Movies To Stream During Black History Month

Plus, our thoughts on the new Netflix movie Malcolm & Marie

Feb 12, 2021

In honor of Black History Month, this week we are recommending films that tell real-life Black stories, including a heart-wrenching documentary and two nuanced movies based on a true story. You can find all three on streaming platforms right now, so this month is a good time to catch up with these.

Out in theaters and on HBO Max today is Judas and the Black Messiah, a drama about Fred Hampton and the Black Panthers, so make sure you check that one out in addition to these picks! Give us your thoughts on the new movie or any of our recommendations.

Billy recommends…

Time (streaming on Amazon Prime)

Documentaries are almost always backed into a corner before even being made. So many have an interesting story, but use a structure we have seen time and time again, losing the power of the story in the process. Time creates a style that is different from any documentary I have seen and in the process enhances a story that would have been powerful no matter the context.

Time follows a woman (Fox Rich) and her family dealing with the absence of their father and husband (Rob Rich II), who was sent to jail for 60 years for armed robbery. Fox and Rob ran on hard times 6 months after their twins were born and staged a botched bank robbery that sent them both to jail. Fox was released after 3 ½ years and vowed to bring her family back together no matter how long it took.

Through old home videos and current footage we get to see a woman who is fighting to make sure the father of her children is not forgotten. In Time, Fox takes on the role as an “abolitionist” that is attempting to bring light to a prison system that encourages “rehabilitation,” but provides almost no resources for that to be possible.

So many pieces of art try to theorize situations like this and make people angry at a situation without talking to the people that experience these atrocities. Time puts you face-to-face with someone who has lived these atrocities and gives her the voice needed to speak truth. And because of that Fox is able to make clear her anger and sadness while breathing hope into a story that on the surface seems absent of it. This quick 81-minute watch is essential viewing that needs to be sought out ASAP.

Drew recommends…

Fruitvale Station (streaming on Netflix)

In the early hours of New Year’s Day 2009, 22-year-old Oscar Grant was killed by a police officer on a transit station platform in Oakland. Grant was being arrested after a fight had occurred on the train when the officer fired a shot into his back. With accurate and immersive detail, Fruitvale Station is a “day in the life” portrayal of an ordinary young black man unjustly killed, showing us Grant’s final hours with empathy and subtlety.

This is the debut of one of the fastest rising filmmakers in movies today, Ryan Coogler. As a Bay Area native, Coogler had a personal connection to this tragic story. He wrote the screenplay, got Forest Whitaker’s help in producing the film, and entered Fruitvale at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, where it took home major awards. Coogler’s promising debut led to Creed, his triumphant Rocky sequel in 2015, and then to the landscape-altering success of 2018’s Black Panther. (Heard of it?)

It’s been a meteoric rise for Coogler, and Michael B. Jordan’s stardom has more than a little to do with it. The two have collaborated on all three of Coogler’s movies so far, creating one of the best director-star duos of the 2010s. After impressive teenage turns on shows like The Wire and Friday Night Lights, Jordan had yet to break out as a star lead in the movies before he played Grant in Fruitvale Station. While this remains one of his best performances, the charismatic Jordan really took off in the following years by starring in Creed, Black Panther, and Just Mercy (see below).

In making this movie, Coogler said that he “wanted the audience to get to know this guy, to get attached, so that when the situation that happens to him happens, it's not just like you read it in the paper.” Fruitvale Station succeeds as an empathy generator for a man that we didn’t know by immersing us in Grant’s world for 24 hours. Coogler and Jordan don’t over-dramatize or exaggerate; they simply let Grant’s ordinary life unfurl before us. They don’t sentimentally depict him as an inhumanly perfect person either. The film shows us his flaws and problems, just like any other person might have, but it also makes time for the joy and connection he had in his life, particularly with his girlfriend, mother, and four-year-old daughter. Fruitvale Station eventually gets to the horrifying final minutes of Grant’s death, but not before presenting his humanity, in all the complexity that entails.

Just Mercy (streaming on HBO)

Just Mercy is a pretty familiar and straightforward legal drama, but these limitations don’t lessen its impact or importance all that much. This is the story of Bryan Stevenson, who founded the Equal Justice Initiative in order to provide legal representation to those who may have been wrongly convicted. We are introduced to Stevenson, played by Michael B. Jordan, as a bright young Harvard law grad that tries to prove the innocence of Walter McMillian (Jamie Foxx), a black man on death row for the murder of a white girl in 1986. There’s mounting evidence of McMillian’s innocence, but a long road for Stevenson to make him a free man.

Although you can tell where Just Mercy is going at almost every turn, the film is impressively able to expose the flawed nature of our criminal justice system. There’s a memorable stretch in the middle of the movie where a character played excellently by Rob Morgan is set to be executed. This, in tandem with the main narrative focused on McMillian, is a clear-eyed portrait of an unjust system in desperate need of an overhaul.

Jamie Foxx’s performance gets this message across better than any other in the movie. It’s deep and grounded work that is unlike the confident Jamie Foxx persona you’ve seen in movies like Django Unchained and Baby Driver. Jordan and Brie Larson (as his assistant) bring their natural charisma, but it can be difficult playing a noble character that lacks depth. Despite only so-so character development, the talented cast keeps you engaged throughout.

Coming out at the end of 2019, Just Mercy was overlooked by buzzier awards season fare, but this is a movie that rightfully allows its vital and powerful story of systemic injustice to take center stage. It highlights the praise-worthy work Stevenson has been doing in real-life since the 80s, while making an impassioned plea for grace, mercy, and justice.

Recent Release Mini-Reviews

Malcolm & Marie (streaming on Netflix)

Drew: You have to give credit to Malcolm & Marie’s stars (Zendaya and John David Washington) and writer-director (Sam Levinson) for finding a way to make their art in a time of lockdown and stasis. They tried something here, even if it turned out to be a flawed and tiresome endeavor.

This black-and-white feature-length back-and-forth between a filmmaker and his girlfriend makes for a movie that’s alternately fascinating and kind of dull. Zendaya is tremendous, her presence so effortless on screen. Washington has his moments, but ultimately his Malcolm doesn’t seem like a real character. With better writing, the two leads have enough chemistry that this could’ve been special. - 2.5 / 5 Apples

Billy: A friend’s response to watching this movie: “They should’ve just gone to bed!”

Both actors are incredibly talented and are given their time to shine. While also given the time to make themselves look dumb because of the forced dialogue. Overall a good watching experience that should have been about 50 minutes. - 2.5 / 5 Apples

Do You Like Apples

Discussion about this post