Bozeman Magazine

On Sunday, February 26th, at the Emerson Center, The Bozeman Doc Series presents the Montana premiere of the Oscar nominated new documentary, I Am Not Your Negro. The film will be screened twice, at 4:30pm and 7:00pm. In 1979, James Baldwin wrote a letter to his literary agent describing his next project, Remember This House. The book was to be a revolutionary, personal account of the lives and successive assassinations of three of his close friends—Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr. At the time of Baldwin’s death in 1987, he left behind only thirty completed pages of his manuscript. Now, in his incendiary new documentary, master filmmaker Raoul Peck envisions the book James Baldwin never finished. The result is a radical, up-to-the-minute examination of race in America, using Baldwin’s original words and flood of rich archival material. I Am Not Your Negro is a journey into black history that connects the past of the Civil Rights movement to the present of Black Lives Matter. It is a film that questions black representation in Hollywood and beyond. And, ultimately, by confronting the deeper connections between the lives and assassination of these three leaders, Baldwin and Peck have produced a work that challenges the very definition of what America stands for. One of the most critically-acclaimed documentaries of the year, the film is currently nominated for the Best Documentary Oscar. “Five stars…a striking work of storytelling…James Baldwin’s words weave a film of immense power…one of the best movies about the civil rights era ever made.” The Guardian “Transcendent…takes a kaleidoscopic journey through the life and mind of James Baldwin, whose voice speaks even more powerfully today than it did 50 years ago.” Variety “A mesmerizing cinematic experience, smart, thoughtful and disturbing…powerfully and painfully relevant today even though its subject died almost 30 years ago. "Not everything that is faced can be changed," Baldwin says at one point, "but nothing can be changed until it is faced." As much as any film out there today, I Am Not Your Negro helps us face our racial divide and possibly begin to change it as well.” Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times Note: The film was originally scheduled to screen on Thursday, February 23rd, but due to scheduling conflicts, has been moved to Sunday, February 26th. Doors open 30 minutes before each screening. Tickets are available at the door or before the show at Cactus Records and Movie Lovers. Tickets are also available online at www.bozemandocseries.org. The screening is supported by the Montana Racial Equity Project, a 501(c)3 non-profit and non-partisan organization which works with individuals, groups, organizations, educational institutions, and businesses to promote and create opportunities to build racial equity in Montana.