"Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom": A Lesson in Blues
With raw and unapologetic performances by Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman, stories about the hardships of Black musicians are weaved in with The Blues.

"This two-part video is a newcomer’s portrait of Montréal. I spent my first winter in Québec in a cold, dark, first floor apartment. I sat in the kitchen beside the electric heater, drinking coffee while watching the electric meter, wondering how I would pay my bills. At night, I looked at the illuminated “Q” on the Hydro Québec building and imagined how much it cost to keep it lit. In the second section, a man looks for meaning in the tile patterns of the Champ-de-Mars metro station. I took his search to an end more absurd than anything I could hope to enact. The moral of these two tales is: “Don’t lose you sense of humour”. It’s from this cliché that the video derives its title." - Nelson Henricks
With raw and unapologetic performances by Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman, stories about the hardships of Black musicians are weaved in with The Blues.
I came across Urchin by chance and decided to watch it because of the title. It made me think of the spiky animal that lives at the bottom of the ocean, and the old Dickensian novels, where an urchin was an orphaned, homeless child in shaggy and dirty clothes.
This is a list of seven films that explore police brutality and systemic racism made by Black filmmakers. These are important movies to watch and to take in, as — through the power of cinema — they showcase what it feels like to be a Black person living in a country that is internally designed to be against you.
Documented human suffering is never easy to view or read about and is understandably triggering for many people, but it can be educational, and education is a key to change. An overwhelming amount queer people worldwide (and in my own country) have it far worse than I could imagine, and documentaries such as Welcome to Chechnya bring issues to light that certain groups of people would never see.
This indie short documentary archived the story of a staple rock band as well as an essential part of local history.
"Idina Menzel: Which Way to the Stage?" shows viewers how the star became who she is today.