Sundance. A Good Day to Be Black and Sexy.

"A groundbreaking film, Dennis Dortch's A Good Day To Be Black and Sexy is, despite its provocative title, getting only a smidgen of the notices that Lance Hammer's Ballast is when people begin to talk about so called 'Black' films in Park City," writes Brandon Harris. "The films exist on almost completely opposite ends of the filmmaking spectrum - Black and Sexy is a frank, joyous, aesthetically alive comedy of manners, where Ballast is an oblique, joyless superimposition of the Dardenne Brothers style on the overwrought concerns of tragedy stricken Blacks living in the Mississippi Delta.... Full of jump cuts, naturalistic camera work, and situations never before glimpsed in narrative films before, A Good Day To Be Black and Sexy exorcises the demons of Toms, Coons, Mammies and Bucks that honest black cinematic representation is constantly attempting to dislodge from the American psyche. Never salacious or mean spirited, the vignettes don't shy away from the uncomfortable aspects of modern sexuality and maintains a healthy irreverence in its sexual politics."

Oddly enough, though, just the other day... "One chapter is like something the Dardennes might do if they wanted to make a sex picture (it's a big might, but still)," suggests the Boston Globe's Wesley Morris.

"I had one industry person chuckle as he mumbled, 'So, it's like a Black art film?'" writes Dortch at Filmmaker's blog.

Online listening tip. Kevin Buist at the SpoutBlog: "Stars Mylika Davis and Jerome Anthony Hawkins discuss why they were happy to portray black sexuality in a fresh way."

Posted by dwhudson at January 25, 2008 4:05 PM