The past year gave us all kinds of cinematic thrills and chills, taking us on storytelling journeys of the past and pushing our consciousness into future realms of Blackness. We grouped together to show the power of the Black cinematic dollar and pushed opening weekend box office takes to the outer limits, and we triumphed after tragedy and loss. The movies gave us much life, more one-liners for the ever-loving Black vernacular, and it’s not over. Nope!
More Black stories are in production, and what’s even more exciting is the fact that we will get to become acquainted with more Black directors and cheer on the diverse casts portraying these stories.
Variety Magazine, the premier source of entertainment news since 1905, recently released its list of 10 Directors to Watch in 2023. Here’s a look at the four Black directors included in the list and the movies they are making:
MAGGIE BETTS – The Burial, a lawyer helps a funeral home owner save his family business from a corporate behemoth, with Jamie Foxx. Jurnee Smollett, and Tommy Lee Jones.
ELEGANCE BRATTON – The Inspection, drawn from his own story as a gay Black Marine with Jeremy Pope, Gabrielle Union, and Bokeem Woodbine (trailer below)
ELIJAH BYNUM – Magazine Dreams, a Black amateur bodybuilder struggles to find human connection, with Jonathan Majors, Haley Bennett, and Harriet Sansom Harris.
ALICE DIOP – Saint Omer, a courtroom drama about a French Senegalese mother, starring Kayije Kagame, Guslagie Malanda, and Valérie Dréville.
See you at the movies!