COL: Film and Lecture Series 2023-2024: Black Film Festival 2022

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z02Ie8wKKRg
Synopsis: 12 Years a Slave is a 2013 biographical period-drama film and an adaptation of the 1853 slave memoir Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup, a New York State-born free African-American man who was kidnapped in Washington, D.C., by two con men in 1841 and sold into slavery. Directed by Steve McQueen, the film received the Academy Award for Best Picture, among other accolades.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFZMrd8fElQ
Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Alice Walker, The Color Purple is an epic tale spanning 40 years in the life of Celie, an African-American woman living in the South who survives incredible abuse and bigotry. After Celie's abusive father marries her off to the equally debasing "Mister" Albert Johnson, things go from bad to worse, leaving Celie to find companionship anywhere she can. She perseveres, holding on to her dream of one day being reunited with her sister in Africa. The critically acclaimed 1985 adaptation was directed by Steven Spielberg.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVAD4fYRcvA
Synopsis: Do the Right Thing is a 1989 American comedy-drama film produced, written, and directed by Spike Lee. It stars Lee, Danny Aiello, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Richard Edson, Giancarlo Esposito, Bill Nunn, John Turturro, and Samuel L. Jackson, and is the feature film debut of Martin Lawrence and Rosie Perez. The story explores a Brooklyn neighborhood's simmering racial tension, which culminates in tragedy and violence on a hot summer day.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4m3t3G3Zqc
Synopsis: If Beale Street Could Talk is a 2018 American romantic drama film written and directed by Barry Jenkins and based on James Baldwin's 1974 novel of the same name. The film follows a young woman who, with her family's support, seeks to clear the name of her wrongly charged lover and prove his innocence before the birth of their child. Nominated for and awarded numerous accolades, when film was chosen by both the National Board of Review and the American Film Institute as one of the Top 10 Films of 2018.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8sUwXTWb4M
Synopsis: Author Toni Morrison leads an assembly of her peers, critics and colleagues on an exploration of race, history, America and the human condition. The 2019 documentary was directed by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HALfME0wjeU
Synopsis: 42 is a 2013 American biographical sports film about baseball player Jackie Robinson, the first Black athlete to play in Major League Baseball (MLB) during the modern era. 42 was written and directed by Brian Helgeland.

Trailer : https://youtu.be/3MM8OkVT0hw
Synopsis : Starr Carter navigates the perilous waters between her poor, black neighborhood and her prestigious, mainly white private school. This all changes when she finds herself in the middle of racial activism after her best friend is shot by police officers, and she's forced to make a decision. Allow the media to skewer her friend to protect the status quo, or stand up and tell the truth in memory of Khalil?

Trailer: https://youtu.be/uVN4aVYA2eA
Synopsis: STEP documents the senior year of a girls' high-school step dance team against the background of inner-city Baltimore. As each one tries to become the first in their families to attend college, the girls strive to make their dancing a success against the backdrop of social unrest in the troubled city.

Trailer: https://youtu.be/sohT0HTgP84
Synopsis: At an all-black army camp, civilian parachute maker and "hot bundle" Carmen Jones is desired by many of the men. Naturally, she wants Joe, who's engaged to sweet Cindy Lou and about to go into pilot training for the Korean War. Going after him, she succeeds only in getting him into the stockade. While she awaits his release, trouble approaches for both of them. Songs from the Bizet opera with modernized lyrics.

Trailer: https://youtu.be/KzZkVGCY5rY
Synposis: Esteemed African-American fashion editor André Leon Talley's life and ascent in the fashion world is chronicled through interviews and archival footage. This documentary traces his career from his youth in the segregated South to his work at W and Vogue to his enduring influence today. Featuring interviews with fashion icons such as Anna Wintour, Marc Jacobs and Diane von Furstenberg.

Trailer: https://youtu.be/1m-4qxz08So
Synopsis: Comedian Chris Rock examines the role of hair in the African-American community and its far-reaching effect on cultural identity. Also: a look at the highly competitive world of black stylists.

Trailer: https://youtu.be/xjDjIWPwcPU
Synopsis: A superhero known as Black Panther defends Wakanda, a technologically advanced country in Africa that has hidden itself away from the rest of the world. Now, he must face a dissident who wants to sell the country's natural resources to fund an uprising.

Trailer: https://youtu.be/jFWHNpfjByQ
Synopsis: This documentary presents archival footage of notable civil-rights activists like Angela Davis, Eldridge Cleaver and Stokely Carmichael, as well as recent interviews with artists and historians on the Black Power movement.

Trailer: https://youtu.be/JMsnRzJdhew
Synopsis: A black family living in a cramped Chicago tenement in the 1940s have the opportunity to improve their social standing via an insurance-policy check, but are in disagreement about how best to spend the windfall. Lorraine Hansberry adapted the script from her hit Broadway play.

Synopsis: Dancing great Bill 'Williamson' sees his face on the cover of Theatre World magazine and reminisces: just back from World War I, he meets lovely singer Selina Rogers at a soldiers' ball and promises to come back to her when he "gets to be somebody." Years go by, and Bill and Selina's rising careers intersect only briefly, since Selina is unwilling to "settle down." Will she ever change her mind? Concludes with a big all-star show hosted by Cab Calloway.

Synposis: Nat Turner’s slave rebellion is a watershed event in America’s long and troubled history of slavery and racial conflict. This program deftly weaves academic commentary with dramatizations to examine that violent confrontation and the multiple, conflicting ways its story has been told. The earliest source of Turner imagery, The Confessions of Nat Turner, was based on jail cell interviews by a white lawyer and was the first to raise the question that continued to be asked for the next two centuries: Was Nat Turner a brilliant religious leader or a deluded fanatic leading slaves to their doom? With Henry Louis Gates Jr., Vincent Harding, Alvin Poussaint, Ossie Davis, and others. Some content may be objectionable. (60 minutes)