In honor of Black History Month,
Time has compiled a list of 25 influential movies starring, about, and/or for African Americans since Paul Robeson made his first silent films in the 1920s. I say “list,” but it’s really an article; Time offers a thoughtful (and at times nicely sarcastic) look at the films and actors in their historical and cinematic context.
As the article points out, in a day when Morgan Freeman plays God and Will Smith
beats George Clooney as a box-office draw, times have improved. Hollywood has come a long way since setting Lena Horne‘s performances as vignettes that could be excised for screenings in all-white communities. (No wonder she gave up on the business.)
So here are a few of the titles (i.e., movies starring women) I found interesting. Some I’ve seen, some I need to.
Imitation of Life (1934) At the heart of this adaptation of a Fannie Hurst novel is the conflict between Delilah (Louise Beavers), a maid and single mother, and her light-skinned daughter Peola (Fredi Washington). Finding she can pass for white, Peola decides to leave her family to live as a white woman, telling her darker-skinned mother, “Even if you pass me on the street, you’ll have to pass me by.” When Delilah dies, presumably of a broken heart, Peola is overcome with guilt.
The moral dilemma of passing to achieve social success but leaving behind one’s family is its own subgenre in literature of that time, and the movie was one of the first films to offer a (somewhat) sympathetic view of a protagonist stuck between family and a whitewashed American dream.
Gone With the Wind (1939) I was a little surprised to see this one on the list, given the subject matter (former slave-owners and the former slaves who love them). But it makes sense that Hattie McDaniel made the list for her role as Mammy, “the movie’s moral center and the stern arbiter of Scarlett’s strategies and whims.”
This sounds familiar. Mammy might have been the prototype for the black BFF who finds her way into stories with largely white casts. McDaniel played this role hundreds of times, but she kept as much a sense of humor as she could, saying, “Hell, I’d rather play a maid than be one.”
Carmen Jones (1954) The film version of Carmen Jones, Oscar Hammerstein’s reimagining of Bizet’s opera with an African American, brought commercial success for the film and stardom to Dorothy Dandridge, who played the title role. She snagged the Academy’s first nomination for a black performer in a leading role.
Sadly, Dandridge didn’t fare much better than her on-screen alter-ego. She wasn’t murdered, exactly, but after being pigeonholed into roles as the sexy temptress in a few other films, her career dead-ended, and she overdosed at age 41.
Lady Sings the Blues (1972) This film appears to have made the list because of its smashing commercial success. If you haven’t seen it, you’ve missed out on some amazing stuff: Diana Ross plays Billie Holiday, the wildly talented but ill-fated blues singer. Ross won an Oscar nod for Best Actress.
Ross’ career itself, of course, was fictionalized in another musical-turned-movie, Dreamgirls, which catapulted Jennifer Hudson from reality show finalist to award winner.
Eve’s Bayou (1997) Writer and director Kasi Lemmons tells a tale of a 10-year-old-girl in a family situation she is too young to understand or control, though that doesn’t stop her from trying to do both. I’m still trying to convince myself that Time wasn’t being condescending by saying, “This is a woman’s film,” but I haven’t seen it yet, so I’m not sure what that means. I’ll have to bump it up in my Netflix queue.
These are most of the films starring women that were mentioned, and looking at them, I’m thinking it’s a tiny list. So what films did Time leave off the list?
