I’m ashamed, but also delighted, that there were copious movie titles completely new to me in Is That Black Enough for You?!?, film critic and writer-director Elvis Mitchell’s documentary survey of African-American cinema. Ashamed, because I was part of a Blaxploitation Marathon on the Filmspotting podcast (a term which this documentary deconstructs) and thought I had a decent handle on at least some of this territory. Delighted, because I can’t wait to dig into the likes of Claudine, The Spook Who Sat by the Door, and Uptown Saturday Night. In terms of structure, Is That Black Enough for You?!? is a bit scattershot, yet each individual segment reveals something trenchant (and often forgotten) about film history, while talking-head interviews with the likes of Harry Belafonte, Billy Dee Williams, and Suzanne de Passe provide clear-eyed, eyewitness testimony. The doc works best when Mitchell, who narrates, gets past the facts and lets his acutely observant critical voice merge with his memories, as when he recalls seeing Spook on the big screen with friends as a teenager in Detroit. His education then, is ours now.
(11/19/2022)
