On black representation in movies

It’s absurd to expect every piece of black art to reflect everyone’s black experience, but that’s exactly what many black artists are expected to do. This discourages black artists from taking the kind of risks that make what they’re creating worth consuming, because unless you want to draw someone’s ire for “making black people look bad” or “reinforcing stereotypes” you have to make something, well, boring. The paradox is that if we had more commercially successful black art, there would be less of a crisis of representation and more opportunity to make books and movies that would offer more insight into the diversity of the black experience in America. It would also mean more and better art.

From The Problem With Black Movies Is That There Aren’t Enough Of Them. (Via @negrophile)

Also see: On black folks and the movie “Precious”