BostonPL_Films for Black History Month: Educate and EntertainLike this list

17 items

• Blackkklansman

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  From legendary director Spike Lee and based on a true story, BLACKKKLANSMAN portrays how an African-American police officer from Colorado successfully managed to infiltrate the local Ku Klux Klan and became the head of the local chapter.

• I Am Not Your Negro

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  In 1979, James Baldwin wrote a letter to his literary agent describing his next project, Remember This House. Now, in his incendiary new documentary, master filmmaker Raoul Peck envisions the book James Baldwin never finished.

• Night Catches Us

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  In 1976, complex political and emotional forces are set in motion when a young man returns to the race-torn Philadelphia neighborhood where he came of age during the Black Power movement.

• Whose Streets?

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  Told by the activists and leaders who live and breathe this movement for justice, WHOSE STREETS? is an unflinching look at the Ferguson uprising. Filmmakers Sabaah Folayan and Damon Davis know this story because they are the story.

• Rafiki

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  Despite a political rivalry between their families, Kena and Ziki resist and remain close friends. When love blossoms between them, the two girls will be forced to choose between happiness and safety.

• Daughters of the Dust

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  At the dawn of the 20th century, a multi-generational family in the Gullah community on the Sea Islands off of South Carolina struggle to maintain their cultural heritage and folklore while contemplating a migration to the mainland.

• 12 Years a Slave

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  Steve McQueen's 12 YEARS A SLAVE, based on the true story of Solomon Northup, is both an unflinching account of slavery in American history and a celebration of the indomitable power of hope.

• Within Our Gates

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  In this early silent film from pioneering director Oscar Micheaux, kindly Sylvia Landry (Evelyn Preer) takes a fundraising trip to Boston in hopes of raising money to keep a Southern school for impoverished black children open to the public.

• Moonlight

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  A look at three defining chapters in the life of Chiron, a young black man growing up in Miami. His epic journey to manhood is guided by the kindness, support and love of the community that helps raise him.

• John Lewis

  Good Trouble

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  Using interviews and rare archival footage, this documentary chronicles Lewis's 60-plus years of social activism and legislative action on civil rights, voting rights, gun control, health care reform, and immigration.

• Hidden Figures

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  As the United States raced against Russia to put a man in space, NASA found untapped talent in a group of African-American female mathematicians that served as the brains behind one of the greatest operations in U.S. history.

• The Watermelon Woman

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  Cheryl Dunye's directorial debut, which she also wrote, stars Dunye as a twenty-something black lesbian working as a clerk in a video store while struggling to make a documentary about Fae Richards, an obscure black actress from the 1930's.

• I Am Somebody

  Three Films by Madeline Anderson

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  Three short films by groundbreaking filmmaker Madeline Anderson, the first African American woman to direct a documentary film: I Am Somebody (1970), Integration Report I (1960), and A Tribute to Malcolm X (1967).

• Eve's Bayou

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  A young girl learns some difficult lessons about truth, love, and fidelity in this critically-acclaimed Southern gothic drama starring Samuel L. Jackson and a young Jurnee Smollett.

• Belle

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  Although Dido Elizabeth Belle, an eighteenth century English woman of mixed race, is raised in privilege by her aristocratic great-uncle and his wife, she is denied full entry into their world because of her skin color.

• Tongues Untied

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  Marlon Riggs' essay film TONGUES UNTIED gives voice to communities of black gay men, presenting their cultures and perspectives on the world as they confront racism, homophobia, and marginalization.

• Love & Basketball

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  A young African-American couple navigates the tricky paths of romance and athletics in this drama, the first feature film from writer/director Gina Prince-Bythewood.