News, features and opinion on the world of film. there are quite a few important films and documentaries that were made for uk television and do not have entries in mubi’s catalogue. First Black director whose film won an Oscar for Best Picture. Ové’s second fiction feature uses cricket – a sport with a complex colonial history – as a launchpad for a smart, sly and sharply observed comedy of cultural manners. The children’s friendship symbolically flies in the face of bigotry and London’s de facto segregation patterns of the era. films about being black and british, black in britain, and films by black british directors. As the founder of the Sankofa artists’ collective, Isaac Julien was long established as a key figure in the British culture scene by the time of this exciting 1991 film. also included in this list are some films that feature black british characters, with regards to representation – e.g. films about being black and british, black in britain, and films by black british directors. Even so, a significant – if under-seen and underrated – body of work exists that’s dedicated to exploring black British life in all its complexity, diversity, sadness and joy. Black Watch is the result. Since then, due to a combination of factors (lack of training and funding, exodus of talent to the United States), there’s been a cycle of frustration in maintaining and developing the black British presence on film. british social dramas that feature black characters or commentary on racial tensions. • British African Stories…. British images. The first black artist to win the Turner Prize, part of the Young British Artist movement in the 1990s, and no stranger to controversy: if you've heard of Chris Ofili then you may be immediately thinking of elephant dung, the Virgin Mary and offending the ex … Subscribe now for exclusive offers and the best of cinema. Facing the myriad pressures cited in the film’s reggae title track (parental, social, mental, ‘Babylon’ aka the police), the befuddled Tony floats through Ové’s film like a slow-motion pinball. There is a confidence among new Black British writers and directors, who are finding crossover audiences with gritty realistic teenage dramas such as Bullet Boy (2004) and A Way of Life (2004). Beautiful, interesting, incredible cinema. Having been born in Nigeria and grown up in London, this is a story that relates closely to the director’s own life. Focussing on a young multiracial Londoner, the film follows him as he traces his roots back in Senegal. Sparks, opinions, revelations – and a few nifty leg-breaks – duly fly. Akinola Davies Jr.. Pressure makes a good companion piece with Anthony Simmons’ comedy-drama Black Joy (1977), which deserves a place in this list too. Charlie Chaplin 1889-1977. This entertaining stew of sexual, racial and social identity in a changing Britain is notable for launching the career of future Academy Award nominee Okonedo. Director | Set It Off F. Gary Gray was born on July 17, 1969 in New York City, New York, USA as Felix Gary Gray. With music by the O’Jays, the Blackbyrds, Parliament-Funkadelic, War and Roy Ayers (among others), Young Soul Rebels also boasts one of the best soundtracks in British cinema history. So, there’s plenty to look forward to. Explore the history of film in list form. We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. The film’s key focus, though, is Pat’s journey to political ascension, via the ups and downs of her relationship with mercurial manual labourer Del (Victor Romero-Evans). Black British Theatre Awards Head of Sponsorship is Tahlia Gray. It would also be remiss not to mention the stunning Miles Davis soundtrack. british social dramas that feature black characters or commentary on racial tensions. 'These films are historic in many ways. They face the double prejudice of racism and homophobia, in both West Indian and white British communities. All rights reserved. British director Amma Asante achieved critical success after writing and directing her debut film, A Way of Life, in… Directed by South African Lionel Ngakane – an ANC member exiled to London – this touching, half-hour long film is a masterclass in brisk, fluid storytelling. While not the only play dealing with the British or even the Scottish experience in Iraq, its raw intensity and wider implications for ideas of Scottishness, masculinity and war in general set it ahead of the pack. Buy Pressure + Baldwin’s Nigger on DVD and Blu Ray. In May of this year, 60 Black & Asian Artistic Directors sent an open letter to the Government citing the perils lockdown/COVID-19 has had on the Theatre industry and even more so how it … The 1980s saw a surge in activity for black British production and representation, encouraged in part by the arrival of Channel 4 (which put diverse programming at the centre of its remit) in 1982. Directed with impressive sensitivity by former documentarian Saul Dibb, Bullet Boy is a bleakly compelling study of two black brothers from Hackney, east London. Played by the striking Anjela Lauren Smith, Anita is the eponymous ‘babymother’, raising two young children with the help of her mother Edith (Burning an Illusion star Corinne Skinner-Carter) on a gloomy north-west London estate. https://www2.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/lists/10-great-black-british-films What have I got? What are some of the best films about black British experience? I didn't see people that looked … In the 1930s and 40s, it was overshadowed by America, to the extent that African American actors usually got any roles for black actors on British stages. Black British life has been sorely underrepresented in our national cinema, but there have been hints of a resurgence in recent years. • Black British Film http://www.screenonline.org.uk/film/id/1144245/ Burning an Illusion is notable for its rounded characterisation. for more resources, please see: Made for television, Babymother is a fun, colourful, and strangely haunting look at an all-black London district arguably as mythical as Richard Curtis’s notoriously whitewashed Notting Hill (1999). (2014) sharply observed the tensions between young Britons of Jamaican and Nigerian descent; and Debbie Tucker Green’s magnificent Second Coming (2014), starring Idris Elba and Nadine Marshall, skilfully examined an unexpected, mysterious pregnancy and its resultant impact. Away from the cinema, Steve McQueen has developed a major BBC television series that will follow a group of black British friends and their families over a number of decades. The film's protagonists, one of them McQueen, are both black, but issues of race, he has said, do not take priority in his work. One of its most subtly affecting threads tracks Dido’s relationship with the Lindsays’ black servant Mabel (Bethan Mary-James), who helps our heroine come to terms with her identity. The elder, Ricky (Ashley Walters), is just out of his teens, and prison; the younger, Curtis (Luke Fraser) is only just discovering his manhood. Black British Theatre Awards was founded by Co-Founders & Directors Solange Urdang and Omar F Okai. Burke’s Black Watch is remarkable for a number of reasons. John Akomfrah Director | The Nine Muses Ghana born John Akomfrah is known for his experimental documentaries and... 2. Set in 1977, during the week of the Queen’s Silver Jubilee, Young Soul Rebels focuses on a murder investigation involving one of the central characters, Chris (Valentine Nonyela), and his relationship with his girlfriend (Sophie Okonedo). Arriving a year after Don Letts and Rick Elwood’s cult Jamaican reggae film Dancehall Queen, Babymother shines a spotlight on the UK version of the musical craze. The film is further marked by some terrific location shooting: we’re immersed in a variety of evocative London locations like the Notting Hill carnival, a crucial event in black British culture. Amma Asante’s 18th-century-set drama Belle (2013) became an international box-office success, shining a light on the true story of Dido Elizabeth Belle, the mixed-race daughter of an African woman and a British naval captain; Destiny Ekaragha’s Peckham-set comedy Gone Too Far! Buy Burning an Illusion on DVD and Blu Ray. Social and sexual tensions reach boiling point in Isaac Julien’s acclaimed, London-set drama. films about being black and british, black in britain, and films by black british directors. A … Want to learn more? Five-year-old Johnny, the white son of a right-wing nationalist father (who is shown demonstrating against immigration) strikes up an instant, close friendship with Jemima, the daughter of a recent West Indian immigrant family; her community is depicted with refreshing detail and sensitivity. While a significant breakthrough in its own right, for a long time Ngozi Onwurah’s 1995 Welcome II the Terrordome stood as the only film by a black British woman ever to see UK release. Woods; Edgar Wright; Joe Wright; Michael Winterbottom; Simon West; Ben Wheatley; Y. David Yates; Peter Yates; Terence Young; See also • British African Stories http://www.screenonline.org.uk/film/id/1082830/ Playing Away begins in mid-80s Brixton, a world away from its current hyper-gentrified state, where a group of West Indian friends (including future Desmond’s stars Norman Beaton and Ram John Holder) attempt to organise themselves ahead of a forthcoming trip. White Colour Black. also included in this list are some films that feature black british characters, with regards to representation – e.g. As an editor on Horace Ové’s classic concert documentary Reggae (1971), and the director of BBC’s Linton Kwesi Johnson documentary Dread Beat an’ Blood (1978), Franco Rosso was an apt choice to helm the first major British feature film to take reggae music as its central theme. Ann Ogidi Richard Ayoade Writer | Submarine Richard Ellef Ayoade was born in Hammersmith, and grew up in Suffolk, in England,... 3. St. Clair Bourne british social dramas that feature black characters or commentary on racial tensions. Founder and Director at Black British Academics London, United Kingdom 500+ connections. Office blocks!” Pressure is more observational and vérité-like than plot-driven, but conflict arises when Tony must decide whether or not to get involved in the Black Power cause. But what about looking back? Byron, her babies’ father (and a local reggae star), invites her to perform at his show, but reneges on the offer. ©2021 British Film Institute. The frustrated Anita launches her own group, but her world turns upside down when family tragedy strikes. He is a director and producer, known for Set It Off … Here, Dido must navigate her transition into womanhood while at the whim of perplexing social codes: she finds herself too high in rank to dine with the servants, but too low in status, on account of her skin colour, to dine with her family. Two big budget films have starred Black British talent - Hotel Rwanda (2004) and Dirty Pretty Things (2002) - breaking another unwritten rule. Find out about international touring programmes, BFI Film Academy: opportunities for young creatives, Get funding to progress my creative career, Search the BFI National Archive collections, Read research data and market intelligence, Search for projects funded by National Lottery, Apply for British certification and tax relief, Get help as a new filmmaker and find out about NETWORK, Find out about booking film programmes internationally. Chaplin is one of the few British directors who would make it on to a list … British director Amma Asante knows how hard it is to get a costume drama off the ground — especially when it stars a Black female newcomer and is directed by a Black … He can’t get hired (he’s either shut out by racist employers or overqualified for menial labour); his potential romance with a friendly white girl is kiboshed by a hostile landlady; he’s ill-suited to the life of petty crime preferred by the group of ne’er-do-wells he falls in with; and his parents are stuck in their old ways. Want quarterly updates on Black Women Directors news? Watch Burning an Illusion online on BFI Player, Watch Young Soul Rebels online on BFI Player, Watch The Stuart Hall Project online on BFI Player. 2016: Barry Jenkins: Moonlight: Nominated Second Black director to direct a Best Picture-winning film.. First African-American director to direct a Best Picture-winning film. An overview of Black Power on film, Jemma Desai , Selina Robertson , Alex Davidson , Josephine Botting , Jez Stewart , Michael Brooke , Ros Cranston , Lisa Kerrigan , Katy McGahan , Dylan Cave. Amanda Tapping (British born Canadian) Gerald Thomas; Ralph Thomas; J. Lee Thompson; Pete Travis; U. Peter Ustinov; V. Biju Viswanath; Matthew Vaughn; W. John Walsh; Peter Watkins; James Whale; Kanchi Wichmann; Michael Winner; Arthur B. Ngakane was a pioneer, but he wasn’t the only filmmaker depicting black British life in the 1960s: Jamaican actor-turned-director Lloyd Reckord made the experimental short Ten Bob in Winter (1963), about the exchange of a 10-shilling note between two Caribbean immigrants of different classes; and in 1969 Frankie Dymon made the wacky, experimental Death May Be Your Santa Claus (available as an extra on the BFI Flipside Blu-ray of Joanna.). Click Here for more information. there are quite a few important films and documentaries that were made for uk television and do not have entries in mubi’s catalogue. Widely regarded as the first black British feature film, Horace Ové’s gripping, neorealism-inspired drama focuses on the tribulations of school grad Tony (Herbert Norville), the British-born son of first generation Trinidadian immigrant parents who arrived in England in the 1950s. Visit the Journal. Following a number of issue-based films that addressed the black British experience in the 1950s and 60s (Pool of London, Sapphire, Flame in the Streets), the first wave of films to genuinely focus on a new generation of postwar, Windrush-era arrivals and their children in Britain began in 1975 with the release of Horace Ové’s brilliant Pressure. Stud Life is directed and written by one of the UK’s very few trans filmmakers, my dear friend, Campbell X. Their outlandish beauty is the gateway out of the ordinary and into the realm of the magical for Anita and viewer alike. ... and the result was the £25,000 Black Pond. Babylon is also notable for its sheer stylistic brio, thanks in large part to the piercing, dreamlike cinematography by Chris Menges (Kes, 1969; The Killing Fields, 1984). Ngakane’s clear-eyed optimism for a colour-blind society is hugely touching, yet also sad when viewed in the light of the subsequent failure of this utopian ideal to materialise. Meanwhile, Asante followed up Belle with the period romantic drama A United Kingdom (2016), starring David Oyelowo as Prince Seretse Khama of Botswana. For many it raised questions about race, sexual attraction to men, and grew up in a spiral events. Directors who would make it on to a list … Beautiful, interesting, incredible cinema match between two who. Face of bigotry and London ’ s de facto segregation patterns of best! 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