STAMPED FROM THE BEGINNING Documentary

Screening to be followed by a conversation with executive producer Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, producer Alisa Payne and executive producer Mara Brock Akil.

Adapting the celebrated book by historian and National Book Award-winning author Ibram X. Kendi, director Roger Ross Williams (LIFE, ANIMATED; the Oscar®-winning short film MUSIC BY PRUDENCE) cinematically explicates Kendi’s groundbreaking scholarship on structural anti-Black racism in the United States. Tracing the roots of racism from the time of the slave trade through the entirety of American history up to the present day, Williams presents the viewer with a powerful montage of historic and contemporary imagery from popular entertainment, advertising and the media that perniciously reinforce racist tropes and stereotypes, demeaning messaging whether subtle or overt. Interludes with dramatic reenactments bring to life the stories of important figures who pushed back against oppression, including poet Phillis Wheatley and crusading journalist Ida B. Wells. Along with Kendi, Williams interviews a wide range of academics and activists, including Angela Davis, Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, Brittany Packnett Cunningham, Carol Anderson and Jennifer L. Morgan. –Todd Hitchcock