Shadow and Act has a special Valentine’s Day present for our readers:

We’ve put together a video documenting 122 years of #BlackLove. Set to the score of Barry Jenkins’ If Beale Street Could Talk by Nicholas Brittell, it starts with 1898’s Something Good-Negro Kiss (which was recently restored for viewing by USC) to 2018’s Beale.

In December 2018, Twitter user Kyle (@kyalbr) saw the release of Something Good-Negro Kiss as an opportunity to mesh the newly found piece of history with another artifact of Black love, the recently released If Beale Street Could Talk. Using the film’s score, he gave the short film a brand new life, heightening the already happy and carefree tone of the film. We extended that theme through over a century of Black love on screen with our video, Shadow and Act Presents: 122 Years of #BlackLove.

Watch the video below:

Featuring:

Something Good-Negro Kiss (1898)
Stormy Weather (1943)

Carmen Jones (1954)

Lady Sings The Blues (1972)

Claudine (1974)
Mahogany (1975)

The Color Purple (1984)

Coming to America (1988)
Boomerang (1992)
Poetic Justice (1993)
Jason’s Lyric (1994)
Love Jones (1997)
How Stella Got Her Groove Back (1998)

Love and Basketball (2000)

Deliver us from Eva (2003)

Their Eyes Were Watching God (2005)

Seven Pounds (2008)

Just Wright (2010)

Middle of Nowhere (2012)

Moonlight (2016)
Black Panther (2018)
If Beale Street Could Talk (2018)

The Photograph (2020)

Jason's Lyric