Black History Month movie recommendations from an expert

It's me. I'm the expert.

Streaming services have put together their Black History Month collections and, well, yikes. Max—formerly HBO—for example has a “Black Voices” section that includes movies like Bad Boys, Ghost Dog and Black Orpheus. While these are movies I really enjoy—and they are certainly movies with great Black actors—they are also all written and directed exclusively by white men. Max’s TV picks are even worse. The Wire, as an example, again, is a great show, but mostly written and fully created by white man David Simon. Industry is another show in that group and while one of its two creators is Black, it is a British show created by Brits and British Black History Month is in October. Also, its premier episode was directed by hipster racist Lena Dunham (may we never forget this particular Lena Dunham lie).

Bookie might just be the most insulting of all of Max’s chosen Black Voices, as it not only was created by white men and has white writers and directors, but the entire show is just a vehicle for its white comedian lead, Sebastian Maniscalco. The only Black regular on the show seems to be Omar Dorsey who is incredible as Sebastian’s sidekick, a character that apparently gets treated like this:

Anyway, the point is that even in 2025, some still find it difficult to put together any kind of list of movies written by, directed by and starring Black people. This might have something to do with the over 500 Black movies erased from existence.

So, here are five movie recommendations speaking with actual from-the-chest Black voices. And since I know some nights it can be difficult to commit to a movie, I’ve included five TV series recommendations as well.

Also, you should know that my movie recommendation expertise lies in the total of 15 years I worked at video stores back when they existed.

#VideoportForever.