Release Date: 2/24/17; In Theaters Genre: Horror Rating: Unknown Running Time:Unknown Director: Jordan Peele Studio: Blumhouse Productions, QC Entertainment. Cast: Daniel Kaluuya (Chris), Allison Williams (Rose), Keith Stanfield, Bradley Whitford (Dean), Caleb Landry Jones, Catherine Keener (Missy), Betty Gabriel (Georgina), Marcus Henderson (Walter).
Story: When a young African American man visits his white girlfriend’s family estate, he becomes ensnared in a more sinister real reason for the invitation. Now that Chris (Daniel Kaluuya) and his girlfriend, Rose (Allison Williams), have reached the meet-the-parents milestone of dating, she invites him for a weekend getaway upstate with Missy (Catherine Keener) and Dean (Bradley Whitford). At first, Chris reads the family’s overly accommodating behavior as nervous attempts to deal with their daughter’s interracial relationship, but as the weekend progresses, a series of increasingly disturbing discoveries lead him to a truth that he could have never imagined. Source: Shadow & Act, IMDB.
Release Date: 10/16/16; Tallgrass Film Festival Genre:Drama Rating:NR Running Time: 92 mins. Director(s): Aaron Greer, Seth Panitch. Studio(s): Gettin’ Grown Productions, University of Alabama. Cast: Morgan Auld (Eli), Christopher Livingston (Michael), Lamman Rucker (Dr. Johnson), Keith David (Dean Holmes), Sydney Morton (Melanie), Nathan James
(ER Doctor).
Story:In 1967, both Eli Rosenberg and Michael Dubois have a problem. For Eli, only one medical school in the country will accept him: Meharry Medical College, an all-black medical school in Tennessee, a considerable distance from his life in Brooklyn, New York. For Michael, only one medical school in the country will do for him: Meharry Medical College, his successful father’s alma mater, and therefore his, whether he likes it or not.
Both Eli and Michael are outsiders from radically different backgrounds forced to work together inside the pressure cooker of medical school in the turbulent 1960s. At odds from the very moment they meet, Eli and Michael not only clash with each other, they battle the indecipherable mysteries of medicine, two warring professors, and a student body warily distrustful of both of them. Ultimately, it is upon the anvil of riot and revolution on the day of Dr. King’s assassination, that each must answer the question that has haunted them from the beginning: is a physician, a healer, in service of self, or is their true calling “Service to Man?”
Inspired by a true story.Source(s): servicetoman.com, official site; IMDB.
Release Date: 2/25/17; TV One Genre:Drama Running Time: Unknown Director: Craig Ross, Jr. Studio: TV One
Cast: Penny Johnson Jerald (Jackie Jones), Brian White (Michael Jones), Gary Dourdan (Jabbar Randolph), Stephen Bishop (Will Randolph), Chrystee Pharris (Crystal Jones), Blue Kimble (Anthony Jones), Pooch Hall (Clay), Denise Boutte.
Story: Media is a backdoor pilot to a potential series that will explore the drama and secrets behind a powerful family dynasty. The TV movieis described as a riveting story of a wealthy family battling the competitive challenges of keeping their status and position in the communications industry. Passion, intrigue and murder become a lethal recipe for powerful matriarch Jackie Jones and her children. Jackie is the founder of Jones Universal Media Properties, aka JUMP, the world’s premier urban media conglomerate. A family tragedy forces her son, prominent lead city attorney and prosecutor Michael Jones, to abandon his political aspirations and take over the company just as a ruthless rival challenges JUMP’s longtime domination of a lucrative industry. Michael is confronted by sins of the past, and the dangers of the present when Jabbar Randolph, CEO of JUMP’s biggest competitor, is released from prison. Grabbing back the reigns from his brother, Will, Jabbar embarks on a mission of revenge, betrayal and corporate intrigue. Source: Deadline, Shadow and Act.
Release Date: 12/25/16 (In Theaters) Genre:Drama Rating: Unknown Running Time:139 mins. Director: Denzel Washington Studio: Bron Studios, MACRO, Paramount Pictures, Scott Rudin Productions
Cast: Denzel Washington (Troy), Viola Davis (Rose), Mykelti Williamson (Gabriel), Russell Hornsby (Grimm), Stephen Henderson (Bono), Saniyya Sidney (Raynell) Jovan Adepo (Cory).
Story: In Fences, Denzel Washington returns to the director’s chair for the fourth time in his career. It’s based on a play by August Wilson that won a Pulitzer Prize and multiple Tony Awards, revolving around a sanitation worker in Pittsburgh who is haunted by his dream as a young man to become a professional baseball player, at a time before the major leagues were integrated. Washington starred with Viola Davis in a Broadway revival of the play in 2010, which won Tony Awards for both of them. The two are reprising their roles as Troy and Rose in the movie.Joining Washington and Davis in front of the camera are: Mykelti Williamson, Russell Hornsby, Jovan Adepo and Saniyya Sidne.
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Details:Back in 1987, Wilson’s play was set up at Paramount as a potential vehicle for Eddie Murphy, who was looking for a serious role. He had his eye on a part as the older son of Troy Maxson, currently played by Washington in both a stage version of the play and the movie. By December 1988, the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, now extinct, had Murphy rewriting his own character, which, according to the paper, he thought “came off too wimpy in the play.” Eventually, he left the writing to Wilson, but the project became tangled in the playwright’s insistence that Fences, which deals with racial barriers and intricate family relations, should have a black director. “Until the industry is ready to hire a black to direct De Niro or Redford, blacks should at least be able to direct their own experience,” he said in January 1990, at a conference sponsored by the California Afro-American Museum. “White directors are not qualified for the job. The job requires someone who shares the specifics of the culture of black Americans,” Wilson added.
Actually, Paramount was trying to accommodate. A black executive worked on the film and by 1992 Paramount was in talks with John Singleton, who was then riding high on his success with Boyz N The Hood. Ultimately, Singleton bowed out, as did Murphy. Produce Scott Rudin appears to have gotten involved in about 1997, when he was still a powerhouse producer at Paramount. Eventually, Rudin sent Wilson’s script to Washington, as a potential director. Washington, according to people who have tracked the project through the years, said yes; but he wanted to revive it first on Broadway, which he did. Wilson died in 2005, but his one-man campaign for a black-directed film became something of a movement.
Fences which opens nationwide on Christmas Day, is beginning to look like a serious rival to Nate Parker’s The Birth Of A Nation along with Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight and perhaps others to carry the torch for black cinema. Sources: Shadow and Act; Movies.com; Deadline.
Story:A comedy about a dysfunctional family of women who have happily sent all the men in their lives running and a daughter who’s desperate to break the tradition. To say that twenty-something writer Jean is at a crossroads would be putting it kindly — she really doesn’t know which way she’s headed. A vista of unenticing career prospects opens before her, and her latest relationship has just unceremoniously ended. Chronically self-analyzing, she often hangs out with her two aunts, mother, and grandmother Daphne. The women constantly bicker and judge each other’s life choices, a routine that’s interrupted when the estranged patriarch of the family literally dies on their doorstep. Ray, the paramedic who takes their 911 call, falls fast for the acerbic Jean. The feeling is more or less mutual, but their potential romance will have to take a back seat to the chaos leading up to the funeral. In a series of sometimes harsh, always-spirited discussions — fueled by a complex family history, a few drinks, and the occasional toke — the women will do their best to figure themselves out, and to understand each other. Source: Tribeca Film Institute; Tiff.net.
Release Date: 10/15/16; Lifetime Genre:Drama/Biography Rating: NR Director: Janice Cooke Studio(s): Sony Pictures Television and Thinkfactory Media. Cast: Rhyon Nicole Brown (Michel’le), Curtis Hamilton (Dre), Jamie Kennedy (Jerry Heller), R. Marcos Taylor (Suge Knight).
Story: The blockbuster film Straight Outta Compton mesmerized music fans with its vivid look behind the scenes of the pioneering hip hop collective N.W.A. Now get ready to hear a shocking new side of their story. Surviving Compton: Dre, Suge & Michel’le, tells the tale of Michel’le Toussaint, who rose to fame in the early days of rap as the so-called “First Lady of Ruthless Records.” Surrounded by industry titans like Eazy-Z, Tupac Shakur, and obviously Suge Knight and Dr. Dre, she achieved major chart success – only to have it tarnished by betrayal and corrupt business dealings. Her romantic relationship with Dre lasted for nearly a decade, during which time she veered further into a world ruled by substance abuse and crime. A blossoming affair with Knight, Dre’s friend and business partner, would offer temporary salvation, but ultimately complicate all of their lives. Source(s): People; Billboard.
Release Date: 2/24/17; In Theaters
Black Cinema Connection 