Imitation of Life

Imitation of Life

A struggling widow and her daughter take in a black housekeeper and her fair-skinned daughter. The two women start a successful business but face...

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Animal Crackers

Animal Crackers

The well-known explorer and hunter Captain Spaulding has just returned from Africa, and is being welcomed home with a lavish party at the estate of...

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The Emperor Jones

The Emperor Jones

Unscrupulously ambitious, Brutus Jones escapes from jail after killing a guard and, through bluff and bravado, finds himself the emperor of a...

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One Mile from Heaven

One Mile from Heaven

A female journalist travels to a new neighborhood after getting a (false) lead and is surprised by what she finds.

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The Letter

The Letter

A planter's wife shoots a neighbor, but tells conflicting stories of what happened.

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Black and Tan

Black and Tan

Duke Ellington plays hot jazz in a fictional story that finds him down on his luck; he tries in vain to dissuade his friend, dancer Fredi...

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Black Shadows on a Silver Screen

Black Shadows on a Silver Screen

Ossie Davis narrates a history of "race films," films made before 1950 which catered to a primarily black audience.

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Cab Calloway's Hi-De-Ho

Cab Calloway's Hi-De-Ho

This jazz musical short has a comedy plot about marital infidelity. Bandleader Cab Calloway plays a ladies man who dates the wife (Fredi...

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Ouanga

Ouanga

In Haiti, a black female plantation owner enacts a voodoo curse, and revives zombies for revenge on a white male neighbor, who has chosen a white...

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Mills Blue Rhythm Band

Mills Blue Rhythm Band

In this short film, musical and dance acts perform, first at a night club, then at a "rent party".

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Square Joe

Square Joe

A well-respected boxer is framed by his enemies in the death of a policeman during a raid on a local gambling establishment. He is convicted and...

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