{"id":30432,"date":"2019-02-11T11:35:42","date_gmt":"2019-02-11T16:35:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=30432"},"modified":"2019-02-11T22:22:07","modified_gmt":"2019-02-12T03:22:07","slug":"horror-noire-a-history-of-black-horror-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2019\/02\/11\/horror-noire-a-history-of-black-horror-2019\/","title":{"rendered":"Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror (2019)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>\u201cBlack History is<\/em><\/strong> Black Horror.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHorror Noire\u201d is the film you have to see right now. If you fancy yourself a horror aficionado, a film buff, or just a lover of history, \u201cHorror Noire\u201d is essential viewing that is long overdue. For a long time we\u2019ve garnered some amazing documentaries that have covered a lot of overlooked chapters in horror cinema, and \u201cHorror Noire\u201d touches upon the most important era, exploring the history of African Americans in horror cinema, and how they evolved from being demonized, to becoming props, right up to becoming genuine heroes.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Directed by Xavier Burgin (written by \u201cHorror Noire\u201d author Robin Means Coleman, along with Ashlee Blackwell and Danielle Burrows) covers the span of African Americans in film and how their stereotypes and stigmas were transferred over in to horror cinema. Burgins is bold in his exploration of African Americans and how they\u2019ve been perceived, discussing the origin of horrendous tropes and clich\u00e9s conceived in 1915\u2019s \u201cBirth of a Nation\u201d and how it took decades for the race to step back for what was generally an accepted depiction. Even from the president. True, \u201cBirth of a Nation\u201d is not traditionally considered horror, but it helped to demonize and stigmatize a whole race of people, and opened the door for many of the hideous stereotypes that were accepted for decades.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s so refreshing is that \u201cHorror Noire\u201d explores the history of black horror cinema through the eyes of African Americans. Director Burgin side steps a lot of typical talking heads and professors, and brings us in to a more intimate experience on what many within the African American community have felt watching their contemporaries depicted on-screen as almost nothing but dismissible clich\u00e9s. There\u2019s a lot of enlightening discussion, from the invention of goofy devices like the \u201cSacrificial Negro,\u201d the \u201cMagical Negro,\u201d and of course the token in slasher films that almost always died first. Director Burgin runs down the history garnering reactions and frank discussion from folks like Keith David, Jordan Peele, Tony Todd, Director Ernest Dickerson, and writer and scholar Tananarive Due.<\/p>\n

Burgin also explores how strong characters like Duane Jones in \u201cNight of the Living Dead,\u201d and William Marshall in \u201cBlacula\u201d helped changed the perception of minority characters in the genre. As well, there\u2019s also honest insight in to the Blaxploitation movement, how the black character dying first in slashers had pros and cons, and the inevitable rise of the African American hero in films like \u201cAttack the Block\u201d and \u201cGet Out.\u201d One of the most entertaining elements, though, was the often riveting reactions from folks like Miguel Nunez Jr. and Ken Foree, all of whom discuss their crucial roles in very popular movies and how the general public felt about them. There\u2019s an especially sweet callback from \u201cThe Craft\u2019s\u201d Rachel True who fondly remembers an encounter with a fan of the film that validated her importance in the film.<\/p>\n

Overall, I would have loved to see more about how George Romero helped diversify the horror genre, and Romero\u2019s more complex ideas about race and class warfare depicted in his films \u201cNight\u201d and \u201cDawn.\u201d Either way, \u201cHorror Noire\u201d is a much needed chronicle of the history of African Americans in horror cinema and horror as a whole. It\u2019s a painfully overdue education in cinema that should be essential viewing for film students and film buffs alike.<\/p>\n

Now Streaming Exclusively on Shudder.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cBlack History is Black Horror.\u201d \u201cHorror Noire\u201d is the film you have to see right now. If you fancy yourself a horror aficionado, a film buff, or just a lover of history, \u201cHorror Noire\u201d is essential viewing that is long overdue. For a long time we\u2019ve garnered some amazing documentaries that have covered a lot […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[64,138,292,357,359,469,477],"class_list":["post-30432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-adaptation","tag-biography","tag-documentary","tag-film-history","tag-filmmaking","tag-history","tag-horror"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30432"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30432\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30438,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30432\/revisions\/30438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}