ABSTRACT
In 2004, Julie Dash’s Daughters of the Dust (1991) was selected for inclusion in the National Film Registry. A resurgence of widespread interest in films directed by Black women soon followed. This latter-day renaissance included films such as the young women’s sports anthem Love and Basketball (2000), directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood, the coming-of-age Black lesbian exploration Pariah (2010), directed by Dee Rees, and Selma (2014), directed by Ava DuVernay. Foreshadowed in the contemporary period are landmark films from previous eras. Even though widespread knowledge of Black women’s films is subject to intermittent cycles of intense mainstream interest, their body of work extends back to the beginning of the twentieth century. This essay traces Black women’s film history-primarily African American women-giving particular attention to those films and filmmakers that have advanced the understanding of this wealth of creativity (See Ciecko, this volume, for a discussion of African women filmmakers). Dash’s Daughters of the Dust was the first US film directed by a Black woman to be placed
in commercial theatrical release. Two earlier filmmakers, Jessie Maple and Kathleen Collins, were among the first Black women to create long-form dramatic narrative feature films: Maple directed Will (1981) and Collins directed Losing Ground (1982). First films produced by major Hollywood studios that were directed by Black women include: Euzhan Palcy’s A Dry White Season (1989, MGM); Leslie Harris’s Just Another Girl on the I.R.T. (1993, Miramax); and Darnell Martin’s I Like It Like That (1994, Columbia). Martin would later go on to direct other noteworthy films and television programs, including the Oprah Winfrey produced made-for-television adaptation of Zora Neale Hurston’s 1937 novel Their Eyes Were Watching God (2005, ABC). Martin joined Black women directors Gina PrinceBythewood, with Disappearing Acts (2000, HBO), and Julie Dash, with Funny Valentines (1999, BET), as being the first Black women to helm media adaptations of Black women’s literature. Yet another significant benchmark for Black women filmmakers occurred when Camille
Billops’ co-direction of Finding Christa (1991) received the Grand Jury Prize for documentaries at the 1992 Sundance Film Festival. More recently, Ava DuVernay earned the Best Director Award at Sundance for her film Middle of Nowhere (2012). Moreover, Academy Award nominations in diverse categories are represented by DuVernay with Selma (2014) nominated for Best Picture and Best Song (winning in the latter category). An earlier
AcademyAward nomination was garnered by director Dianne Houston for her filmTuesday Morning Ride (1995, Showtime). Black women’s films are corrective narratives, a form of “representational reparations”
featuring aspects of Black women’s lives, histories, and experiences different from those evident in mainstream films. Unheralded political activists such as Ella Baker, artists of the caliber of Sweet Honey in the Rock, and stylized documentaries looking at child adoption are a few examples.
