African-American Studies Collections

Filmography: F

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

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FACES OF SLAVERY.
1990. 20 minutes. (V3240).
Documentary. Slavery--Photographic History, Photography--History, Slavery--Brazil. Produced and directed by Robert M. Levine.

This is a short photographic history of slavery. Rare photographs depicting slavery, largely in Brazil [where it existed until 1881], are used to show the conditions of slaves at work and in daily life.
Notes: Produced by Charles Fox. Videography by Daniel Rich and Margaret Wygant. Music performed the Experience. Narrated by Charles Perrone.


FAMILY ACROSS THE SEA.
1991. 56 minutes. (V4007).
Documentary. African Americans -- Gullah People -- South Carolina -- Gullah Language [Geechie, Gullah, Krio]. Directed by Tim Carrier.

". . . told as an historical and linguistic detective story. It shows how scholars have uncovered the remarkable connections between the Gullah people of South Carolina and the people of Sierra Leone. FAMILY ACROSS THE SEA movingly portrays how African Americans have preserved their ties with their homeland through centuries of oppression. The ancestors of the Gullah were African slaves brought to the Sea Islands because of their expertise in rice cultivation. FAMILY ACROSS THE SEA documents how the Gullahs incorporated many aspects of African culture in the daily life of the plantations. The Gullah language contains over 3,000 words of African origin and resembles the Krio language of Sierra Leone. The Film concludes with the 'homecoming' of a delegation of Gullah to the West African brothers and sisters they hadn't realized they had. One woman speaks what many African Americans will feel: 'Now, I know that I have really come home.'"
Notes: Produced by South Carolina Educational Television. Produced and written by Tim Carrier. Video by Domino Boulware. Edited by Elaine Cooper, Mary Taylor and Carrier. Narrated by Augusta Baker. Sea Islanders who made the trip to the Sierra Leone include Ernestine Atkins, Cornelia Bailey, emery Campbell, Lance, Laurence and Freddie Cudjie, Myrtle Glascoe, Arnelle Giradeau, Elaine Jenkins, John Matthews, Doug Quimble, Frankie Quimble, and Laurette Sams. The scholarship and research (done in the 1930s) of Lorenzo Turner and others in tracing the Gullah connections to the specific culture of Sierra Leone are discussed.


FAMINE IN AFRICA.
1991. 18 minutes.
Documentary. Famine, Africa. Famine in Somalia.

Drought, civil war, and economic disaster in Ethiopia, Somalia, Angola, Liberia, Angola, Mozambique and the Sudan are the subjects of this CNN news presentation. The politics of aid to assist the displaced refugees is explained in contest of the support of repressive regimes who mismanage aid given. Interviewees include Graham Hancock author of The Lands of Poverty, Alex de Waal of Africa Watch; Rudolph Von Bernuth; Care USA; Salim Lone of Africa Recovery; C. Payne Lucas, Africare; Dieter Frisch, European Community; Gitobu Imanyara, Kenyan Dissident; Reporters include Richard Blystone, Christiane Amanpour.


FANNIE BELL CHAPMAN.
1975. 43 minutes.
Documentary. Chapman, Fannie Bell. Black Religious Experiences. Women in the Black Church. Religious Music.

This film explores the religious life of Fannie Bell Chapman and her family in Centerville, Mississippi. Chapman and her husband describe how their personal singing festivals became a tradition throughout their community. The Chapman's faith is served through their celebratory singing and in local "missionary" work. Chapman's songs, wholly spontaneous creations, are the focus of this film, but her other religious work includes some forms of faith healing, and leadership in church functions. [There is a glitch approximately 19 minutes into the film. Please disregard].
Notes: Filmed and recorded by Bill Ferris, Judy Peiser, and Bobby Taylor. Edited by Peiser.


FANNY KEMBLE'S JOURNAL OF A RESIDENT ON A GEORGIAN PLANTATION 1838-1839.
1981. 28 minutes.

Dramatic rendering of excerpts from Fanny Kemble's Diary. Fanny Kemble, 1809-1893. Slavery. Plantation Life, Social Conditions. This program presents the dramatic readings by Anne O'Connell of excerpts from famous British stage actress Fanny Kemble's diary entries while she was married to a Georgia slave owner. Kemble's almost native British antagonism to slavery put her immediately at odds with her husband. Her insistence of hearing the tribulations of the slaves, her eyewitnessing of the horrific scenes on the Sea Island plantation her husband owned, led to her writing of the events and publishing them, forcing the divorce of the couple.
Notes: Directed by Gary R. Moss. Produced by Moss and Robin Reidy. Camera by Lee Blasingame. Edited by Moss. Production was filmed at Butler Island, Howfyl-Broadfield Plantation St. Simons Island. Music is Francois Couperin Pieces de Clavecin and Georgia Sea Island singers singing Buzzard Lope, Pay Me My Money Down, Mama Lumma, and Lord's Prayer.


FEAR OF A BLACK HAT.
1994. 85 minutes.
Satire. Parody of Rap Music. Hip Hop Parody. Directed by Rusty Cundieff.

With Rusty Cundieff is Ice Cold the leader, more or less, of a group of rap singers who begin as friends, become rivals, and regain group synergy when they find that they work better together. The film is actually a biting satire of the rap scene, culture, and industry specifically taking aim at the mega group NWC. The film is funny in many of the same ways that This Is Spinal Tap was, and dumb in some of the same ways as well. Cundieff with Larry B. Scott as Tasty Taste, Mark Christopher Lawrence as Tone Def give pretty deft and daffy performances With: Kasi Lemmons as Nina Blackburn in this scabrous satire of rap music. Also with Howie Gold, Barry Heins, Rosemarie Jackson, Faizon, Deezer D. and Moon Jones.
Notes: Photographed by John Demps, Jr. Music supervision by Larry Robinson. Written by Cundieff.


FEMMES AUX YEUX OUVERTS.
1994. 52 minutes. In French with English subtitles.
Documentary. African Cinema. Women in Togo, Benin, Burkina Faso, Senegal and Mali. African Women. Women's Studies. Women Directors. Directed by Anne-Laure Folly.

"A film about African women is a rarity, even more one made by an African woman. Femmes Aux Yeux Ouverts presents portraits of contemporary African women in four West African countries: Burkina Faso, Mali, Senegal, and Benin. We meet a woman active in the movement against female genital mutilation. She explains why in Africa it is easier to oppose this practice as a health issue than as a women's rights issues. We also join a health worker demonstrating condom use in a marketplace and explaining how diseases are sexually transmitted. Women are the traditional market traders in Africa. Successful businesswomen describe how they have set up an association to share expertise and prove mutual assistance."
Notes: Edited by Sylvie Alombert. Photographed by Jean Louis Penez, Pop Seck and Racine Arouna Ketta. Music by Ali Wade, Philippe Papin and Gabriella.


FEMMES DU NIGER: ENTRE INTEGRISME ET DEMOCRATIE see WOMEN OF NIGER


FIGHT AGAINST SLAVERY see THE OLD AFRICAN BLASPHEMER


FINZAN.
1990. 107 minutes. (V2777). In Bambara with English subtitles.
Drama. Mali. Women's Rights - African Women. Directed by Cheick Oumar Sissoko. Also known as A Dance For The Heroes.

In a remote African village called Sabuga, a recently widowed woman is placed under pressure by the village custom to become the wife of her late husband's brother. The woman, however, had a hard life as the wife of the dead man and resents the notion that should become the wife of his mentally deficient, clownish brother. She resists and that resistance creates a stir among the villagers. In the same village a young girl sent by her conservative father to the place to experience some sense of her place shocks the villagers when they learn that she has not been circumcised. When she resists, she is violently force to succumb to the dangerous, painful "surgery" by some of the village women. This film is startling because of its frank discussion of women's issues in so clearly a male dominated culture as represented by the village and villagers of Sabuga. When a woman has the spirit to defy the cultural inanities and customs, she faces stiff odds and ridicule. There are other interesting things in this film, the most intriguing being the depiction of humor among these people -- it is a humor based on sexual innuendo and puns and crude jokes that are best described as bathroom oriented. It's a fascinating study into the lives of African women, and a interesting attempt at satire. It's not really a good film, but it is a significant and noteworthy one. With: Mamadou Fomakon Coulibaly, Mohamed Lamine Toure, Diarrah Sanogo, Quota, Armor Namroy Keita, Saidou Toure, Balla Moussa Keita, Habib Dembele, Gouanson Coulibaly, Isser Coulibaly, Yougoor Coulibaly, and Babou Timbely.
Notes: Screenplay by Sissoko. Filmed in the villages of Sabaga and Konyamani.


FIRE EYES.
1994. 60 minutes.
Documentary. Female Circumcision. Women's Rights. Women in Developing States. Directed by Soraya Mire.

"This powerful and important film is the first to present an African viewpoint on a culturally explosive issue. Somali filmmaker Soraya Mire knows firsthand about the traditional African practice of female genital mutilation. At thirteen she was subjected to it and spent the next twenty years recovering physically and emotionally from its cure legacy. FIRE EYES explores the socio-economic, psychological, and medical consequences of this ancient custom which affects more than 80 million women worldwide."
Notes: The film was sited at The Sundance, Berlin, New York African and Human Rights Watch International Film Festivals.


FIRST WORLD FESTIVAL OF NEGRO ARTS.
1968. 20 minutes.
Documentary. World Festival of Negro Arts, Dakar, Senegal 1966. Black Art.

"Pictures scenes of the first World Festival of Negro Arts held at Dakar in1966, showing music, dance, sculpture, painting, and the reciprocal influences of Negro art and culture in relation to the modern Western world."
Notes: A UNESCO production.


THE FIVE HEARTBEATS.
1991.
Drama with Music. Black Directors. Rock Music. Black Music. Directed by Robert Townsend.

New York in 1965 is where this story of talented young singers trying to break into pop music begins. Five young black friends are trying to compete in a talent contest that will get them to the big time. This film is about the rise of this young group from rigged talent shows to the big times. It is also about the personal trials and tribulations of the groups' members. Robert Townsend, Michael Wright, Leon, Harry J. Lennix, and Tico Wells are the Heartbeats. With: Harold Nicholas and Diahann Carroll, Hawthorne James, Roy Fegan, John Witherspoon, Troy Beyer, Anne-Marie Johnson, Lisa Meade, Theresa Randle and Theresa Thomas.
Notes: Photographed by Bill Dill. Written by Robert Townsend Keenen Ivory Wayans. The original music by Stanley Clarke is a pastiche of Motown and Philadelphia sounds of the '60s and '70s. Choreography by Michael Peters. The Dells are listed as the film's musical advisers. Songs include: I've Never Felt This Good, Are You Ready for Me, Nothing But Love, and Nights Like This all of which were written for the film.


FIXING TO TELL ABOUT JACK.
1975. 25 minutes.
Jack Tales. Directed by Elizabeth Barrett.

A film about the survival of jack tales in the Appalachian mountains. These folk tales have been passed on from one generation to the next, in traditional mountain fashion. "Jack" is a mythical character who is either folksiness innocent and honest or just plain naive.


THE FLAME TREES OF THIKA.
1981. 404 minutes [Four Cassettes of 101 minutes each].
Colonial Drama. British East Africa. Popular British Fiction. Directed by Roy Ward Baker.

Hayley Mills is Tilly Grant, David Robb Robin Grant and Holly Aird their daughter Elspeth in this mini-series about a British family's struggles and dreams to build a coffee plantation in remote East Africa. The four segments include:

• Episode 1 [Tape #1]-- The Promised Land. "Tilly Grant and her daughter Elspeth arrive in Thika to find a barren terrain dominated by packs of dangerous wild animals. Robin Grant reassures his wife and daughter that it is only a matter of time before their dream of transforming the bleak landscape into a thriving coffee plantation is realized. As they make friends with other British settlers and the Kikuyu natives who will help them buld their home and work the land, Espeth begins to fall under the spell of this virgin territory. Tilly is less hopeful, but attmpts to make a go of it -- until the drenching rains, relentless insects and murderous animals make her begin to wish she'd never left England."
• Episode 2 -- Hyenas Will Eat Anything. "Much progress has been made during the first few months on the farm and the Grants are comfortable enough in their new house to invite their neighbors, Lettice and Hereward Palmer, to dinner one night. The celebration is cut short when a pack of hyenas attack the Palmers' mule cart. But worse violence soon follows, when a savage murder is discovered on the Palmers' farm."
• Episode 3 [Tape #2]-- Happy New Year. "Elspeth holds the secret to an unsolved murder at the Palmers farm -- one of many secrets unfolding there. Ian Crawfurd, the dashing hunter who has arrived to deliver six ponies to Captain Palmer, has fallen deeply in love with the Captain's lonely wife, Lettice. When Elspeth joins her parents and the Palmers for a picnic in the African Reserve, she soon discovers that her love for wild animals is at odds with Captain Palmer's love of hunting, and tells him so, much to the embarrassment of Tilly and Robin."
• Episode 4 -- Friends in High Places. "When a string of disasters befalls Sammy, the Grant's headman, he blames his bad luck on Njombo, another worker, and has a spell place on him. Believing he is marked for death by Kikuyu witchcraft, Njombo refuses to eat and grows weaker with each passing day. Tilly tries desperately to help him, but when all conventional treatments fail, she angrily confronts the tribal Chief to demand that the spell be removed."
• Episode 5 [Tape #3]-- A Real Sportsman. "During a gathering at the Palmer's to celebrate the arrival of their new piano, tensions between Captain Palmer and Ian Crawfurd begin to surface. Before tempers can flare, however, a marauding leopard strikes, killing one of Lettuce's beloved pet dogs. Realizing that the leopard, will be back -- and probably isn't alone -- a shooting party is organized to kill the leopards before they can attack again."
• Episode 6 -- Safari. "While on safari, Ian and Lettice find a quiet moment to be together. Ian begs her to run away with him, but Lettice isn't sure she can leave Hereward. Later, when Hereward ignores Ian's advice and causes a buffalo stampede with a careless shot, the long-simmering tensions between the two men ignite with dire consequences. Their problems are soon overshadowed by the ominous news that Germany and Great Britain have gone to war."
• Episode 7 [Tape #4]-- The Drums of War. "Just as the coffee crop has finally been planted. The Great War shatters the Grant's dreams and takes its first casualty from their circle of friends. When Robin rejoins his old battalion in France, Tilly and Elspeth prepare to return to England, knowing they must begin their sad farewells to their friends and to the land they have come to love and call home." Cast also includes: John Nettleton as Major, Morgan Sheppard as Mr. Roos, Carol Macready as Mrs. Nimmo, Paul Onsonco as Jua, Mick Chece as Njombo, Steve Mwenesi as Sammy and Tom Mwangi as the Warrior, Ben Cross as Crawfurd, Tony Osoba as Ahmed, James Falkland as Victor, Sheila Brennan as Mary.

Notes: Photography by Ian Wilson. Original Music composed by Ken Howard and Alan Blaikley. Dramatized by John Hawkesworthy.


FOR COLORED GIRLS WHO HAVE CONSIDERED SUICIDE WHEN THE RAINBOW WAS ENUF.
1982. 60 minutes. (V398).
African-American Women. American Theater. Directed by Oz Scott.

Ntozake Shange's verse/prose play about black women's experience in America and their relations with black men is an intense emotional and psychological experience. The play is strongly inter-active, the action is focused to insure audience emotional and visceral response. This is an adaptation produced for American Playhouse on public television in 1982.
Notes: Produced by Lindsay Law. Written Ntozake Shange.


FOR LOVE OF IVY.
1968. 100 minutes. (V1451).
Romantic Comedy. Directed by Daniel Mann.

A comic romance about a successful black businessman/gambler and a black maid who are brought together by the family the woman works for. Most significant as one of the very first Hollywood to portray blacks in the romantic lead roles. Slight but pleasant effort by Poitier to create a romantic presence on the screen for black audiences. With: Abby Lincoln, Beau Bridges, Carroll O'Connor, Nan Martin, and Lauri Peters.
Notes: Screenplay by Robert Alan Arthur from a story by Poitier. Music by Quincy Jones.


FOXY BROWN.
1974. 92 minutes.
Action Melodrama. Blaxploitation Cinema. Directed by Jack Hill.

Foxy Brown is a beautiful black woman who seeks revenge for the murder of her lover Michael, an undercover federal agent. When Michael is ordered killed by a drug ring, Foxy seeks revenge by infiltrating the gang as one of their prize call girls. American International Pictures entered the lucrative blaxploitation film market with a series of films starring the statuesque Pam Grier. Like much of the genre a great deal of pandering is done to the film's black audience -- the black hero/heroine are up against a vicious white villain. Foxy Brown is as cheaply produced and semi-amateurish as most films in the genre, but that does not eliminate the fact that black audiences finally had black pop figures to identify with at last. Grier was clearly chosen for the part because of her very real physical allure -- but she has been a survivor in the business. Of all the stars of the blaxploitation genre she has developed as an actress well beyond the one-dimensional non-acting she does in this film. With: Peter Brown, Terry Carter, Kathryn Loder, Harry Holcombe.
Notes: Antonio Fargas plays Foxy's pimp/drug selling brother made a career of these types. He is a walking, talking caricature and used his comic skills to exaggerate every character he played. Fargas plays the out-of-date pimp in the gaudy outfit in Kenan Ivory Wayans' I'm Gonna Get You Sucker!


FREDERICK DOUGLASS: WHEN THE LION WROTE HISTORY.
1994. 90 minutes.
Documentary. Biography. Douglass, Frederick.

"Before Nelson Mandela triumphed over apartheid, before Malcolm X divined that knowledge was power, before Martin Luther King had a dream . . . there was Frederick Douglas (1818-1895). Frederick Douglass was a passionate leader in the early fight for civil rights. He was also in the political trenches with the first American women's rights activists, Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. . . laying a foundation for modern feminism. Frederick Douglass was an elegant orator and provocative abolitionist. An escaped slave whose freedom was bought by supporters he met on a speaking tour in England, Douglass became a journalist, publisher, diplomat an unceasing voice for civil rights--the hallmark of a free society."
Notes: Interviewed include: David Plight, Vincent Harding, Margaret Washington, William McFeeley, Lerone Bennett. [Historians].


FREEDOM BAGS.
1990. 32 minutes.
African-American Women. Black migration, North. Produced by Stanley Nelson and Elizabeth Clark-Lewis.

"The story of African-American women who migrated from the rural south during the first three decades of the 20th Century. Hoping to escape from the racism and poverty of the post-Civil War South, they boarded segregated trains for an uncertain future up North. Having had limited educational opportunities back home, most could find jobs only as houseworkers. With spirit and humor, the women remember their tactics for self preservation in the homes of their employers, where they often faced exploitation and sexual harassment. After hours they relished their independence and enjoyed good times with friends and family. Their stories are interwoven with rare footage, still photographs, and period music to crate a portrait of the largest internal migration in U.S. history. These were proud women who kept their dignity and sense of worth through difficult times."
Notes: Produced by Elizabeth Clark-Lewis and Stanley Nelson. Directed by Nelson. Written and researched by Clark-Lewis and Nelson. Edited and Photographed by Todd Holme. Narrated by Carmen Lattimore. The song Sadie's Servant Room Blues performed by Hattie Burleson. L and N Blues performed by Clara Smith, and Bourgeois Blues performed by Huddie Ludbetter. St. Louis Blues and Working Woman Blues were performed by Bessie Smith.


FREEDOM ON MY MIND.
1993. 110 minutes.
African Americans in Mississippi. Civil Rights Movement, Mississippi. Race Relations -- United States. SNCC. MFDP. Mississippi Summer. Documentary.

"Mississippi, 1961, - a virtual South African enclave within the United States. Everything is segregated. There are no black voters. bob Moses, often called the black Ghandi of the civil Rights Movement, enters the state and meets NAACP organizer Amzie Moore and the Voter Registration Project begins. The first black farmer they take to register is shot down and killed by no less than a Mississippi State Representative. But by 1965, four years later, the registration books were opened and today Mississippi has more elected black officials than other state in the union. Freedom On My Mind vividly chronicles this complex and compelling history of the Mississippi voter registration struggles culminating in a dramatic confrontation at the Democratic Convention of 1964. It emphasizes the strategic brilliance of Mississippi's young, black organizers, who, barred from political participation, create their own integrated part--the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party [MFDP]. They recruit a thousand mostly white students from around the country to come to Mississippi, hoping to bring they would bring the conscience of the nation with them. The MFDP organize a delegation of sharecroppers, maids and day-laborers to challenge the all white delegates to the 1964 Democratic National Convention. They demand equality and justice from the highest official in the land - the President -confronting the country's leading politicians to live up to the democratic values they profess to hold. The outcome of that confrontation has a profound effect on the organizers, both black and white, becoming a watershed for the turbulent times known as 'the sixties'. The legacy of that time, the interracial nature of the campaign, the tensions and conflicts, the achievements and failures, remain with us today. The story is told by the participants themselves, illustrated with rare archival footage, authentic Mississippi delta blues and vibrant gospel songs."
Notes: Produced and directed by Connie Field and Marilee Mulford. Edited by Michael Chandler. Among those interviewed: Endesha Ida Mae Holland [Greenwood, Mississippi]; Curtis Hayes [McComb, Mississippi]; Victoria Gray Adams [Hattiesburg, Mississippi]; Cleve Sellars [Denmark, South Carolina]; Len Edwards [San Jose, California]; Marshall Ganz [Bakersfield, California]; Robert Moses [New York]; John Doar [U.S. Justice Department]; Heather Booth [University of Chicago]; Pam Chude Allen [Carleton University]; Len Edwards [Wesleyan College]; Malva and Red Heffner [McComb, Mississippi]; Joe Rauh [UWA, general counsel]. Narrated by Ronnie Washington. Camera by Michael Chinn, Steve Devila, and Vicente Franco. Script by Connie Field, Michael J. Moore, and Marilyn Mulford.


FRESH.
1994. 120 minutes.
Ghetto Drama. Drug Dealing. Directed by Boaz Yakin.

Fresh is a young boy in the Chicago ghetto who runs crack for Esteban, a local hood. Wary, smart, and cautious, Fresh wants out the life he and his sister lead in the city. Though they live with a caring but care-worn aunt, the strain of keeping up appearances, of struggling to survive the gang life and the drugs takes its toll. The boy's relationship with his estranged father revolves around intense, strategically complex street chess matches. When his beautiful sister is proves nothing more than a sexual pawn between Esteban and another hood, Fresh initiates an intrigue to entrap both of them, maneuvering the situation like he has learned to move on the chessboard. He hatches a brilliantly simple scheme to rid himself of the two hoods. This is a strong, intelligent piece of filmmaking. Yakin has managed to add a fresh and exhilarating wrinkle to the ghetto melodrama. The cast - led by, Sean Nelson as Fresh, Giancarlo Esposito as Esteban, N'Bushe Wright, Ron Brice as Corky, and Samuel L. Jackson - is first rate.
Notes: Screenplay by Yakin. Photographed by Adam Holender. Music by Stewart Copeland.


FURTHER ON DOWN THE ROAD.
1986. 90 minutes. (V2324).
Documentary. Rock Music - History. Directed by Chris Campbell and Jim Brown.

A documentary about rock and roll guitar greats Albert Collins, Lonnie Mack, and Roy Buchanan. Concert footage and interviews and commentary are combined to discuss these legendary figures. Among those interviewed include Robbie Robertson, Dickey Betts, Kris Kristofferson, Roy Benson, Joe Ely, and David Johansen, and John Hammond.
Notes: The video is of a live performance by the three men given at Carnegie Hall. Directed by Jim Brown. Written by David Karpoff, Created by John Ware and Chris Campbell.