Black Movies Everyone Should See

  Because Black History Month should be all year round, let's talk about Black films everyone should see. Sure, everyone will have Hidden Figures, Guess Who's Coming To Dinner, In the Heat of the Night, Selma, 12 Years a Slave, Black Panther, Hustle & Flow, Do The Right Thing, Menace II Society, or The Help on their list, but let me give you a few you probably didn't think of. 

Here are my:

5: Jump In!

   When a teen boxer wins a competition that accelerates his dreams of being like his boxer father,  Isadore 'Izzy' has to decide what he wants when he finds joy in being a part of a competitive double Dutch team with his neighbor and crush, Mary Thomas. 

    This movie was amazing when it came out. It has baller actors, Keke Palmer and Corbin Bleu, who are on the pinnacle of entertainment. When this movie came out, it was one of the few black-led DCOMS, and the first to surpass viewership even beating out Corbin Bleu's previous movies, High School Musical and The Cheetah Girls 2 with 8.2 Million viewership. For a DCOM to surpass High School Musical and Cheetah Girls in viewership but not hit the heights of both is amazing to me. I haven't heard anyone talk about this movie, and I think more people especially those who were younger when this movie came out should revisit it. It's a great movie for kids to see, especially those who still do double Dutch outside in the summer.

4: American Fiction

    Based on the book Erasure by Percival Everett, American Fiction follows a black novelist Thelonious 'Monk' Ellison, who writes a black satirical novel to prove a point and have it fail only for it to not only be a best seller but the success props him as a stereotype that white audiences love but he despises.

    Despite winning an Oscar for original screenplay and multiple other accolades, American Fiction hasn't stayed in the conversation of black-led films. I haven't really seen anyone talk about it, and I think it's a shame. Everyone in it was fantastic, and the conversations about whether 'black literature' is still good or even worthy of attention when it portrays misnomers about African Americans in society is something that should be an ongoing conversation. The fact that this won so many awards has to mean that the conversation is needed. If you somehow haven't seen or heard of it, you should check this movie out. It has many comedic moments but enough emotional to make you think.

3: Rustin

  Inspired by the real Bayard Rustin, Netflix's Rustin follows Bayard Rustin (Played magnificently by icon Colman Domingo) a gay civil rights activist as he works alongside Martin Luther King during the civil rights movement but is opposed by other activists who are weary of Rustin's sexual orientation. 

    This movie was sorely needed. I don't even know if half of the country knew who Bayard Rustin was before this movie. I know I didn't, but this movie made me somehow miss a man I've never met and made me angry towards those who were so short-sighted and homophobic towards him. Colman Domingo should have won an award, and though the Best Actor award was super duper tight and could have gone to anyone on that list (Cillian Murphy would win it for Oppenheimer, obviously), I think Colman could have easily won if Oppenheimer had been pushed another year. 

(Sidenote, can I just gush over Colman for a minute? This is the hardest working man I have EVER! noticed! This man did Rustin, The Color Purple, his own movie called Singsing which came out in June while filming The Color Purple! and did other shows and movies and small bits here and there IN THE SAME DAMN YEAR! Give this man an Oscar just for that feat alone! My God!) 

    Anyway, you should see Rustin. It shines a spotlight on a man who paved the way for many and didn't get the flowers he deserved until 65 years later.

2: Akeelah and The Bee

    Speaking of Miss True Jackson, Keke Palmer's other movie that came out one year before Jump In! is another film everyone should see. Akeelah and the Bee follows Akeelah, an 11-year-old girl who (without the support of her mother but with encouragement from her friends and teacher) competes in the Scripps National Spelling Bee. 

    It seemed like this movie was everywhere when I was younger. It definitely put spelling bees on the map as an opportunity for many kids who didn't know it was an option. This movie had a stellar cast. Rising star at the time, Keke Palmer aside, it also featured Academy Award-winning, Angela Bassette and Lawrence Fishburn. This movie though had its moments of perpetrating black stereotypes with certain aspects regarding Akeelah's home life and situation, the rest of the movie does its best to give us more than what most Black-led films were doing at the time. More people should check this movie out. 

1: A Soldier's Story

    A Soldier's Story was based on a true event which was then made into a play called A Soldier's Play, the film A Soldier's Story is set in racially segregated Louisiana and follows a black military officer during World War II who has to solve a mystery when an African American drill sergeant is found dead and has to grapple with what he has found when it turns out that the mystery isn't the only thing wrong within the segregated regiment. 

    My introduction to the movie was actually the play when it toured with Norm Lewis as Captain Davenport who in the movie is played by Howard Rollins Jr. It is an amazing and heartbreaking journey through not only a part of World War II that America never talks about, every single black man who served, but also what they had to put up with when they were sent in parts of the country who'd rather them dead than fight beside other white men. It also has a huge conversation about self-hatred that leaves any heart heavy.

   This movie is amazing, everyone does a fantastic job. If you haven't seen this movie or seen the play yet I very much highly recommend it. 

Have you seen any of these movies? Let me know down below.