The #1 Bus Chronicles Joel Katz Producer: Delmira Valladares 2020, Color, US The #1 Bus Chronicles uses a small sociological microcosm – a bus stop on an industrial highway in New Jersey – to intimately portray some of the most marginalized lives in America today - the ‘workin...
#Bars4Justice a.k.a. Bars4Justice Queen Muhammad Ali & Hakeem Khaaliq Producer: Nation19 Magazine (a Mobile Regime brand) 2015, 9 min., Color, US On the one year anniversary of Mike Brown's death in Ferguson, Missouri, a benefit concert in commemoration of his life was organized by Hip-Hop and civil rights activists Common, Talib Kweli, Immorta...
139X (Newsreel #22) San Francisco Newsreel Producer: Newsreel 25 min., BW, US The film details the efforts of Berkeley students to develop support for a mass sit-in and a building take-over after the State Regents refused to allow Elridge Cleaver to teach Political Science 139X...
Adventures in Assimilation Richard Dean Moss 1992, 8 min., Color, US In this engaging performance video, Moss experiments with his own choreography and dance, using movement within a fixed frame to express self-discovery and the aesthetics of identity....
Afro-punk James Spooner 2003, 66 min., Color, US AFRO-PUNK explores race identity within the punk scene. This film tackles hard questions, such as issues of loneliness, exile, inter-racial dating and black power. We follow the lives of four people w...
Against the Grain Seyi Adebanjo & Betty Yu 2011, 6 min., Color, US To break the mold of past documentaries about gender transformation, AGAINST THE GRAIN goes beyond the usual gender binary and linear racial focus. This short documentary follows the story of OluSeyi,...
All Our Sons: Fallen Heroes of 9/11 Lillian Benson 2003, 28 min., Color, US Twelve African American firefighters were among the World Trade Center victims on September 11th, 2001. This moving documentary profiles these heroes, their families and the ultimate sacrifices they ...
amBUSHed Jared Katsiane 1992, 12 min., BW, US This beautifully shot film depicts the brutal and daily occurance of police violence. AMBUSHED uses experimental narrative techniques to delve into the life and consciousness of two generations of Afr...
An Intro to Cultural Skit-zo-frenia Jamika Ajalon 1993, 10 min., Color, US An experimental documentary exploring the lives, views of people who don't fit or who live outside the definitions regulating race ("i.e. black enough"), gender, or sexuality....
Anomaly: A Documentary Film about Multiracial Identity Jessica Chen Drammeh Producer: Jessica Chen Drammeh & Sharon K. Smith 2013, 47 min., Color, US ANOMALY is an award-winning documentary film that provides a thought-provoking look at multiracial identity by combining personal narratives with the larger drama of mixed race in American culture. Th...
Another Brother Tami Gold Producer: AndersonGold Films 1998, 51 min., Color, US Through found photographs, audiotaped interviews and archival footage, ANOTHER BROTHER tells the story of Vietnam veteran Clarence Fitch. Clarence Fitch was a man of and for his times, an African Ame...
Audre Lorde - The Berlin Years 1984 to 1992 Dagmar Schultz 2012, 79 min., Color, Germany 2012 marks the 20th anniversary of Audre Lorde’s passing, the acclaimed Black lesbian feminist poet and activist. Throughout the 70s and 80s, Lorde’s incisive writings and speeches defined and inspir...
AWOL Brigid Maher 2005, 20 min., Color, US/Iraq Keisha Johnson, an African American soldier, goes AWOL in Iraq after she flees a violent incident. On her "walkabout" journey, she encounters children who decide to help her. Keisha and the children g...
Behind These Walls: Mumia Abu-jamal and the Long Struggle For Freedom Jule Buerjes & Heike Kleffner Producer: KAOS FIlm and Video Team Cologne 1996, 70 min., Color, US On August 17, 1995, Mumia Abu-Jamal, journalist and former Black Panther Party Member was scheduled to be executed. His case--he is one of 3,000 death row inmates in the US--has raised international a...
Beyond the Bricks: A New Era of Education Derek Koen Producer: Ouida Washington 2010, 31 min., Color, US BEYOND THE BRICKS follows African‐ American students Shaquiel Ingram and Erick Graham as they struggle to stay on track in the Newark public school system. Fifteen year‐old Shaquiel is a bright studen...
Big Willow Jared Katsiane 2013, 11 min., Color, US Can a young artist's creativity save his favorite willow tree from bulldozers?...
Birth of a Nation: 4*29*1992 Matthew McDaniel 1993, 60 min., Color, US After criminal charges were dropped against four Los Angeles police officers accused in the brutal beating of Rodney King, Los Angeles erupted. This video offers a rare view of the rebellion that bega...
Black & White Edgar Garcia Chavez Producer: Edgar Garcia Chavez 2020, 5 min., Color, US This experimental film dissects the Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary’s definitions of the words "Black" and "White" – to prove how, historically, the meanings of both words have been ingrained with ver...
Black and Blue Hugh King & Lamar Williams 1987, 58 min., Color, US A powerful mix of archival material, news clips and documentary footage chronicles impassioned community response to decades of deadly force against people of color by members of the Philadelphia poli...
Black Body Thomas Allen Harris 1992, 7 min., Color, US Thomas Allen Harris uses text, special effects, and a single bound male nude to emphasize the humanity underlying the multiple definitions of black identity and subjectivity. The audience may be asked...
black enuf* Carrie Hawks 2016, 23 min., Color, US A queer oddball seeks approval from Black peers despite a serious lack of hip-hop credentials and a family that ‘talks white’. Carrie Hawks' quest for a Black Card (undeniable acceptance of my racial ...
Black Nations/Queer Nations? Shari Frilot Producer: Frilot and Black Nations/Queer Nations? 1995, 52 min., Color, US This is an experimental documentary chronicling the March 1995 groundbreaking conference on lesbian and gay sexualities in the African diaspora. The conference brought together an array of dynamic sch...
Black Panther a.k.a. Off the Pig (Newsreel #19) San Francisco Newsreel Producer: Newsreel 1968, 15 min., BW, US A compelling document of the Black Panther Party leadership in 1967. This film contains a prison interview with Minister of Defense Huey P. Newton as well as an interview with Minister of Information ...
Black Women, Sexual Politics and the Revolution Black Planet Productions Producer: Black Planet Productions 1992, 29 min., Color, US Black women speak candidly on issues of sex, class and gender roles. The video examines how African American women deal with issues of poverty, abortion, battering and lack of health care, and address...
Blaze: The Truth Through Hip Hop Maurice Lynch 2006, 90 min., Color, US The Hip-Hop Christian movement has been uplifting youth by delivering positive religious messages that are not about drugs, sex, or hate but of hope and peace.
In a society where artists are glorif...
Bobby Seale a.k.a. Interview with Bobby Seale (Newsreel #44) San Francisco Newsreel Producer: Newsreel 1969, 15 min., BW, US At the time of this moving prison interview, Black Panther Party Chairman Bobby Seale had faced a series of charges of conspiracy in connection with his involvement in the Black Liberation and Anti-wa...
Bodily Functions Jocelyn Taylor 1995, 14 min., Color Exploring the notions of body image and sexual expression as they intersect with family and society, this short interweaves three narratives: first, a "naked fugitive on the loose" as she runs, walks ...
Bringin' in Da Spirit Rhonda L. Haynes 2003, 60 min., Color, US Through the use of first person narrative and rare archival images, this documentary provides a moving glimpse of the women who have skillfully brought scores of children across the threshold of exist...
Call to Manhood Narcel G. Reedus 1994, 57 min., BW, US CALL TO MANHOOD is an emotional testament to the brothers who are reaching back into the community to save young black boys. This documentary traces the steps taken by the Fulton County Human Services...
Can't Jail the Revolution and Break the Walls Down Kenyatta Tyehimba & Ada Gay Griffin Producer: Third World Newsreel 1991, 60 min., Color, US These two 30 minute videos use footage compiled from over 40 social justice media productions to chronicle the perspectives of political prisoners and of war within the United States. Historical foot...
Changing Face of Harlem Shawn Batey Producer: Shawn Batey & Shaun Jaffier 2014, 62 min., Color, US Told through the personal accounts of residents, business owners, politicians and real estate developers, CHANGING FACE OF HARLEM explores the drastic transformation of this historic neighborhood over...
Chasing the Moon Dawn Suggs 1991, 4 min., BW, US This fascinating film presents the meditations of a Black lesbian grappling with the memory of an attack that makes her wary about being out on the street....
The Cinematic Jazz of Julie Dash Yvonne Welbon 1992, 26 min., Color, US This is an in-depth interview with filmmaker Julie Dash, whose first feature film, DAUGHTERS OF THE DUST, has become a critical and word-of-mouth sensation since its release in the Winter of 1992. Her...
Claiming Open Spaces Austin Allen 1995, 87 min., Color, US CLAIMING OPEN SPACES explores African-American culture as it clashes with the design of the modern American city. The film includes a comprehensive section on New Orleans--the vital place of historica...
Close to Home Rodney Evans 1998, 24 min., Color, US CLOSE TO HOME documents the filmmaker's journey as he comes out to a conservative, Jamaican family and negotiates a painful relationship with a 21-year old heterosexual man....
Closer to the Dream (Long Version) Guetty Felin & Hervé Cohen 2008, 102 min., Color, US An electoral road movie about Barack Obama and the movement that united Americans across party, racial and ethnic lines. In 2008 Haitian-American filmmaker Guetty Felin, her husband, French filmmaker ...
Closer to the Dream (Short Version) Hervé Cohen & Guetty Felin 2008, 54 min., Color, US An electoral road move about Barack Obama and the movement that united Americans across party, racial and ethnic lines. In 2008 Haitian-American filmmaker Guetty Felin, her husband, French filmmaker H...
Community Control (Newsreel #24) Newsreel Producer: Newsreel 1969, 38 min., BW, US This film documents one of the most important struggles for education in the sixties. In 1968, under intensive community pressure from Black and Latino communities, the State of New York chose three N...
Corrections Ashley Hunt 2001, 59 min., Color, US CORRECTIONS is a documentary about private prisons. A story of justice turned to profit, it presents the new investors in the "war on crime": venture capital and for-profit prisons. With the highest i...
A Cosmic Demonstration of Sexuality Shari Frilot 1992, 20 min., Color, US A humorous comparison between female sexuality and cosmic structures, this video interviews five different women on topics such as menstruation, masturbation and ejaculation. The video proposes how se...
Crocodile Conspiracy Zeinabu Irene Davis 1986, 13 min., Color, US/Cuba This charming tale focuses on Willa Ledbetter, an African American middle-aged school teacher in Watts, and her longing to visit her parent's homeland of Cuba. In the face of unexpected political and...
De*fat*ting Michelle Lewis & Third World Newsreel Workshop Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop 2000, 13 min., Color, US Today is the first day of the elusive diet for Lewis' main character. A funny and poignant meditation on American society's fascination with thinness, DE*FAT*TING explores food, addiction, obesity, an...
Deft Changes: An Improvised Experience Alonzo Speight 1991, 10 min., Color, US Through short improvised sketches, this video explores the generational conflicts between a father and son who are each musicians. It features performances by guitarist Mark Whittfield, and the late m...
Demarcations Kym Ragusa Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop 1992, 5 min., Color, US DEMARCATIONS uses the female body as a landscape to explore memories of a rape. Ragusa focuses on ways in which identity and exoticism are played out on the level of the body....
Deported Rachèle Magloire & Chantal Regnault 2012, 72 min., Color, Haiti DEPORTED follows members of a unique group of men in Haiti: criminal deportees from North America. Since 1996, the United States has implemented a policy of repatriation of all foreign residents who h...
Doing What It Takes: Black Folks Getting and Staying Healthy Donna Golden Producer: Black Planet Productions 1994, 23 min., Color, US Black communities are disproportionately affected by cancer, heart disease, low birth weight and infant mortality rates. Facing political, economic and racial barriers to good health, this video docum...
A Dream Is What You Wake Up From Larry Bullard & Carolyn Y. Johnson Producer: Third World Newsreel 1978, 50 min., Color, US Originally released in 1978, A DREAM IS WHAT YOU WAKE UP FROM explores the role of Black families in American society. The everyday lives of three Black families with different approaches to their str...
Dreams Deferred: The Sakia Gunn Film Project Charles B. Brack Producer: Charles B. Brack, CoProduced with Third World Newsreel 2008, 58 min., Color, US This documentary tells the little known story of Sakia Gunn, a 15 year old student who was fatally stabbed in a gay hate crime in Newark, New Jersey. Sakia was an Aggressive, according to GLAAD, a hom...
E Minha Cara Thomas Allen Harris 2001, 56 min., Color, US/Brazil A mythopoetic feast of self-discovery that crosses three continents and three generations, E MINHA CARA traces the filmmaker's journey to Salvador Da Bahia, the African heart and soul of Brazil, as he...
Encounter at the Intergalactic Café Thomas Allen Harris 1996, 17 min., Color, US A videotape of a live performance--a mythopoetic rendering of the original encounters between African, Indigenous and European peoples in the present day "border regions". Saint, comic, demon, deity, ...
Extra Change Carmen Coustaut 1988, 28 min., Color, US A realistic view of a 12-year-old African American girl's voyage through early adolescence, peer pressure, friendship and love. Focusing on society's expectations for young women, EXTRA CHANGE is an e...
Ezekiel's Dream Narcel G. Reedus 1994, 15 min., BW, US EZEKIEL'S DREAM starring Steve Coulter is a visual poem describing the last thoughts of a black man perparing for the fight of his life. This film has garnered numerous awards and has screened in Berl...
Fade to Black Tony Cokes & Donald Trammel 1991, 33 min., Color, US This videotape is a meditation on contemporary race relations. In voiceover, two Black men describe events that typically go unnoticed or discounted by the white mainstream. They examine gestures, hes...
Fight Black: Urban Martial Arts Third World Newsreel Workshop Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop 1991, 15 min., Color, US Marcus Salgado is a young martial artist from the South Bronx who leads the viewer through a stunning array of community martial arts activity in New York City. The tape shows classes that promote hea...
Finding Christa Camille Billops & James Hatch 1991, 55 min., Color, US This documentary presents a moving yet unsentimental view of motherhood and adoption. It explores the feelings surrounding the reunion of a young woman with her natural mother 20 years after being giv...
Finding Common Ground in New Orleans Walidah Imarisha Producer: Phil Fivel Rothberg 2006, 23 min., Color, US In this short documentary, activist and poet Walidah Imarisha travels to New Orleans and other neighboring towns shortly after Hurricane Katrina devastated the area. In her path she encounter grassroo...
For Colored Boys Who've Considered Homicide Narcel G. Reedus 1995, 27 min., Color, US In this spiritual drama, an ancestor (Thomas Merdis) travels through time and space to interrogate a murderer (Chong Thi Nguyen) to find out why young black boys are killing each other.
"FOR COLOR...
Foster Care Film Series: Volume 1 Yasmin Mistry Producer: Yasmin Mistry 2017, 39 min., Color, US In this award-winning collection, Charell, Ashley, and Camilla share their deeply personal stories about their experiences in the U.S. foster care system. Foster Care Film Series: Volume 1 celebrates ...
Four Women Julie Dash 1979, 7 min., Color, US An imaginatively choreographed dance interpretation of the ballad by Nina Simone on four common stereotypes of Black women....
Frankie & Jocie Jocelyn Taylor 1994, 20 min., Color, US Examining the relationships between brother and sister, hetero and queer, male and female, this video weaves a provocative discussion between a Black lesbian and her straight brother. In an eloquent e...
From Harlem to Harvard Four Square Productions Producer: Four Square Productions 1982, 30 min., Color, US An excellent discussion film for college bound students, this thoughtful documentary captures the alienation, prejudice and insecurity that often confront African American students at predominantly wh...
Ganja and Hess Bill Gunn 1970, 110 min., Color, US This extraordinary foray into the realms of Black consciousness has acquired deserved status as a cinema classic. The vampire film genre is used to create a mythical vision of the forces that shape Dr...
Gershwin & Bess: A Dialogue with Anne Brown Nicole Franklin Producer: EPIPHANY Inc. 2010, 36 min., Color, US In 2004 at her home in Oslo, Norway, soprano Anne Wiggins Brown sat down with tenor Dr. William A. Brown (no relation) of the Center Black Music Research for an on-the-record conversation about origin...
Gideon's Army Dawn Porter Producer: Julie Goldman 2013, 95 min., Color, US GIDEON’S ARMY follows the personal stories of Travis Williams, Brandy Alexander and June Hardwick, three young public defenders who are part of a small group of idealistic lawyers in the Deep South ch...
Hair-tage Shawn Batey Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop 1997, 10 min., Color, US This short documentary examines the decisions involved in growing and wearing dreadlocks in African-American communities. Through interviews and playful camerawork, Batey explores the motivations and ...
Heart of Harlem Brian Lindstrom
Bob McCullough 2001, 9 min., Color, US HEART OF HARLEM traces the life and times of Holcombe Rucker, who founded a summer basketball league while working for New York Citys Parks Department in order to give young people a positive alternat...
Heaven, Earth and Hell Thomas Allen Harris 1994, 26 min., Color, US Reflecting on the "trickster" figure in African and Native American cultures, while recounting the story of his first love, this beautiful work incorporates the critical texts of Frantz Fanon, bell ho...
Human Touch: Pain and Power Vejan Lee Smith Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop 1995, 30 min., Color, US In a powerful and moving reclamation of the body and human touch, this video documents how survivors of sexual abuse reaffirm their sexuality and physical selves. Intercutting dance footage, interview...
Human Traffic: Past and Present Frances-Anne Solomon 2012, 34 min., Color, US This eye-opening film documents the 2011 Conference on Human Trafficking and features the work of leading scholars, historians, lawyers, activists, and artists to generate a broad discussion of some o...
I.S. 201 and Report from Newark (Newsreel #10) Newsreel Producer: Newsreel 7 min., BW, US Nine months after the riot. Malcolm X Memorial Services held at I.S. 201 in New York, March 1968, and scenes from Newark, March 1968....
Illusions Julie Dash 1983, 34 min., BW, US Set in a fictitious Hollywood studio in 1942, this elegant drama contrasts society's views of Black women with their self-perceptions. An ambitious movie executive, Mignon Dupree is perceived by her ...
In a Perfect World… Daphne McWilliams Producer: Daphne McWilliams & Sam Pollard 2015, 76 min., US IN A PERFECT WORLD… Explores all the requisite dynamics of what it is to be a man raised by a single mother. The inspiration for the film came from the director's own relationship with her son who has...
In the Spirit of Peace Al Santana Producer: Third World Newsreel 2001, 8 min., Color, US After September 11th, religion becomes the vehicle for a community looking for commensurability in the midst of an environment that would rather seek quick answers to a larger problem....
Ina Mae Best Charlene Gilbert 1993, 25 min., Color A documentary portrait of a courageous African American woman, who after 18 years working at a textile factory in Goldsboro, North Carolina, became a passionate and outspoken leader in a struggle to u...
Invisible Roots: Afro-Mexicans in Southern California Tiffany Walton & Lizz Mullis Producer: Tiffany Walton, Lizz Mullis & Richard Goldlander 2015, 21 min., Color, US More than one million Mexicans are of African descent, yet this heritage is often forgotten, denied, and many times stigmatized, both in Mexico and in Chicanx communities in the United States. INVISIB...
The KKK Boutique Ain't Just Rednecks (76 minutes) Camille Billops & James Hatch 1994, 76 min., Color, US Write Billops and Hatch: "Even as late as a hundred years ago, discrimination on the basis of race was considered a natural and even desirable trait for humans to possess. We Americans have tried to i...
The KKK Boutique ain't Just Rednecks: A Docu/Fantasy about Everybody's Racism Camille Billops & James Hatch 1994, 60 min., Color, US Write Billops and Hatch: "Even as late as a hundred years ago, discrimination on the basis of race was considered a natural and even desirable trait for humans to possess. We Americans have tried to i...
L’Esprit Prêt-à-Partager Jamika Ajalon 2009, 28 min., Color, Germany/Senegal Documents an art workshop held in Dakar, Senegal, in 2008, where artists from Africa and Europe explore issues surrounding fashion, sport and diasporic art and identities. The artists collaborate with...
Land Where My Fathers Died Daresha Kyi 1991, 24 min., Color, US A fiercely independent young African American woman and her nouveau-nationalist photographer boyfriend decide to visit the father she hasn't seen in years. The tragicomic reunion shatters her illusion...
A Litany For Survival: the Life and Work of Audre Lorde (90) Ada Gay Griffin & Michelle Parkerson Producer: Third World Newsreel 1996, 90 min., Color, US An epic portrait of the eloquent, award-winning Black, lesbian, poet, mother, teacher and activist, Audre Lorde, whose writings -- spanning five decades -- articulated some of the most important socia...
A Litany For Survival: the Life and Work of Audre Lorde Ada Gay Griffin & Michelle Parkerson Producer: Third World Newsreel 1995, 52 min., Color, US An epic portrait of the eloquent, award-winning Black, lesbian, poet, mother, teacher and activist, Audre Lorde, whose writings -- spanning five decades -- articulated some of the most important socia...
Little Brother: Series Nicole Franklin Color, US LITTLE BROTHER is a series of short documentary films dedicated to giving Black boys a unique voice. Beginning in 2010, filmmakers Nicole Franklin and Jasmin Tiggett started taking an annual look at B...
Little Brother: A Do Right Man (Chapter 3) Jasmin Tiggett Producer: Nicole Franklin, Epiphany, Inc. 2012, 17 min., Color, US LITTLE BROTHER is a series of short documentary films dedicated to giving Black boys a unique voice. Beginning in 2010, filmmakers Nicole Franklin and Jasmin Tiggett started taking an annual look at B...
Little Brother: Manchild in the Promised Land (Chapter 5) Nicole Franklin Producer: Nicole Franklin & J. Tiggett 2015, 17 min., Color, US LITTLE BROTHER: MANCHILD IN THE PROMISED LAND is Chapter 5 of the film series that features young Black boys and their thoughts on Love. This chapter was filmed in Tucson, AZ, where the young men have...
Little Brother: The Fire Next Time (Chapter 4) Nicole Franklin 2014, 17 min., Color, US LITTLE BROTHER is a series of short documentary films dedicated to giving Black boys a unique voice. Beginning in 2010, filmmakers Nicole Franklin and Jasmin Tiggett started taking an annual look at B...
Little Brother: The Street (Chapter 2) Nicole Franklin Producer: EPIPHANY Inc. 2012, 17 min., Color, US LITTLE BROTHER is a series of 15-minute documentary films dedicated to giving Black boys a unique voice. Beginning in 2010, filmmakers Nicole Franklin and Jasmin Tiggett started taking an annual look ...
Little Brother: Things Fall Apart (Chapter 1) Nicole Franklin & Jasmin Tiggett Producer: EPIPHANY Inc. 2010, 18 min., Color, US LITTLE BROTHER is a series of 15-minute documentary films dedicated to giving Black boys a unique voice. Beginning in 2010, filmmakers Nicole Franklin and Jasmin Tiggett started taking an annual look ...
Locations of the M/othership: Black Women as Fugitive Archetype of Resistance Jamika Ajalon 2009, 20 min., Color/BW, UK/US A live audio/visual installation using images of subversive and legendary Black women and excerpts from sci-fi films and TV series. Ajalon explores the intersection of Black women’s representations an...
The Lower 9: A Story of Home (Long Version) Matthew Hashiguchi Producer: Matthew Hashiguchi & Elaine McMillion 2012, 50 min., Color, US THE LOWER 9: A STORY OF HOME showcases six determined Lower Ninth Ward residents who share their most intimate stories of home, as they resume their lives years after Hurricane Katrina ravaged their n...
The Lower 9: A Story of Home (Short Version) Matthew Hashiguchi Producer: Matthew Hashiguchi & Elaine McMillion 2012, 20 min., Color, US THE LOWER 9: A STORY OF HOME showcases four determined Lower Ninth Ward residents who share their most intimate stories of home, as they resume their lives years after Hurricane Katrina ravaged their ...
Mama Gloria Luchina Fisher Producer: Yvonne Welbon & Zainab Ali 2020, 76 min., Color, US At a time when Black transgender women face escalating violence and make up the majority of transgender people murdered each year, Gloria Allen’s story is an inspiring portrait of aging seldom seen. B...
Marriage Equality: Byron Rushing And The Fight For Fairness Thomas Allen Harris 2011, 15 min., Color, US A documentary that connects the Lesbian and Gay Marriage Equality movement with the Black Civil Rights Movement.
This documentary interweaves archival footage and photos with contemporary intervie...
May Day Panther a.k.a. May Day (Newsreel #29) San Francisco Newsreel Producer: Newsreel 1969, 15 min., BW, US This film documents a rally in San Francisco sponsored by the Black Panther Party. Kathleen Cleaver, Bobby Seale, and other speakers addressed thousands of protesters demanding more rights for Africa...
Memory Tracks Jamika Ajalon 1996, 12 min., UK A woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown follows the afroed spirit of a revolutionary past through London's streets: Brixton and Portobello. I used the camera as the means for reflexive analysis of...
Military Option Al Santana & Alonzo Speight Producer: Third World Newsreel 2005, 11 min., Color, US Women, money and travel. It's still the hook that military recruiters are using on young men, as two students discover at a Queens recruitment office. A look at the military recruitment process thro...
Missing Relations Yvonne Welbon 1994, 13 min., Color, US Almost 30 years ago, the filmmaker's mother gave birth to twin daughters. For a few months, Welbon shared her childhood with her baby sisters until their father "kidnapped" them. Welbon never saw her ...
Mississippi Triangle Christine Choy, Worth Long, Allan Siegel Producer: Third World Newsreel 1984, 78 min., Color, US This is an intimate portrait of life in the Mississippi Delta, where Chinese, African Americans and whites live in a complex world of cotton, labor, and racial conflict. The history of the Chinese com...
Mississippi Triangle (110 minutes) Christine Choy, Worth Long & Allan Siegel Producer: Third World Newsreel 1984, 110 min., Color, US This is an intimate portrait of life in the Mississippi Delta, where Chinese, African Americans and whites live in a complex world of cotton, labor, and racial conflict. The history of the Chinese com...
Monique Yvonne Welbon 1990, 3 min., BW, US Using a childhood experience of racial bigotry at school, this film looks at the ways in which racism is ingrained in American society, even in the play of children. MONIQUE is a compelling exploratio...
Mother of the River Zeinabu Irene Davis 1995, 28 min., BW, US This powerful drama of a young girl's slave experience in the antebellum South is based on the power of the folk tale and the riddle. Dofimae is an independent spirit despite her condition of slavery....
Mother Tongue Patrice Mallard Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop 1994, 7 min., BW, US Inspired by the experience of her great-grandparents, Mallard uses the history of slavery and the nature of language to examine the profound effects of colonization on the psyche of a people....
Nas: Time Is Illmatic One9 & Erik Parker Producer: One9 & Erik Parker 2014, 74 min., Color, US Twenty years after the release of Nas’s groundbreaking debut album ‘Illmatic,’ NAS: TIME IS ILLMATIC takes us into the heart of his creative process. Returning to his childhood home in Queensbridge, N...
The Nation Erupts Black Planet Productions Producer: Deep Dish TV, Black Planet Productions 1992, 60 min., Color, US Focusing on nationwide responses in the wake of the Rodney King verdict. Grassroots producers across the country reflect on the media coverage of the resulting L.A. uprising and its aftermath. Communi...
NCZ Goes to War Black Planet Productions Producer: Black Planet Productions 1992, 30 min., Color, US An examination of the Persian Gulf anti-war movement and its scant coverage in the mainstream media. NCZ went out in the streets and documented the response from activists, demonstrators, journalists ...
No Time to Lose Allan Siegel & Patricia Benoit 1988, 28 min., Color, US Average New Yorkers describe their childhood experiences as "carefree", and "lots of fun and games". But 40% of all Black children and 50% of all Hispanic children in New York City live below the nat...
Ocoee: Legacy of the Election Day Massacre Bianca White & Sandra Krasa 2002, 26 min., Color, US In the early 20th century, Ocoee was home to one of Florida's most prosperous African American communities. On Election Day 1920, Mose Norman and July Perry attempted to vote and the African American ...
Odds and Ends Michelle Parkerson Producer: Michelle Parkerson/American Film Institute 1993, 28 min., Color In the year 2096, Black women warriors wage a vigilant battle against racial and gender annihilation. In this devastated universe, a fable unravels between interplanetary frontlines. Lieutenant Loz Wa...
Older Women and Love Camille Billops & James Hatch 1987, 26 min., Color, US Using interviews and dramatizations, this film achieves a touching and often humorous look at social attitudes towards relationships between older women and younger men. The filmmakers are involved on...
On the Downlow Abigail Child 2006, 54 min., Color, US "On the Downlow" presents an intimate portrait of four men negotiating their bisexual desire within the African-American community of Cleveland, Ohio. These men selfdescribe as "dipping on both sides ...
One People Al Santana Producer: Laura L. Fowler & Al Santana 2007, 30 min., Color, US Is everything political? Against the backdrop of a gentrified Harlem community, the story centers on two sisters who have opposite views about social responsibility and the role of artists. Aliyah, a ...
Our House: Lesbians and Gays in the Hood Black Planet Productions Producer: Black Planet Productions 1993, 28 min., Color, US Up front and in your face interviews with Black gays and lesbians provide an uncompromising look at homophobia, racism, alienation and empowerment for queer African Americans. This riveting documentar...
People Say Mary Beth Black 2005, 5 min., Color, US This insightful video montage embodies the full range of images, sights and emotions which followed in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.. Yet, it also depicts the hope, compassion and commit...
The People United Alonzo Speight 1985, 60 min., Color, US Boston, 1978: It was an intense period of racial conflict over school bussing and escalating incidents of police brutality in the predominantly Black section of Roxbury. In the wake of growing racial ...
Politics from a Black Woman's Insides Yuko Edwards 1997, 26 min., Color, US Follow one woman's search for the Hottentot Venus, the legendary link between ape and human and icon of black female subjectivity. Edwards's film explores the construction of race through both scienti...
Praise House Julie Dash 1991, 30 min., Color, US This video uses stunningly beautiful and innovative techniques to tell the story of a young woman moved to dance by a powerful and creative spirit. Despite her mother's disinterest, Hannah is driven t...
PRIMETIME: Fighting Back Against Foreclosure Jennifer Fasulo & Manauvaskar Kublall Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop 2009, 23 min., Color, US This timely film takes the viewer behind the foreclosure statistics and into the homes and hearts of two NYC women who have been pummeled by the foreclosure tsunami. It breaks down the complex issues...
Race Against Prime Time David Shulman 1985, 60 min., Color, US An award winning documentary about TV news and racial conflict in Miami.
In 1980, Arthur McDuffie, an African American community worker was brutally kicked, beaten and clubbed to death by Miami po...
Railroad Reflecting John Bentham Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop 1992, 9 min., Color, US In this intimate and inventive video, two African men reflect on freedom, slavery and colonization from differing view points. Bentham juxtaposes their stories in a manner evoking African oral history...
Remembering Jason Nashid Fareed Producer: Third World Newsreel Workshop 2000, 24 min., Color, US Dedicated to "those we have lost to needless violence", REMEMBERING JASON portrays the lives of those connected to him. After living what could be termed a normal life--school, sports, music--Jason Th...
Remembering Wei Yi-fang, Remembering Myself. Yvonne Welbon 1995, 30 min., Color, us/China An autobiographical experimental documentary about the artist's experiences as an African-American woman living in Taiwan for six years. Recreations of time and place are presented through memories, h...
Rezoning Harlem: The Battle over Harlem's Future Natasha Florentino & Tamara Gubernat Producer: Natasha Florentino, Tamara Gubernat, Juliana Alzate and Pamela Nichols 2008, 40 min., Color, US Since 2002, more than 100 rezonings have been signed into law in New York City, including the rezoning of 125th Street in Harlem.
REZONING HARLEM follows longtime members of the Harlem community a...
Saints Rising Hailima Yates Producer: Anonamiss Productions, LLC 2008, 45 min., Color, US SAINTS RISING is a documentary presenting the voices of New Orleans years after Hurricane Katrina and the breech of the levees. From children to volunteers, they discuss the troubles that were left be...
Salty Dog Blues Al Santana & Denise B Santiago 2012, 52 min., Color/BW, US SALTY DOG BLUES features a group of men and women of color who served in the United States Merchant Marine from 1937 – 1989. This nine-year project examines their development as a multi-racial and int...
Sapphire and the Slave Girl Leah Gilliam 1995, 17 min., BW, US This film is loosely based on the 1950's British detective film SAPPHIRE, in which two Scotland Yard detectives investigate the murder of a young woman who is passing for white. Referencing everyone f...
Seen, But Not Heard: AIDS and the Untold War Against Black Women Cyrille Phipps 2008, 12 min., Color, US SEEN, BUT NOT HEARD is a short documentary that will explore the historical antecedents, current trends, and emerging activism concerning HIV/AIDS and women of African descent. Through raw and reveal...
Shades Jamika Ajalon 1994, 12 min., Color SHADES explores the issues around dark and light skin in the African American community. Drawing on erotic imagery and the relation between a light skinned woman and a darker skinned Lesbian, this vid...
Shopping Bag Spirits and Freeway Fetishes: Reflections On Ritual Space Barbara McCullough 1980, 60 min., Color, US This video investigates the use of ritual in the work of artists using different media. Here ritual is defined as the creation and utilization of objects, words or tones used in a repetitive or habitu...
Slave Routes: Resistance, Abolition and Creative Progress Jayne Cortez Producer: Manthia Diawara 2009, 100 min., Color, US From the 1400s to the 1800s millions of Africans were forcefully removed from Africa and shipped across the Atlantic to the so-called "New World". In 1808, the passage of the Transantlantic Slave Trad...
Slowly, This Arthur Jafa 1995, 26 min., Color, US When two friends meet in a crowded Manhattan restaurant, the conversation takes an unexpected and intimate turn. Speaking from their experiences as a Japanese American man and an African American man,...
Splash! Thomas Allen Harris 1991, 10 min., Color, US SPLASH is a fable-like tale of memory and emotion. Using a range of techniques, it deftly explores the interplay between identity, fantasy, gender, homosexual desire and pre-adolescence. These forces ...
A String of Pearls Camille Billops & James Hatch 2002, 56 min., Color, US With this film, Camille Billops completes her family's trilogy - three documentaries that cover more than thirty years: "Suzanne Suzanne", shown in the New Director's series at the Museum of Modern Ar...
Suzanne, Suzanne Camille Billops & James Hatch 1982, 30 min., BW, US This poignant documentary profiles a young black woman's struggle to confront the legacy of a physically abusive father and her headlong flight into drug abuse. Suzanne, after years of physical and ps...
Take Your Bags Camille Billops 1998, 11 min., Color, US "My take on slavery: When the Africans boarded the ships bound for America, they carried in their bags all their memories of home. When they arrived in the New World, their bags had been switched, and...
Teach Our Children Christine Choy & Susan Robeson Producer: Third World Newsreel 1972, 35 min., BW, US This film focuses on the historic 1971 Attica prison rebellion in upstate New York. It targets the conditions that caused prisoners to take drastic steps toward securing their basic rights. The film...
This is My House Charlene Gilbert 1995, 6 min., Color, US This experimental short humorously and powerfully explores women's body imagery. A Black woman's body is defined and re-defined in her own voice, exploring the notions of beauty, power, gender, owners...
Three Tours Betty Yu Producer: Betty Yu 2016, 49 min., Color, US "Nicole Goodwin, Ryan Holleran and Ramon Mejia are three U.S. military service members who deployed to Iraq after 9-11 to fight in the “Global War on Terrorism.” Nicole and Ramon served in Iraq during...
The Throwaways Bhawin Suchak & Ira McKinley Producer: Bhawin Suchak & Ira McKinley, Executive Producer: Sam Pollard 2014, 62 min., Color, US THE THROWAWAYS is a personal exploration of the devastating impact of police brutality and mass incarceration on the black community told through the eyes of formerly incarcerated activist Ira McKinle...
Trans Lives Matter! Justice for Islan Nettles Seyi Adebanjo 2013, 7 min., Color, US TRANS LIVES MATTER! JUSTICE FOR ISLAN NETTLES is a powerful and moving document of a community vigil for Islan Nettles, a Transgender Womyn of Color who was beaten to death in front of a New York Poli...
Twelve Disciples of Nelson Mandela Thomas Allen Harris Producer: Thomas Allen Harris 2005, 73 min., Color, US In the wake of his stepfather’s death, Thomas Allen Harris embarks on a journey of reconciliation with the man who raised him as a son but whom he could never call "father." As part of the first wave ...
United Front Against Racism (Newsreel #37) Newsreel 20 min., BW, US A report on the 3-day conference called by the Black Panther Party in Oakland, California, in July 1969. The film emphasizes the nature of developing Fascism in the U.S., covering Imperialism, Capital...
Untold Legacy Leslie K. Brown Producer: Third World Newsreel 2005, 12 min., Color, US In February 2005, the NY City Council considered a bill that would require companies doing business with NY to investigate and reveal any past complicity and profit from the Trans-Atlantic slave trade...
Vintage: Families of Value Thomas Allen Harris 1995, 72 min., Color, US VINTAGE is an experimental documentary which looks at three African American families through the eyes of lesbian and gay siblings--including the filmmaker and his younger brother. Three groups of que...
Voices of the Gods Al Santana Producer: Al Santana 1985, 60 min., Color, US This documentary captures the rich legacy of ancient African religions practiced today in the United States. It provides viewers with rare insight into the practices and beliefs of the Akan and Yoruba...
Voting Rights Now Mary Beth Black 2006, 12 min., Color, US On April 1st, 2006, seven month after Hurricane Katrina devasted the city of New Orleans and weeks before the elections for Mayor of New Orleans, thousands of New Orleans residents marched to protest ...
Water Ritual #1: An Urban Rite of Purification Barbara McCullough 1979, 4 min., BW, US An original and visionary work, this cathartic film links the present with the ancestral past. A graceful young African American woman emerges from the ruins of a crumbling building. She disrobes, and...
Wave: A True Story in Hip Hop Tony Wesley & Brian Bullock Producer: Tony Wesley & Brian Bullock 2016, 46 min., Color, US See how the legendary Tony "Mr. Wave" Wesley went from a kid in the Bronx to an international B-Boy superstar to entrepreneur and activist. This film includes never before seen archival pictures and i...
Whatever It Takes Christopher Wong 2011, 92 min., Color, US WHATEVER IT TAKES chronicles the struggles and triumphs of the very first year of the Bronx Center for Science & Mathematics, an innovative public high school in New York City.
At the Bronx Center ...
The Woman's Film (Newsreel #55) Newsreel Producer: Women's Caucus--San Francisco Newsreel 1971, 40 min., BW, US Produced collectively by women, this documentary is a valuable historical document of the origins of the modern women's movement in the United States. The film delves into the lives of ordinary women ...
The World Saxophone Quartet Barbara McCullough 1980, 5 min., Color, US A glance at an innovative quartet of jazz saxophonists, Hamiet Bluiet, Oliver Lake, Julius Hemphill, and David Murray, both in concert and conversation....
X 1/2: The Legacy of Malcolm X Black Planet Productions Producer: Black Planet Productions 1994, 45 min., Color, US Set within the context of current African American struggles, this video examines the historical and contemporary legacies of Malcolm X. Using mixed media and experimental audio, X & 1/2 explores Blac...
Yari Yari Pamberi: Black Women Writers Dissecting Globalization Jayne Cortez 2007, 75 min., Color, US Globalization, now a buzzword in the West, has been a phenomenon that has shaped the culture and politics of Africa and its diaspora for centuries. YARI YARI PAMBERI brings together women from across ...
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