Review of I Am Not Your Negro (2017) by Jason H — 19 Feb 2017

I liked this movie a lot.... a whole lot. It is in many ways a sad movie because so much of what Baldwin said nearly 50 years ago still seems so true. In other ways it is an optimistic movie (if for no other reason than) because he tells us to be optimistic in the film.

As the title suggests, this seems to be more a movie for white people than for black people (but maybe that's my whiteness telling me it's all about me), and Baldwin is definitely not mine or yours or anyone else's human being.

He is Baldwin. He and the film maker take the audience right up to the edge a squeemish-want-to-look-away discomfort (again, I'm guessing mainly white audience members will feel this way) but manages to keep his hooks in us with a wisdom and a lyricism that makes this film compelling.

If you're someone who thinks we already spend too much time talking about race, then I can almost guarantee that you won't like this movie, but I still wish you'd see it.