio movie from a Black director tells the semi-autobiographical story of its director growing up in 1920s Kansas, and I was actually pretty impressed with it as a movie.
Category Archives: Race themes
BRIAN’S SONG (1971)
The ultimate weepy romance, but it’s for dudes because the two leads are football players.
THE PARTY (1968)
I get why some people probably love this virtuoso exhibition of physical comedy by Peter Sellers, but not only is it super racist, I think it should be re-titled “Social Anxiety: The Movie.”
DEVIL IN A BLUE DRESS (1995)
A very well-done neo-noir that deals with issues the original film noirs mostly ignored. Denzel Washington plays the detective in over his head.
THE BLOOD OF JESUS (1941)
This is a movie as “outsider art,” an unfiltered detour into a religious mind without an insincere bone in its body.
MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE (1985)
Daniel Day-Lewis had his first starring role in this low-key 1980s British LGBT romance.
COOLEY HIGH (1975)
In which we learn that it’s possible to be nostalgic about something yet not remember it as perfect.
GUESS WHO’S COMING TO DINNER (1967)
A lightish drama about interracial marriage that came out the same year it became legal nationwide. But is it a good movie?
WITHIN OUR GATES (1920)
The earliest extant movie from a Black director, I found myself getting into it as more than homework.
NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1968)
This tiny indie movie found the right metaphor for basically all of modern society’s fears and single-handedly spawned a major subgenre that’s lasted until today.
