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Through a Lens Darkly: Black Photographers and the Emergence of a People Photos

Through a Lens Darkly: Black Photographers and the Emergence of a People (2014)

View All Photos (16)

Movie Info

Filmmaker Thomas Allen Harris examines how photography has affected the lives of black Americans.

Genre:

documentary
Original Language:

English
Director:

Thomas Allen Harris
Release Date (Streaming):

Mar 18, 2017
Box Office (Gross USA):

$65.2K
Runtime:

1h 30m

Cast & Crew

Thomas Allen Harris
Director

News & Interviews for Through a Lens Darkly: Black Photographers and the Emergence of a People

Critics Consensus: The November Man is Slick But Convoluted

View All

Critic Reviews for Through a Lens Darkly: Black Photographers and the Emergence of a People

All Critics (18) | Top Critics (12) | Fresh (11) | Rotten (7)

This ambitious and heartbreaking documentary tackles no less mammoth a subject than the African-American identity as it exists in photographic imagery.

February 20, 2015 | Full Review…

Drew Hunt
Chicago Reader
A fascinating, visually stunning, emotionally devastating documentary by Thomas Allen Harris.

December 11, 2014 | Rating: 3/4 | Full Review…

Ann Hornaday
Washington Post
This is sound-bite cinema, revealing at times, but also frustratingly basic stuff.

November 20, 2014 | Rating: 2.5/4

John Hartl
Seattle Times
With the thousand words vividly painted through each picture, we connect, identify and find solidarity.

November 14, 2014 | Full Review…

Martin Tsai
Los Angeles Times
Harris indulges in too many personal memoir detours and overdoes the talking heads, but much of the imagery on display is extraordinary.

August 29, 2014 | Rating: B | Full Review…

Peter Rainer
Christian Science Monitor
Though a tad uneven, as a whole the documentary cannily juggles an overview of African-American history in general with the specifics of its photographic representation and talents.

August 28, 2014 | Full Review…

Dennis Harvey
Variety
Thomas Allen Harris' lush, lovely, loving Through a Lens Darkly chronicles the role of photography in a 170-year history of the lives of black Americans. A teeming abundance of stirring and often brilliant imagery by African-American artists.

September 23, 2014 | Full Review…

Ray Pride
Newcity
Provocative and mildly engaging. It could have used a better organization of its wealth of facts.

August 29, 2014 | Rating: 7.12/10 | Full Review…

Avi Offer
NYC Movie Guru
It's all way too much, for in his desire to be comprehensive, Harris plumb forgets that less would have been more.

August 27, 2014 | Full Review…

David Noh
Film Journal International
Perhaps too ambitious in scope, a few truly powerful sequences still manage to elevate this historical overview of African-American photography above its uneven style.

August 27, 2014 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review…

Daniel Walber
Nonfics
Director Thomas Allen Harris has made an earnest, though often sloppy, documentary on the essential role imagery plays in shaping the narrative of a people.

August 26, 2014 | Rating: 3/5 | Full Review…

Andrew Lapin
The Dissolve
I just wish that, given it's a film about art, Through a Lens Darkly had taken a bit more of an artistic method to its message.

August 21, 2014 | Rating: B- | Full Review…

Glenn Dunks
Glenn Dunks