Final night time, as I’m wont to do, I went to the Music Field Theatre. There, a programme in its seventh iteration titled Life Throughout the Lens happened. It was staged by the Chicago-based programmer and curator Tyler Balentine, who beforehand introduced his Melanin, Roots, and Tradition collection in 2024 and 2025, which featured Life Throughout the Lens as an accompanying shorts block. This 12 months, not solely did he stage this shorts part, he additionally started a weekly collection at Sides of Black shorts entitled Sunday’s Finest, which may have its closing displaying on March 1.
His assemblage of seven shorts on this 12 months’s Life Throughout the Lens stuffed the 700+ seat theater on the Music Field, the place a sea of Black people celebrated cinematic choices, whether or not by way of the origins of their creators or the place of their setting, with ties to Chicago. These screened works leaped effortlessly throughout genres to sort out heady subjects, usually with light-hearted aptitude. So, as I settled into my seat with a plate of àkàrà, jollof rice, rooster suya kabob, doused with a spicy peri-peri sauce, all from Dozzy’s Grill, a neighborhood West African restaurant which catered the night time, I took in a bevy of sincerely crafted tales that reminded of the potentiality of Black cinema.
The programme started with Jacob Sutton’s “BLK IS TIME/WAKE UP,” an summary piece that mixes footage of dance, usually slowed to a crawl, matched with an lively lyrical piece of poetry. Filmed on the Dance Middle of Columbia School Chicago, the lo-fi quick witnesses a lone dancer, wearing a white button-up shirt, transferring by way of an amber-lit area with sharp depth. Generally Sutton’s use of time lapse turns into so intense, it feels as if our protagonist will merely spin out of body. Bending time to even higher impact is the usage of The Final Poets’s 1971 observe “Black is Chant/Black is Time.” These verses’ energetic, usually kinetic rhythm, gives a rebellious backbeat to the honed actions of the protagonist, intimating the pulsations of Black life.
That agile quick transitions into Sarah Oberholtzer’s extra meditative work “We Name Every Different.” In that movie, which is the primary of a three-part collection the director has conceived, a father (Ronald L. Conner) of three brings liquid fertilizer for a backyard he maintains in his residence. Sooner or later, nevertheless, his fertilizer goes lacking. He initially suspects the local people backyard may’ve taken his provide till he discovers {that a} younger man, with equal horticultural ambitions, may’ve swiped it as an alternative. Whilst you may anticipate the movie to take a vengeful flip, it fortunately doesn’t. As an alternative, Oberholtzer invests the piece with an unusual sense of empathy that exemplifies the quiet understanding required to uplift associates, neighbors, and even strangers.
That sense of permitting grace to unlikely figures additionally takes place within the programme’s third movie: Phil Lee’s satirical quick “Road Magnate.” The easy premise sees a plainly dressed Cory (Edward Williams III) strolling into an workplace constructing housing Layment Buyers. He asks to talk to the proprietor and is summarily dismissed by the receptionist. Quite than be deterred, he steadfastly sees his approach in to speak to 3 white staff. I don’t wish to spoil the flip that happens after this level, however suffice it to say, it’s not only a ‘don’t choose a guide by its cowl’ state of affairs. It’s additionally an occasion of subversion that neatly re-works the racist perceptions of Black males right into a punchline that’s equal elements humorous and eloquent.
The programme continued emphasizing ardour through Sanicole’s metaphysical odyssey “The Guess.” Right here, Blue (Vincent Fenner Jr), a wayward teenager gunned down after making an attempt to rob a comfort retailer, turns into a spirit alongside the sage Equipment (Church Lockett). Via numerous acts of kindness, the latter, regardless of being jaded about humanity, has tried to make his approach from this purgatory into heaven. Blue, the beginner, who nonetheless believes within the inherent goodness of man, makes a wager with Equipment to show that folks will be saved. If Blue wins, then Equipment should present him how one can transport from place to put. If Equipment wins, then Blue should sever contact with him. Other than its charitable premise, this movie thrives on Fenner and Lockett’s easygoing comedic chemistry, which turns the afterlife on Chicago’s streets right into a poignant story about brotherhood.
Intuitively, the ghostly story of “The Guess” leads us into Eve Wright’s equally phantasmagorical story “The Scorekeeper.” On this style image, one can really feel shades of Jordan Peele’s “US” when a Black lady named Jade (Bri McDonald), who’s getting ready for a primary date, is adopted by a Black feminine apparition… aka the Scorekeeper (Alexis Queen), who’s lugging an AV membership tv behind her. In the course of the indirect movie, tough recollections rise to the floor through the Scorekeeper’s poking and prodding by way of cryptic questions directed at Jade. This speculative format additionally reminds one in every of Rungano Nyoni’s “On Changing into a Guinea Fowl,” which additionally hoped to parse previous traumas by way of metaphor. The sense of temper is the same as the duty, fashioning a story that doesn’t instantly give itself over to straightforward solutions.
At this level, I’m going to exit of flip by mentioning Luchina Fisher’s uplifting sports activities documentary “Group Dream.” The ultimate movie within the programme, although it’s not the final one I’m writing about, lovingly captures its two topics: Ann E. Smith and Madeline Murphy Rabb. Each are coaching for the 2022 Nationwide Senior Video games. Smith was the primary African-American lady to win a statewide election in Illinois, incomes a spot on the College of Illinois Board of Trustees. Rabb was Govt Director of the Chicago Workplace of Wonderful Arts. Each girls, now of their 80s, took up swimming for a number of causes. In the beginning, as a result of the exercise fulfills them. Secondly, they wish to disprove the stereotype that Black individuals don’t swim. Fisher tells their story merely but successfully, giving us a full overview of their prodigious backgrounds and displaying the extreme effort they put right into a sport that brings out their aggressive fireplace.
Of all of the movies featured within the programme, nevertheless, probably the most thrilling is perhaps Shiloh Tumo Washington’s “Bailey’s Blues.” A black and white shot marvel, the movie, because the director defined in a Q&A, is impressed by an extended, un-produced function the director intends to make. When that function didn’t come to fruition, he determined to craft this documentary concerning the protagonist. The result’s stellar and highly effective.
The fictional Marion Bailey (Namir Smallwood) is a jazz stand-up bass participant, who’s being interviewed by a white French journalist (Pierre Lucas) in 1962 about his position as a Black man on this musical style. Quite than give this gazy reporter some eloquent sob story concerning the plight of artistry, he volleys a collection of bristling retorts whose frankness electrifies each second. This honesty commentary about systemic racism can’t be seemed away from, significantly due to Smallwood’s unflinching relationship to the digicam and the fabric. As soon as extra, the movie can be extremely shot, matching the model of Nineteen Sixties French documentaries right down to the subtitles. I encourage of somebody, please give Washington the means essential to understand his imaginative and prescient. As a result of what’s on show right here is clearly unimaginable.