Black History Month 2025

Black History Month 2025

OVID.tv is proud to present a deep dive into Black history – from a documentary on the Apollo Theater in Harlem to a history of African-American art, and documentary portraits of Ella Baker, Roy DeCarava, and Okwui Okpokwasili, to prize-winning films by path-breaking filmmakers such as John Akomfrah, Madeline Anderson, St. Claire Bourne and Marlon Riggs. Explore this selection of over 50 films on aspects of the African-American experience.

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Black History Month 2025
  • You Got to Move: Stories of Change in the South

    Directed by Lucy Massie Phenix and Veronica Selver • Documentary • With Myles Horton, May Justice, Bernice Johnson Reagon, Bernice Robinson • 1985 • 85 minutes

    Lucy Massie Phenix's You Got to Move: Stories of Change in the South is about individuals who have dared to change the world for the be...

  • Chisholm '72: Unbought & Unbossed

    Directed by Shola Lynch • Documentary • With Shirley Chisholm, Amiri Baraka, Octavia Butler, Bobby Seale • 2004 • 77 minutes

    Recalling a watershed event in US politics, this compelling documentary takes an in-depth look at the 1972 presidential campaign of Shirley Chisholm, the first black woman...

  • Meeting the Man: James Baldwin in Paris

    Directed by Terence Dixon • Documentary • With James Baldwin • 1970 • 27 minutes

    Shot in Paris, a city in which Baldwin lived for nine years after leaving New York — a decision he has described “as a matter of life and death.” The early sequences find Baldwin uncooperative, even hostile to the B...

  • The Five Demands

    Directed by Greta Schiller and Andrea Weiss • Documentary • 2023 • 74 minutes

    THE FIVE DEMANDS is a riveting story about the student strike that changed the face of higher education forever. In April 1969, a small group of Black and Puerto Rican students shut down the City College of New York, a...

  • Say Amen, Somebody

    Directed by George Nierenberg • Documentary • With Thomas A. Dorsey, Willie Mae Ford Smith, Delois Barrett Campbell, Billie Barrett GreenBey, Rodessa Barrett Porter, Edgar O'Neal, Edward O'Neal • 1982 • 100 minutes

    One of the most acclaimed music documentaries of all time, Say Amen, Somebody is ...

  • Bronx Gothic (Okwui Okpokwasili)

    Directed by Andrew Rossi • Documentary • With Okwui Okpokwasili • 2017 • 91 minutes

    From director Andrew Rossi (Page One: Inside the New York Times, The First Monday in May) comes an electrifying portrait of writer and performer Okwui Okpokwasili and her acclaimed one-woman show, Bronx Gothic. R...

  • Gil Scott-Heron: Black Wax

    Directed by Robert Mugge • Documentary • With Gil Scott-Heron • 1983 • 79 minutes

    BLACK WAX is a musical-political entertainment film produced and directed by Robert Mugge. It centers on the late African American poet-singer-songwriter Gil Scott-Heron - the man Melody Maker called "the most dang...

  • Sun Ra: A Joyful Noise

    Directed by Robert Mugge • Documentary • With Sun Ra and his Arkestra • 1980 • 59 minutes

    Robert Mugge filmed jazz great Sun Ra on location in Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C. between 1978 and 1980. The resulting 60-minute film includes multiple public and private performances, poet...

  • Gospel According To Al Green

    Directed by Robert Mugge • Documentary • With Al Green, Willie Mitchell, Ken Tucker • 1984 • 66 minutes

    GOSPEL ACCORDING TO AL GREEN looks at Green's transition from hugely successful soul singer to gospel artist and fundamentalist preacher. Filmed in concert in Washington, D.C., in rehearsal in...

  • Fundi: The Story of Ella Baker

    Directed by Joanne Grant • Documentary • 1981 • 63 minutes

    FUNDI: THE STORY OF ELLA BAKER reveals the instrumental role that Ella Baker, a friend and advisor to Martin Luther King, played in shaping the American civil rights movement. The dynamic activist was affectionately known as the Fundi, a...

  • A Daughter’s Tribute to Her Father: Souleymane Cissé

    Directed by Fatou Cissé • Documentary • With Souleymane Cissé, Martin Scorsese, Costa-Gavras, Baba Diop • 2022 • 73 minutes

    A Daughter’s Tribute to Her Father: Souleymane Cissé is the story of a filmmaker as told by his daughter. Through interviews with his friends, family, and collaborators, th...

  • How They Got Over

    Directed by Robert Clem • Documentary • With J.W. Alexander, Ira Tucker • 2018 • 87 minutes

    How They Got Over tells the story of how Black gospel quartet music became a primary source for what we would call rock and roll, and in the process helped to break down racial walls in 1950s America.

    Be...

  • Roberta

    Directed by Antonino D'Ambrosio • Documentary • 2022 • 87 minutes

    Directed by award-winning filmmaker Antonino D'Ambrosio, this is the long overdue documentary about the legendary Roberta Flack. Of course she is well known the world over for “First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” and "Killing Me Soft...

  • And She Could Be Next: Part One - Building the Movement

    Directed by Grace Lee, Marjan Safinia • Documentary • With Stacey Abrams, Rashida Tlaib • 2020 • 111 minutes

    “Episode One: Building The Movement” opens with the powerful reminder that “women of color have been the backbone of our communities forever.” An energetic montage of modern American civi...

  • And She Could Be Next: Part Two - Claiming Power

    Directed by Marjan Safinia, Grace Lee • Documentary • With Stacey Abrams, Rashida Tlaib • 2020 • 121 minutes

    “Episode Two: Claiming Power” takes us to the weeks leading up to election day and focuses on how organizers combat voter suppression in their own communities. At the heart of the episode...

  • James Baldwin: From Another Place

    Directed by Sedat Pakay • Documentary • With James Baldwin • 1973 • 12 minutes

    Set in Istanbul, the film opens with a surprisingly candid scene of Baldwin leisurely awakening in his bedroom. Sedat Pakay, a Turkish filmmaker who studied with Walker Evans, is known for his photographic portraits o...

  • The Upsetter: The Life and Music of Lee Scratch Perry

    Directed by Adam Bhala Lough, Ethan Higbee • Documentary • With Lee “Scratch” Perry, Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Paul McCartney, The Clash, Bunny Wailer, Marcus Garvey, Carl Bradshaw, Eve, Benicio Del Toro • 2008 • 95 minutes

    THE UPSETTER tells the wild, weed-fueled story of Lee “Scratch” Perry — a ...

  • From Swastika to Jim Crow

    Directed by Lori Cheatle • Documentary • 2000 • 60 minutes

    In the 1930s Jewish intellectuals who escaped Nazi Germany and immigrated to the U.S. faced an uncertain future. Confronted with anti-Semitism at American universities and a public distrust of foreigners, many sought refuge in an unlikel...

  • Strange Victory

    Directed by Leo Hurwitz • Documentary • With Alfred Drake, Muriel Smith, Gary Merrill • 1948 • 71 minutes

    The year was 1945. The free world rejoices over the defeat of fascism. But the peace soon chilled, and in the Cold War that followed the United States entered a period of national paranoia a...

  • Black Hair Magic

    Directed by Alaysja Clark • Documentary • 2017 • 7 minutes

    African-American women discuss the struggles and benefits of being a black woman in America through hair.

  • Unmarked

    Directed by Brad Bennett, Chris Haley • Documentary • 2021 • 40 minutes

    Throughout the South, vast numbers of African-American gravesites and burial grounds for enslaved persons have been lost or are disappearing through neglect and nature reclaiming the solemn tombstones and markers. Recently, ...

  • Ornette: Made in America

    Directed by Shirley Clarke • Documentary • With Ornette Coleman, William Burroughs, Brion Gysin, Buckminster Fuller, Don Cherry, Yoko Ono, Charlie Haden, Robert Palmer • 1985 • 85 minutes

    Returning in 1983 to his home in Fort Worth, Texas, documentary footage and dramatic scenes recall legendar...

  • Hidden Heritage: The Roots of Black American Painting

    Directed by Andrew Piddington • Documentary • With David Driskell • 1991 • 52 minutes

    David Driskell, the pathbreaking art history professor and artist, is the focus of HIDDEN HERITAGE: THE ROOTS OF BLACK AMERICAN PAINTING. He made it his life mission to trace the work of Black artists from the ...

  • Marcus

    Directed by Patrick Savey • Documentary • With Marcus Miller, Herbie Hancock, George Benson, Miles Davis • 2014 • 97 minutes

    Patrick Savey plunges us into Marcus’s world, capturing the New York roots of the legendary bass player, following his path like the pebbles of Tom Thumb, as he meets mast...