Black Lives

Black Lives

OVID.tv is proud to present a large selection of films about contemporary Black lives - from documentaries ranging in topics from Harlem's Apollo Theater and performer Okwui Okpokwasili to an allegorical fable by John Akomfrah.

Share
Black Lives
  • I'm Fine (Thanks For Asking)

    Directed by Kelley Kali, Angelique Molina • Drama • With Wesley Moss, Kelley Kali • 2021 • 86 minutes

    This is post-pandemic America and everyone is struggling to get by. In this exhilarating debut feature Danny, played by co-director Kelley Kali in a star-making performance alongside Deon Cole, ...

  • The Last Angel of History (John Akomfrah)

    Directed by John Akomfrah • Documentary • 1996 • 45 minutes

    John Akomfrah, director of Seven Songs of Malcolm X, returns with an engaging and searing examination of the hitherto unexplored relationships between Pan-African culture, science fiction, intergalactic travel, and rapidly progressing c...

  • Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child

    Directed by Tamra Davis • Documentary • With Jean-Michel Basquiat • 2010 • 88 minutes

    Centered on a rare interview that director and friend Tamra Davis shot with Jean-Michel Basquiat more than 20 years ago, this film chronicles the meteoric rise and fall of the young artist. In the crime-ridden ...

  • How to Tell You're a Douchebag

    Directed by Tahir Jetter • Drama • With Charles Brice, DeWanda Wise • 2016 • 75 minutes

    A controversial blogger in New York finds himself in hot water when he messes with the wrong woman.

  • Kehinde Wiley: An Economy of Grace

    Directed by Jeff Dupre • Documentary • With Kehinde Wiley • 2014 • 40 minutes

    The artist behind Barack Obama’s presidential portrait, Kehinde Wiley is known for his vibrant, larger-than-life reinterpretations of classical portraits featuring young Black men. “Kehinde Wiley: An Economy of Grace” ...

  • Fannie's Film

    Directed by Fronza Woods • Documentary • 1981 • 15 minutes

    In FANNIE'S FILM, a 65-year-old cleaning woman for a professional dancers' exercise studio performs her job while telling us in voiceover about her life, hopes, goals, and feelings. A challenge to mainstream media's ongoing stereotypes o...

  • 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...

  • 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...

  • Portrait of Jason

    Directed by Shirley Clarke • Documentary • 1967 • 108 minutes

    On the night of December 2, 1966, Clarke and a tiny crew convened in her apartment at the Hotel Chelsea to make a film. There, for twelve straight hours they filmed the one-and-only Jason Holliday as he spun tales, sang, donned costum...

  • Killing Time

    Directed by Fronza Woods • Drama • 1979 • 9 minutes

    KILLING TIME, an offbeat, wryly humorous look at the dilemma of a would-be suicide unable to find the right outfit to die in, examines the personal habits, socialization, and complexities of life that keep us going. Part of the mediamaking move...

  • Colette and Justin

    Directed by Alain Kassanda • Documentary • 2023 • 89 minutes

    Born in Kinshasa and living in Paris, filmmaker Alain Kassanda embodies the classic immigrant dual identity: in the Democratic Republic of Congo he is seen as French, while in France he is seen as Congolese. Determined to understand th...

  • 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...

  • 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.

  • Good White People

    Directed by Jarrod Cann & Erick Stoll • Documentary • 2016 • 16 minutes

    In the Spring of 2001, the African-American community of Over-the-Rhine in downtown Cincinnati arose in protest after unarmed 19-year-old, Timothy Thomas, was killed by a white officer named Steven Roach. In the years follow...

  • A Murder in Abidjan

    Directed by Mosco Boucault • Documentary • 1997 • 86 minutes

    Warning: This film contains graphic sequences of police violence, brutality, and torture.

    1995. On the outskirts of Abidjan, the largest city in Ivory Coast, a policeman is murdered. Shot outside his vehicle, while his fiancée sits in...

  • When A Farm Goes Aflame

    Directed by Jide Tom Akinleminu • Documentary • 2021 • 112 minutes

    A young Nigerian leaves his village at the end of the 1960s and goes to Denmark to study. There he meets his future wife. Together they move to Nigeria and start a family. But 16 years later, circumstances in a politically tense ...

  • 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...

  • Kigali Shaolin Temple

    Directed by Claire Mollard and Magali Chirouze • Documentary • 2013 • 52 minutes

    Kigali Shaolin Temple is a kung-fu club in Rwanda started by a group of orphans from the genocide. They find fulfillment in passing on their skills and teaching young Rwandans the values of sharing, tolerance and mu...

  • Cane River

    Directed by Horace B. Jenkins • Drama • With Tommye Myrick, Richard Romain, Carol Sutton • 1982 • 104 minutes

    Written, produced, and directed by Emmy Award-winning documentarian, Horace B. Jenkins, and crafted by an entirely African American cast and crew, CANE RIVER is a racially-charged love s...

  • Delphine's Prayers

    Directed by Rosine Mbakam • Documentary • 2021 • 91 minutes

    Delphine reclines on a daybed in her bright, cluttered apartment in Belgium, an empty crib beside her. “I started to work the streets like crazy,” she says, matter-of-factly recounting her life story. “Selling my body.” Delphine, who is...

  • Tall As the Baobab Tree

    Directed by Jeremy Teicher • Drama • With Dior Ka, Oumoul Ka • 2012 • 82 minutes

    Coumba and her little sister Debo are the first to leave their family’s remote African village, where meals are prepared over open fires and water is drawn from wells, to attend school in the bustling city. But when...

  • 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...

  • When Claude Got Shot

    Directed by Brad Lichtenstein • Documentary • With Claudaire Motley, Victoria Davison, Nathan King • 2021 • 94 minutes

    This unscripted feature follows five years in the life of Claude Motley as he tries to recover mentally and physically from being shot in the face by carjacker Nathan King, a 15...

  • 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...