African American Movie Reviews Samples For Students

12 Years a Slave

The concepts of freedom and democracy in America have developed significantly since the colonial periods. The foundation of these concepts lay in the enlightenment period when the colonists sought independence from the Crown. However, soon after the enlightenment period and independence only white people benefited in terms of freedom and independence. African American citizens continued to live with limited freedom and did not enjoy the benefits of democracy such as voting. Although America was independent, the thought of freedom and majority rule did not mean much to African Americans who were subjected to serve their ...

Introduction

The politics of racial representation has always manifested itself in most of the films or shows present in the media scene. According to social scientists, there exist different forms of racism. This includes racism defined in the context of modernism and the traditional racism of segregation. In the traditional perspective, the black Americans were always portrayed to be non-civilized, they only belonged to the fields and the offices were meant for the whites in the United States of America. In addition, it is evident that most of the films have portrayed the black Americans as violent in most episodes. ...

Critical review of the movie “The Help”

Synopsis of the movie
The Help is a 2011 motion picture directed by Taylor Tate and based on Kathryn Stockett’s bestseller under the same title. The movie’s setting is Jackson, Mississippi which was one of the most violent and dangerous towns for African Americans and consequently vehemently resisted the civil rights movement. The movie is based on the untold lives of African American women in their service to their Caucasian counterparts. The movie’s main characters are Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan and Aibileen Clark. Skeeter is an idealistic young lady who has just returned to her home from ...

The Land where the Blues Began is a collection of music clips showing the origin of the Delta Blues style of music. It features performers such as Lonnie Pitchford, Napoleon Strickland and Jack Owens (folkstreams.net). The main topics covered in this video depict the socio-economic lives of the people in native environments where traditional blues used to be favourite music to many folks in the countryside. The song covers the religion of the people through recordings of revival meetings, crime as shown through clips of prison chain gangs. Moreover, the love of music of the people in the Mississippi Delta ...

Prejudice and discrimination

Summary of the movie
A very rich and powerful man known as Philip Colbert who comes from Chicago and who had plans to construct a factory in a rural southern town called Sparta in Mississippi was found murdered. The regional police boss Chief Bill is under pressurre to investigate the murder of Philip quickly. A well-dressed African-American northerner named Virgil Tibbs, who was waiting for a train in a deserted station, is picked up by a police officer who is a racist. Virgil is found with a lot of money in his pocket. After being arrested, he is brought ...

Let Freedom Sing: How Music Inspired the Civil Rights Movement directed by Jon Goodman in 2009 is a DVD documentary film explaining the part music played during the Civil Rights Movement and its impact on society, development and enforcement of civil rights and freedoms. The story is narrated by the infamous award-winning actor Louis Gossett Jr. discussing the influence of music with a great variety of splendid civil rights activists, freedom riders and artists, who have made their contribution to raising and spreading the issue of inequality and racism in regards to the African Americans and fighting for the recognition of ...

Movie Review: “A tribute to Alvin Ailey with the American Theatre”

Alvin Ailey lived between 1931 and 1989 and in the 58 year, he lived left a legacy in the dance theatre industry. Ailey had a passion in theatre and dancing which led him to pursue choreography as a profession. His passions led him to establish the American Dance Theatre, which he named after himself. Today dancers pay patronage to Ailey`s activism in revolutionizing and popularizing modern African-American dance. Other dancers refer to Ailey as the cultural ambassador from America (DeFrantz, 2004). Apart from dancing, Ailey also served as an activist for the participation of African Americans in the dance concerts that ...

Birth of a Nation

Birth of a Nation is a film directed by D. W. Griffith. It is said as a masterpiece of a well researched work of art. Many reviewers assert that the film has contributed a lot to native beauty and narrative form. It attracted an equal number of critics because it was viewed as bias and having great elements of racism. The movie stars before the onset of the civil war. It brings to the viewer’s attention the beginning of slavery. The events in the movie take a form of a story where two families are brought in light. These families are from different races and ...

The Trials of the Scottsboro Boys

The world is filled with webs that are so big, one has to struggle really hard to get out of them. Others may not get out from such massive, detailed and meticulous webs. Some may get out but not have the strength to make it to the other side. Many could say that one of their biggest fears is to be accused of a crime that they did not commit. In the true story of the Scottsboro Boys, these young African American men were living a worst fear and fighting for their lives. The trials of the Scottsboro boys ...

Gender trends and perception differ from one region to another and from generation to generation. The definition of roles and societal expectations for women has changed over time. A good way to determine this is to examine the lives of women in earlier generations, in comparison to modern women. I interviewed Angela Baker, a sixty-year-old woman from Odessa Texas and realized that the gender perceptions from previous generations are different from contemporary issues in many aspects.
Angela grew up in Mississippi, in a conservative African American family. They did not have much, and life took a struggle to get ...

William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe is a documentary that follows the life of a radical-leftist attorney. However, the captivating and incendiary film is also based on the tragic form of liberal guilt. The movie revolves around the numerous cases that Kunstler was involved with until his demise. The film depicts William Kunstler as the passionate defender of the American people’s civil rights, earning him the reputation through defending a majority of the controversial defendants during the 20th Century. In Kunstler’s profession, he defended the American Indian Movement, Chicago 8, the Attica Prison rioters, the Freedom Riders, and ...

A call to conscience is a documentary that was made of all of Martin Luther King’s speeches. The director also talks with people who had been to those speeches. Interviews were also given to people who had interacted with MLK and their thoughts on the topics discussed. Speeches of his were discussed and many areas of concern were also represented. His speeches gave an insight into what was wrong with the country and how it affected the African American people in that time. They deserved to have a life and have rights to obtain a future in America.
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Complete Name of Professor

Film Response for ‘Do the Right Thing’
The United States of America has a long dark history of racism, discrimination and subsequent terrorism emerging within the different ethnic groups. Several books and movies are written in the past highlighting the racial oppression, loss of human values, and anguish and suffering of victims through vivid, realistic, harsh and dreadful picturization and description. Writer, director and actor Spike Lee’s 1989 film ‘Do the Right Thing’ based on the similar theme recounts the events taking place within a day in the lives of the people belonging to the working class of Brooklyn ...

Complete Name of Professor

The Express: There’s So Much More than Just a Football Game
The face of American sports would not be what it is today if it weren’t for the huge contributions of many real sports’ heroes. In true American tradition many movies are made to honor these heroes lives and acheivemeents. The Express is a movie based upon the true story of Ernie Davis. The movie depicts Ernie Davis’ extraordinary life as a gifted African-American athlete and a reknown football hero. Ernie Davis was portrayed by Rob Brown in the film. Ernie Davis was the first African-American to win the Heisman ...

1. Rabbit Proof Fence, is a true story of three girls, Molly (14 years old), Daisy (8 years old), and their cousin Gracie (10 years old) from Jigalong, a place nearby the Rabbit Proof Fence, is set in the early 1930’s. The movie portrays the condition of aborigine (half-caste) children where they are snatched forcibly from their families against their wish to work for the white families that assured them a prosperous life. Mr.Neville is the responsible person to find and transport these half-castes to the camps to get rid of the future of Aborigines. As per the federal law, he ...

"42" Jackie Robinson

Brief overview of the film's storyline
“42” is a biographical American sports film released in 2013. It was directed by Brian Helgeland and it dwells on the racial integration in the professional baseball teams of America. The film captures the 1947 Brooklyn Dodgers season and tells the story of Jackie Robinson, a baseball player who wore jersey number 42 (giving the film its ultimate name). The major character in the film under the guidance of the team executive became the first African American to break the color barrier that existed in the American baseball teams. The film records the battle ...

Introduction

Dr. West who was born on June 1953 in Tulsa Oklahoma spent his life in Sacramento in California. He went to John F. Kennedy High school. He attended Harvard University where he graduated with his undergraduate degree in bachelor of education in 1973.He later received his PhD at Princeton University in 1980.He became the first African American to receive PhD from the same university. He initially thought at Princeton University as a professor before he moved to Union Theological Seminary in New York .He thought African American Studies while he was still in Princeton University. After going to Union Seminary, ...

- Paris Is Burning is about the performance of gender. How is it about race? (3)
The movie is also about racism, where the story’s protagonists are portrayed to be segregated based on their racial background by the fact of being African American and Latino. It also portrays gay and transgender communities to be prevalent in the two racial groups.
- Paris Is Burning is about the performance of gender. How is it about class? (3)
It portrays a cliché of African American and Latin transgender and gay community from a poor economic background and social class. ...

The “Lincoln” movie written by Tony Kushner and directed by Steven Spielber, starring being Daniel Day-Lewis. The film covers Abraham Lincoln’s life for the term of four months before meeting his end. It captures the president’s efforts in getting the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution which successfully passed by the United States House of Representatives. The purpose of the 13th amendment was to lead to end slavery in the United States. President Lincoln was not an equal rights advocate, but since he was a thoughtful and an intelligent man, he continued to insist on the abolishment ...

Finding Forrester, Gus Van Sant's 2000 follow-up to his critically acclaimed film Good Will Hunting, follows a young black youth named Jamal (Rob Brown) whose entrance into a well-respected private high school coincides with his befriending of an eccentric, reclusive Salinger-like fiction writer (Sean Connery), who teaches him to cultivate his writing skills. The film centers around this mentor-mentee relationship, as Forrester befriends someone for the first time in decades, while Jamal finds someone who believes in the things he is actually passionate about. Finding Forrester is a sentimental, treacly yet fairly effective movie that touches on ideas of anti-intellectualism, racism, inner-city ...

The complete N Word movie explores the etymology of the word "nigger," and provides the observer a look at the African American culture in the earlier and modern times. The N word was considered as an expression of hate, and designed to be derogatory. The term nigger can be traced back to 17th century and etymologies believe that the word is used to refer to the black people as said by Dr. Randall Kennedy. The term was generally recognized as offensive and potentially illegal along with the other explicitly offensive words. It was also known as Neger or Niggor. Nigger ...

The lecture is about family values and culture in the successful adjustments of ethnic minority adolescents. The speaker at the lecture was Dr. Ana Marl Cauce, the Executive vice Provost and Professor of Psychology in University of Washington. During this fascinating lecture, I was able to grasp the following.

The Importance of parenting as it is one of the key elements that influence the behavior and development of the adolescents. Understanding Adolescence, as a process focuses on many things such as rapid body change, cognitive development, and enhanced intelligence but with minimal wisdom. This will enable better understanding in the ...