Carnelle Scott is a restless Mississippi girl looking for a life change. She decides to enter a beauty pageant, which her cousin had won years before. Despite a lack of support from those close to her Carnelle remains determined. She enlists the help of a seamstress to outfit her for the...
Unchained Memories: Readings from the Slave Narratives
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When the Civil War ended in 1865, more than four million slaves were set free. Over 70 years later, the memories of some 2,000 slave-era survivors were transcribed and preserved by the Library of Congress. These first-person anecdotes, ranging from the brutal to the bittersweet, have been brought...
1930's Pittsburgh, a brother comes home to claim "my half of the piano", a family heirloom; but his sister is not wanting to part with it. This is a glimpse of the conditions for African-Americans as well as some of the attitudes and influences on their lives. But whether he is able to sell the...
In the 1930s, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings moves to Florida's backwaters to write in peace. She feels bothered by affectionate men, editors and confused neighbors, but soon she connects and writes The Yearling, a classic of American literature.
A celebration of Dr. Maya Angelou by weaving her words with rare and intimate archival photographs and videos, which paint hidden moments of her exuberant life during some of America’s most defining civil rights moments. From her upbringing in the Depression-era South to her swinging soirees with...
In 1831, Nat Turner led a slave rebellion in the United States that resulted in the murder of local slave owners and their families, the eventual execution of 55 rebels and the retribution lynching of more than 200 innocent slaves. Nat Turner: A Troublesome Property examines how the story of...
While a major in the U.S. Army, Joe Cheever has a fling with his commanding officer's daughter that results in a pregnancy. Cheever convinces the girl to have an illegal abortion. The abortion goes wrong and the girl dies. To protect his career, Cheever implicates Captain Dennison whose life is...
Documents the race riot of 1921 and the destruction of the African-American community of Greenwood in Tulsa, Oklahoma. With testimony by eyewitnesses and background accounts by historians.
Three muralists (one Chicano, one Black, one American Indian) and the socially-maladjusted cousin of the Chicano muralist set off on a road trip with the intent of painting their images on the White House. Along the way they meet a mysterious Black woman. Together, these four men and one woman...
This film adaptation of James Baldwin's celebrated novel tells the journey of a family from the rural South to "big city" Harlem seeking both salvation and understanding and of a young boy struggling to earn the approval of a self-righteous and often unloving stepfather.
Pilot episode for the TV series introduces the lawyers and employees of McKenzie, Brackman, Chaney and Kuzak, a Los Angeles law firm, in dealing with their courtroom cases and personal matters out of the courthouse. While the entire office deals with the unexpected death of one of the founding...
A single mother plagued by alcohol and drug addictions is sent with her children from Chicago to her ancestral home in the Mississippi Delta, to live with her uncle and aunt for the summer.
The story of the legendary steel-driving folk hero born with a hammer in his hands, who pitted his strength against a mighty railroad-building machine.
The story of Sonny Bell (Freeman), an aging Chicago Blues musician, who refuses to retire and defiantly hits the road with his band for one last long-shot to keep doing the only thing that makes them all feel truly alive--play Blues. The story is inspired by Stone's experiences touring and playing...
Old and bitter, Alvin just wants some peace and quiet in his last days. His wish, however, is not granted when a young, vibrant and ironically full of life Kevin becomes Alvin's hospice roommate. Through this "odd couple" relationship, Alvin learns that its not the minutes in our life, its the...
Nelson Mandela becomes South Africa's first Black President, and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his leadership in negotiating a bloodless revolution in that country.
Donnie goes missing and the rest of the Thornberry family have various adventures (broken bones, getting lost in a cave, and a forest fire) while looking for him. It has been screened as a TV movie and as four episodes in season 4 of the TV series.
