Black Cinema at the Oscars: Hale County This Morning, This Evening

This series will profile Black cinema representation at the 2019 Academy Awards.

Hale County This Morning, This Evening takes place in the Black belt of the South - a region of the United States that held the largest number of plantations. This is important context to consider while watching the documentary as it cuts back and forth between questions about remnants of the South’s history and clips from what appears to be the Birth of a Nation.

The Hale counties of the world sometimes feel like forgotten places - stuck in time. Hale County is the type of place I would visit during family reunions as a child. It had distant cousins, suffocating heat, red clay and not much in terms of things to do. I was thankful that I was able to go back home after a weekend, although my hometown of Jacksonville, FL wasn’t that much better.

The camera follows the documentary subjects, Quincy and Daniel, in such a way that it doesn’t feel like you’re peeking in on someone else’s life. It feels like you’re right there with them like when they’re standing outside joyfully waiting for a storm to come. However, the film isn’t naive enough to forget the South’s oppressive role in the lives of Black people and how it still impacts the socioeconomics of the Black people who remain in the rural south.

Hale County This Morning, This Evening is nominated for Best Documentary Feature. It is currently streaming on PBS.