Harlem's legendary Cotton Club becomes a hotbed of passion and violence as the lives and loves of entertainers and gangsters collide.
Honey Daniels dreams of making a name for herself as a hip-hop choreographer. When she's not busy hitting downtown clubs with her friends, she teaches dance classes at a nearby community center in Harlem, N.Y., as a way to keep kids off the streets. Honey thinks she's hit the jackpot when she meets a hotshot director casts her in one of his music videos. But, when he starts demanding sexual favors from her, Honey makes a decision that will change her life.
A successful and married black man contemplates having an affair with a white girl from work. He's quite rightly worried that the racial difference would make an already taboo relationship even worse.
Monty Brewster, an aging minor-league baseball player, stands to inherit $300 million if he can successfully spend $30 million in 30 days without anything to show for it, and without telling anyone what he's up to... A task that's a lot harder than it sounds!
Three sisters start out singing in their church choir in Harlem in the late 1950s and become a successful girl group in the 1960s.
Orange picker Leroy Jones inadvertently becomes a union leader and is forced out of town, leaving behind his sex-obsessed father, Rufus, and timid spouse, Annie Mae. He heads for Los Angeles, where he falls for union organizer Vanetta. Annie Mae seeks solace from local preacher Lenox Thomas, who eventually impregnates her. When Leroy catches wind, he heads home for a showdown with Lenox.
At Arlington National Cemetery during the Vietnam era, veteran sergeant Clell Hazard trains young soldiers while mourning those lost in combat. Unable to return to war himself, he mentors Jackie Willow—the idealistic son of a fallen comrade—hoping to prepare him for the realities of Vietnam and the cost of duty.
A Palestinian sneaks into the U.S. to reconnect with his sister, and he plans to have a company, which built a bomb that killed his brother in Gaza, make a part for a rocket that he will launch into Israel.
Inside the Blue Note nightclub one night in 1959 Paris, an aged, ailing jazzman coaxes an eloquent wail from his tenor sax. Outside, a young Parisian too broke to buy a glass of wine strains to hear those notes. Soon they will form a friendship that sparks a final burst of genius.
After a brush with the law, Maria has returned to her gritty Bronx roots to rebuild her life with nothing but a talent for street dance and a burning ambition to prove herself.
Two men identified only as Black Man and White Man start the film as a discussion over a speech on race to be given at school the next day and escalates into an argument about the differences in the races - moving along all of the cultural lines and finding mutual fears and concerns.
This feature takes us into the world of "boosters" or shoplifters where a charismatic, intelligent young female booster from a dysfunctional family, notably her mother and grandmother, engages in the illegal occupation of shoplifting. A non-stereotypical view of how problematic family relations fed her foray into a criminal profession.
A multigenerational story of the lives of several black women who call an inner-city tenement home.
In 1957, black lawyer John Williams has to defend his nephew Charlie, who is accused of strangling a white boy to death. John doesn't believe Charlie did it, and although Charlie confesses, John wants to find out the real truth.
To protect his wife's "secret", a small-town Southern lawyer in the 1960s decides to defend a young man accused of murder, all while running for Congress and encountering personal threats to his family.
A lawyer trying to cope with his son's accidental death takes on a case where a farmer is charged with booby trapping a watermelon patch with a shotgun which went off and injured a young boy. But in choosing to defend the farmer, he puts himself at odds with the boy's father, an old friend who is politically influential. In dealing with this case, he is forced to confront his own son's death and his wife's slippage into being a virtual recluse.
Tells the story of Sadie and Bessie Delany, two African-American (they preferred "colored") sisters who both lived past the age of 100. They grew up on a North Carolina college campus, the daughters of the first African-American Episcopal bishop, who was born a slave, and a woman with an inter-racial background. With the support of each other and their family, they survived encounters with racism and sexism in their own different ways. Sadie quietly and sweetly broke barriers to become the first African-American home-ec teacher in New York City, while Bessie, with her own brand of outspokenness, became the second African-American dentist in New York City. At the ages of 103 and 101, they told their story to Amy Hill Hearth, a white New York Times reporter who published an article about them. The overwhelming response launched a bestselling book, a Broadway play, and this film.
As four friends prepare for life after high school, different challenges bring about turning points in each of their lives. The dramas unfold and resolve at their local rollerskating rink, Cascade.
A tribute to the controversial black activist and leader of the struggle for black liberation. He hit bottom during his imprisonment in the '50s, he became a Black Muslim and then a leader in the Nation of Islam. His assassination in 1965 left a legacy of self-determination and racial pride.
Radio Personality, Michael Washington, known as "DJ Mike" makes fun of people's lives with prank phone calls on his radio show, JAB STAB. His jokes make his show #1 of all morning talk show in the state. However, behind the scenes of the radio show, many unpredictable events develop in Mike's personal life. It leads to an adventure that brings him to the brink of disaster, fighting for his own survival. Will he persevere?
A British mercenary arrives in pre-Revolution Cuba to help train the corrupt General Batista's army against Castro's guerrillas while he also romances a former lover now married to an unscrupulous plantation owner.
Mike Epps, Richard Pryor Jr. and others recount the culture-defining influence of Richard Pryor - one of America's most brilliant, iconic comic minds.
A woman in a Hollywood dubbing studio struggles with race and preconceptions. The short film depicts the life of an African American woman passing as a white woman working in the film industry during the 1940s. It calls attention to the lack of African Americans in the film industry during that era.
A security man goes to work for a sadistic gangster with an alluring wife.
Against formidable odds -- and an old-school diving instructor embittered by the U.S. Navy's new, less prejudicial policies -- Carl Brashear sets his sights on becoming the Navy's first African-American master diver in this uplifting true story. Their relationship starts out on the rocks, but fate ultimately conspires to bring the men together into a setting of mutual respect, triumph and honor.
How important is the truth when falling in love? Bella is a Manhattan café waitress, about to turn 35, stuck in a long-term affair going nowhere. Paul is a widower, facing old age alone. Bella's mother sets her up with Bruno, a novelist/cabbie who likes to bed-hop and whose ex-wife expects their two children to stay with him for awhile. While Bruno learns some maturity from his young daughter, Paul answers a personals ad placed by a "widow, 60." The two couples - along with one of Paul's older pals and a Jungian stripper - sort out how to initiate a relationship these days, what to do when someone you like disappoints you, and when to tell the truth.
A basketball player's father must try to convince him to go to a college so he can get a shorter prison sentence.
A psychopath second grader starts knocking off his schoolmates one by one in order to maintain control of the lunchline. Cafeteria hysteria!
Fired from his job, a former executive turns to impregnating wealthy lesbians for profit.
In commemoration of the 100th birthday of lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, performers present classic Hammerstein songs.
Filmmaker Jean Achache shot extensively on the set of ’Round Midnight. This documentary presents that material for the first time, including footage of director Bertrand Tavernier, production designer Alexandre Trauner, and other members of the cast and crew.