Entertainment
Movies About Racism Against Black People
Movies about racism are some of the most emotional and dramatic films to ever hit the silver screen. The top Black racism movies feature characters fighting for their basic rights from the time of slavery to more modern forms of discrimination. This is a list of African American racism movies featuring everything from 12 Years a Slave to The Help to Selma.
What movies will you find on this list of movies about racism against Black people? Fruitvale Station concerns a modern tragedy. Based on the real-life death of Oscar Grant, this award-winning film proves that racism still exists in modern times – and it can be deadly. The Color Purple is another great film that examines the ugly truths about racism in the United States.
While most movies about racism are dramas, Mel Brooks took on this serious issue with the hilarious comedy Blazing Saddles. Other good films featured on roundup of top movies about racism list include Crash, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, and Django Unchained.
Which movie about racism do you think deserves the top spot on this list? Vote the best films up to number one, and get in on the conversation in the comments section.
Ranked by
- 1
Denzel Washington, Angela Bassett, Albert Hall- Released: 1992
- Directed by: Spike Lee
A tribute to the controversial black activist and leader of the struggle for black liberation. He hit bottom during his imprisonment in the '50s, he became a Black Muslim and then a leader in the ...more - 2Viggo Mortensen, Mahershala Ali, Linda Cardellini
- Released: 2018
- Directed by: Peter Farrelly
Dr. Don Shirley is a world-class African-American pianist who's about to embark on a concert tour in the Deep South in 1962. In need of a driver and protection, Shirley recruits Tony Lip, a ...more - 3Whoopi Goldberg, Danny Glover, Margaret Avery
- Released: 1985
- Directed by: Steven Spielberg
An epic tale spanning forty years in the life of Celie (Whoopi Goldberg), an African-American woman living in the South who survives incredible abuse and bigotry. After Celie's abusive father marries ...more - 4Amandla Stenberg, Regina Hall, Russell Hornsby
- Released: 2018
- Directed by: George Tillman
Starr Carter is constantly switching between two worlds -- the poor, mostly black neighborhood where she lives and the wealthy, mostly white prep school that she attends. The uneasy balance between ...more - 5Sidney Poitier, Claudia McNeil, Ruby Dee
- Released: 1961
- Directed by: Daniel Petrie
This lauded drama follows the Youngers, an African-American family living together in an apartment in Chicago. Following the death of their patriarch, they try to determine what to do with the ...more - 6Sandra Bullock, Samuel L. Jackson, Matthew McConaughey
- Released: 1996
- Directed by: Joel Schumacher
Carl Lee Hailey (Samuel L. Jackson) is a heartbroken black father who avenges his daughter's brutal rape by shooting the bigoted men responsible for the crime as they are on their way to trial. He ...more - 7Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Benedict Cumberbatch
- Released: 2013
- Directed by: Steve McQueen
In the years before the Civil War, Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a free black man from upstate New York, is kidnapped and sold into slavery in the South. Subjected to the cruelty of one ...more - 8Viola Davis, Emma Stone, Bryce Dallas Howard
- Released: 2011
- Directed by: Tate Taylor
In 1960s Mississippi, Southern society girl Skeeter (Emma Stone) returns from college with dreams of being a writer. She turns her small town on its ear by choosing to interview the Black women who ...more - 9Tom Hanks, David Morse, Michael Clarke Duncan
- Released: 1999
- Directed by: Frank Darabont
Paul Edgecomb (Tom Hanks) walked the mile with a variety of cons. He had never encountered someone like John Coffey (Michael Clarke Duncan), a massive black man convicted of brutally killing a pair ...more - 10Denzel Washington, Will Patton, Donald Faison
- Released: 2000
- Directed by: Boaz Yakin
In Virginia, high school football is a way of life, an institution revered, each game celebrated more lavishly than Christmas, each playoff distinguished more grandly than any national holiday. And ...more - 11Matthew Broderick, Denzel Washington, Morgan Freeman
- Released: 1989
- Directed by: Edward Zwick
Following the Battle of Antietam, Col. Robert Gould Shaw (Matthew Broderick) is offered command of the United States' first all-African-American regiment, the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry. ...more - 12Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Leonardo DiCaprio
- Released: 2012
- Directed by: Quentin Tarantino
Two years before the Civil War, Django (Jamie Foxx), a slave, finds himself accompanying an unorthodox German bounty hunter named Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz) on a mission to capture the ...more - 13Gene Hackman, Willem Dafoe, Frances McDormand
- Released: 1988
- Directed by: Alan Parker
When a group of civil rights workers goes missing in a small Mississippi town, FBI agents Alan Ward (Willem Dafoe) and Rupert Anderson (Gene Hackman) are sent in to investigate. Local authorities ...more - 14David Oyelowo, Tom Wilkinson, Carmen Ejogo
- Released: 2014
- Directed by: Ava DuVernay
Although the Civil Rights Act of 1964 legally desegregated the South, discrimination was still rampant in certain areas, making it very difficult for Blacks to register to vote. In 1965, an Alabama ...more - 15Michael B. Jordan, Octavia Spencer, Melonie Diaz
- Released: 2013
- Directed by: Ryan Coogler
Though he once spent time in San Quentin, 22-year-old black man Oscar Grant (Michael B. Jordan) is now trying hard to live a clean life and support his girlfriend (Melonie Diaz) and young daughter ...more - 16Gregory Peck, Mary Badham, Phillip Alford
- Released: 1962
- Directed by: Robert Mulligan
Scout Finch (Mary Badham), 6,and her older brother, Jem (Phillip Alford), live in sleepy Maycomb, Ala., spending much of their time with their friend Dill (John Megna) and spying on their reclusive ...more - 17Denzel Washington, Tom Sizemore, Jennifer Beals
- Released: 1995
- Directed by: Carl Franklin
In late 1940s Los Angeles, Easy Rawlins (Denzel Washington) is an unemployed black World War II veteran with few job prospects. At a bar, Easy meets DeWitt Albright (Tom Sizemore), a mysterious white ...more - 18Chadwick Boseman, Josh Gad, Kate Hudson
- Released: 2017
- Directed by: Reginald Hudlin
Marshall is a 2017 American biographical drama film directed by Reginald Hudlin. Based on the early career of Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, this movie follows the young lawyer (Chadwick ...more - 19Chadwick Boseman, Nicole Beharie, Alan Tudyk
- Released: 2013
- Directed by: Brian Helgeland
42 is a 2013 American biographical sports film directed by Brian Helgeland. The powerful story of Jackie Robinson (Chadwick Boseman), the legendary baseball player who broke Major League Baseball’s ...more - 20Pervaiz Khan, Meera Syal, Yvonne Weekes
- Released: 1987
- Directed by: John Akomfrah
Handsworth Songs is a 1986 documentary film directed by John Akomfrah. It examines the 1985 riots in London and Birmingham's Handsworth district that erupted in reaction to the repressive policing of ...more - 21Jennifer Hudson, Kelvin Harrison Jr., John David Washington
- Released: 2019
- Directed by: Anthony Mandler
Monster (aka All Rise) is a 2019 American drama film directed by Anthony Mandler, based on the novel by Walter Dean Myers. A 17-year-old honor student whose world comes crashing down around him when ...more - 22Forest Whitaker, Oprah Winfrey, John Cusack
- Released: 2013
- Directed by: Lee Daniels
After leaving the South as a young man and finding employment at an elite hotel in Washington, D.C., Cecil Gaines (Forest Whitaker) gets the opportunity of a lifetime when he is hired as a butler at ...more - 23Ed Norton, Edward Furlong, Fairuza Balk
- Released: 1998
- Directed by: Tony Kaye
Living a life marked by violence and racism, neo-Nazi Derek Vinyard (Edward Norton) finally goes to prison after killing two black youths who tried to steal his car. Upon his release, Derek vows to ...more - 24Sidney Poitier, Rod Steiger, Warren Oates
- Released: 1967
- Directed by: Norman Jewison
African-American Philadelphia police detective Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier) is arrested on suspicion of murder by Bill Gillespie (Rod Steiger), the racist police chief of tiny Sparta, Mississippi. ...more - 25Omar Epps, Kristy Swanson, Michael Rapaport
- Released: 1995
- Directed by: John Singleton
In John Singleton's powerful portrait of college life in the 1990s, a group of incoming freshmen at Columbus University -- including varsity athlete Malik Williams (Omar Epps), awkward outcast Remy ...more
