The Black Audio Film Collective’s seventh film envisioned the death and life of the African American revolutionary as a seven part study in iconography as narrated by novelist Toni Cade Bambara and actor Giancarlo Espesito. The stylized tableaux vivants that memorialise Malcolm’s life referenced the early 20th century funeral photography of James Van der Zee’s The Harlem Book of the Dead and the elemental static cinematography of Sergei Paradjanov’s The Colour of Pomegranates.
Cast
Darrick Harris
Malcolm X
Danny Carter
Malcolm's Man
Martin Boothe
Malcolm's Man
Byron O. Hurlock
Malcolm's Man
Edward George
Malcolm's Man
Tricia Rose
Malcolm's Mother
Theodore L. Cash
Malcolm's Father
Olamide Faison
Young Malcolm
Giancarlo Esposito
Autobiography Reading (voice)
Toni Cade Bambara
Commentary (voice)
Coco Fusco
FBI Files Reading (as Coco Fusco)
Tiffany Nelson
Girl
Tiffany Tate
Girl
Wilfred X
(as Wilfred Little)
Betty Shabazz
Unknown
Spike Lee
Unknown
Greg Tate
Unknown
Hassan El-Sayeed
Unknown
Yuri Kochiyama
Unknown
Thulani Davis
Unknown
Robin D.G. Kelley
(as Robin Kelley)
Patricia Williams
Unknown
William Kunstler
Unknown
Benjamin 2X
(as Iman Benjamin Karim)
John Henrik Clarke
Unknown
Peter Goldman
Unknown
James Farmer
Unknown
Jan Carew
Unknown
Malcolm 'Shorty' Jarvis
Unknown
Peter Bailey
Unknown
