Concrete Cowboy

Release Date:  4/2/21; Netflix (Original Release – 9/13/20)
Genre:  Drama/Based On A True Story
Rating:  R
Director:  Ricky Staub
Studio(s):  Green Door Pictures, Lee Daniels Entertainment, Neighborhood Film Co., Tucker Tooley Entertainment; Netflix
Running Time:  111 mins.

Cast:  Idris Elba (Harp), Caleb McLaughlin (Cole), Jharrel Jerome (Smush), Lorraine Toussaint (Nessie), Byron Bowers (Rome), Method Man (Leroy).

Story:  In this drama inspired by the real-life Fletcher Street Stables, 15-year-old Cole is taken to live with his estranged father Harp in North Philadelphia. There he discovers the city’s vibrant urban cowboy subculture, which has existed for more than 100 years providing a safe haven for the neighborhood despite the surrounding poverty, violence, and encroachment of gentrification.  Source:  IMDB; Shadow and Act.

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Fast Color

Release Date:  3/29/19; In Theaters
Genre:  Drama/Sci-Fi
Rating:  PG-13
Director:  Julia Hart
Studio(s):   LD Entertainment, Original Headquarters, Codeblack Films
Running Time:  100 mins.
Cast:  Gugu Mbatha-Raw (Ruth), Saniyya Sidney (Lila), David Strathairn (Ellis), Lorraine Toussaint (Bo), Christopher Denham (Bill)

Story:   Fast Color stars Mbatha-Raw as a woman who comes into her own after discovering she has superhuman abilities. When her powers are discovered, the woman is forced to abandon her family in order to protect them. Years later, her mission to remain unseen brings her back home.  Source:  Indiewire.

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Sprinter

Release Date:  6/13/18 – 6/17/18; American Black Film Festival
Genre:  Drama
Rating:  NR
Director:  Storm Saulter
Studio(s):   Mental Telepathy Pictures, MBG Entertainment, Flipped Out Entertainment, Overbrook Entertainment.
Running time:  112 mins.
Cast:  Dale Elliott (Akeem Sharp), David Alan Grier (Coach Miller), Lorraine Toussaint (Donna), Bryshere Y. Gray (Marcus Brick).

Story:   A Jamaican teen, burdened by an unstable father and an unruly older brother, hopes a meteoric rise in track-and-field can reunite him with his mother, who has lived illegally in the U.S. for over a decade.  Produced by: Will Smith, Jada Pinkett Smith, Richard Jefferson.  Source:  ABFF official site.

Coco

Azealia BanksRelease Date:  3/11/16 (In Theaters; Limited)
Genre:   Drama
Rating: NR
Running Time:  Unknown
Studio(s):  Codeblack Films, Lionsgate, Spoken Productions.
Director:  RZA

Cast:  Common (Coltrane), Azealia Banks (Coco), John David Washington (Mahlik), Hana Mae Lee (Julie), Lorraine Toussaint (Nichelle), Jill Scott (Professor Dixon).

Story:  Coco (Azealia Banks) dreams of pursuing a hip-hop career, but is persuaded by her parents to finish college. In a poetry class, she is transfixed by “the power of the spoken word,” developing a verbal strength that ends up propelling her toward her rap goals.

The Hollywood Reporter notes that Scott will play a “a professor who believes that rapping and slam poetry cannot co-exist;” Toussaint will reportedly play Coco’s mother, and Common will appear as a “mentor figure.”

Source:  Rolling Stone; Photo Source:  Billboard/Christie Goodwin/Redferns via Getty Images.

Runaway Island

a/k/a Island in the Sun

Runaway Island Still

Release Date 6/12/15 (American Black Film Festival); 7/25/15 (TV One)
Genre:  Drama
Rating:  NR
Running Time:  85 mins.
Studio(s):  G.R. Entertainment Group, Island in the Sun, TV One.
Director:  Dianne Houston

Cast:  Lorraine Toussaint (Naomi Holloway), Erica Tazel (Vonda Hines), Aisha Hinds (Lara Cook-Nordholm), Leon Thomas III (Evan Holloway), Tom Wright (Raymond Tepper), Melanie Liburd (Kira Geoffries), Thomas Q. Jones (Raphael Burrows), A. Russell Andrews (Reverend Clinton Hines).

Story:  Runaway Island introduces us to a secluded 1700s Gullah Sea Island resort run by an interracial couple. Through their holistic lifestyle, visitors of the island are confronted with the notion to examine their relationships and insecurities, and are challenged to rebuild their love for one another. Among the island guests are the couple’s “wiser-than-her-years” teen daughter, the island care taker, a newly widowed affluent Capitol Hill grandmother and her wayward grandson, a successful pastor and his wife who recently lost their daughter to leukemia, and a media socialite whose engagement to an NFL star poses threat to her cultivated bad girl image.   Source(s): Datzhott; IMDB. Photo Source:  Blackfilm.

Middle of Nowhere

Middle of NowhereRelease Date:  1/13/15 (DVD, Digital HD, On Demand); 10/12/12 (Theatrical Release, limited)
Genre:  Drama
Rating:  R
Running Time:  97 mins.
Studio:  Forward Movement,  Lionsgate Home Entertainment and Code Black Films
Director:  Ava DuVernay
Cast:  Emayatzy Corinealdi ((Ruby) Omari Hardwick (Derek), Edwina Findley (Rosie), Lorraine Toussaint (Ruth), David Oyelowo (Brian), Sharon Lawrence (Fraine), Maya Gilbert (Gina).

Story:  As Ruby rides a bus through the inner city streets, she wills herself to push away memories that crowd her. Four years earlier, she was a vibrant medical student married to the love of her life, Derek. Now, she makes her way to the maximum security prison on the outskirts of town. This is where her love now resides. Behind coiled razor wire and forty foot concrete walls. As the couple stares into the hallow end of an eight-year prison sentence, Ruby must learn to live another life, one marked by shame and separation.

But through a chance encounter with hard-working bus driver Brian and a stunning betrayal that shakes her to the core, she is soon propelled in new and often frightening directions of self-discovery. As we chronicle her turbulent yet transformative journey, we witness the emergence of a broken woman made whole. Source(s): middlenowhere.com, official site; IMDB.

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