Movies and Film

By Dwight Brown film critic for The Times Weekly Call it a comeback! In 2022 the movie industry roared back with high-quality films, stellar performances and great artistry. For the record, movie theaters aren’t dead yet and streaming is a...

At a Union Army encampment, an interview records Peter’s ordeal, the names of his slave owners, the overseer and some details of his breakaway. During a medical examination, two itinerant photographers capture the protruding disfigurations on his back.

  By Dwight Casimere   Black Perspectives celebrates 26 years at the Chicago Film Festival, which had its 58th edition. Founded in 1997 in collaboration with Spike Lee to highlight excellence and diversity in African American cinema, The Perspectives program has grown exponentially....

In-person Tribute, Anna Diop stars in “Nanny”     By Dwight Casimere   The beautiful Senegalese-American actress Anna Diop is the 2022 recipient of the Chicago International Film Festival’s Rising Star Award. Diop’s nuanced performance brings to life the plight of a young immigrant...

Closing Night 60th New York Film Festive 58th Chicago Film Festival-Black Perspectives-LGBTQ-Outlook   Photo: Director and screenwriter Elegance Bratton with his husband and Producer Chester Algernal Gordon and cast at a post screening news conference-Credit: Dwight Casimere   By Dwight Casimere   Elegance Bratton is the...

Searing docudrama charts NY Times Harvey Weinstein sex scandal probe 58th Chicago Film Festival-Spotlight, Women In Film 60th New York Film Festival-World Premiere   Photo: Andre Braugher on the Red Carpet at Alice Tully Hall at the film's premiere credit: NYFF/filmlinc By Dwight Casimere   The...

Chicago International Film Festival Snapshots Coming of Age film   By Dwight Casimere   Director Davy Chou embarks on a somewhat meandering journey of soul-searching and self-discovery by his 25 year old female protagonist, Freddie (a quixotic Park Ji-Min) who returns home to...

In 1955, Mamie (Danielle Deadwyler, The Harder They Fall), a young single-mom and widow, has a very respected office job with the Air Force in Chicago. With great trepidation and egged on by her mother Alma (Whoopi Goldberg), she sends her 14-year-old son Emmett (Jalyn Hall, Bruiser) South to Mississippi for the summer to stay with relatives.

The 2022 Toronto International Film Festival roared back to its splendor with in-theater premieres and showings. Thousands upon thousands of international film lovers flocked to cinemas, viewed the latest wave of diverse voices and watched Black films that reflected Black life.

In 1987, Hattie Mae, an older Black woman views Georgia’s white, racist state attorney general as he spews hate on TV. She walks to his office, barges in and hands the AG a stack of letters. He wants to know why she’s leaving him the missives. But as he reads them, he is engrossed in the story they tell about a ill-fated romance and gruesome murder dating back to the ‘40s. When he’s done, he’s shocked personally beyond words. Why? That’s the crux of the film.