Anti-Racism: Films

American Son

It's 3am on a rainy night in South Florida, and mother Kendra Ellis-Connor (Kerry Washington) paces anxiously in a police station waiting room as she tries to piece together what may have happened to her missing son. Faced with a series of infuriating unanswered questions, she navigates a system of unconscious bias, interweaving perspectives, and a tense marital dynamic with her ex-husband (Steven Pasquale) as they try to uncover the truth about their son's whereabouts. Based on the acclaimed Broadway play, and also featuring reprised roles by Jeremy Jordan and Eugene Lee, AMERICAN SON is an emotional depiction of modern day race dynamics and systemic tensions.

Blindpotting

Bursting with energy, style, and humor, and infused with the spirit of rap, hip hop, and spoken word, Blindspotting, boldly directed by Carlos López Estrada in his feature film debut, is a provocative hometown love letter that glistens with humanity.
Watch on Netflix

Though he once spent time in San Quentin, 22-year-old black man Oscar Grant (Michael B. Jordan) is now trying hard to live a clean life and support his girlfriend (Melonie Diaz) and young daughter (Ariana Neal). Flashbacks reveal the last day in Oscar's life, in which he accompanied his family and friends to San Francisco to watch fireworks on New Year's Eve, and, on the way back home, became swept up in an altercation with police that ended in tragedy. Based on a true story.
Watch on Netflix

I am not your negro

Master filmmaker Raoul Peck envisions the book James Baldwin never finished, Remember This House. The result is a radical, up-to-the-minute examination of race in America, using Baldwin’s original words and flood of rich archival material. I Am Not Your Negro is a journey into black history that connects the past of the Civil Rights movement to the present of #BlackLivesMatter. It is a film that questions black representation in Hollywood and beyond. And, ultimately, by confronting the deeper connections between the lives and assassination of Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr., Baldwin and Peck have produced a work that challenges the very definition of what America stands for.
Watch on Amazon Prime

See you yesterday

High school best friends and science prodigies C.J. and Sebastian spend every spare minute working on their latest homemade invention: backpacks that enable time travel. But when C.J.’s older brother Calvin dies after an encounter with police officers, the young duo decide to put their unfinished tech to use in a desperate bid to save Calvin. From director Stefon Bristol and producer Spike Lee comes See You Yesterday, a sci-fi adventure grounded in familial love, cultural divides and the universal urge to change the wrongs of the past.
Watch on Netflix

Selma

Produced by Oprah Winfrey, Brad Pitt’s company Plan B (12 Years A Slave ) and Christian Colson (Slumdog Millionaire ), the acclaimed film Selma tells the gripping and moving true story of the pivotal moment in Dr Martin Luther King Jr’s epic civil rights struggle - the 1965 protest march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama to secure voting rights for African-Americans.
Watch on Amazon Prime