The Denton Black Film Festival has more to celebrate this January than just its fifth year in operation. It’s also screening some of its main attractions in the spiffy new Alamo Drafthouse, so festivalgoers can order good food and discuss what they’ve seen over the theater’s plentiful selection of craft beer. Among those headlining films is an anniversary screening of Imitation of Life, Douglas Sirk’s opulent, highly problematic, and incredible-looking 1959 melodrama about a mixed-race teenage girl who is light-skinned enough to pass for white.
Other attractions you might want to catch include Moussa Djigo’s Obamas, which isn’t about the former president but rather a French-language romantic comedy set in Montreal; Loraine Blumenthal’s The Mayor’s Race, about a black candidate running for the mayoralty of Bristol, England; and Mr. Soul, a documentary about the largely forgotten figure of Ellis Haizlip, the openly gay TV host who brought African-American culture and arts to the nation’s living rooms in the late 1960s.
Of course, the DBFF will also have its share of non-film activities, including art exhibitions and seminars at myriad locations around Denton, as well as a musical performance by Kirk Whalum at UNT to cap off the whole affair.
The Denton Black Film Festival runs Wed-Sat at various venues in Denton. Single tickets are free-$10, passes are $14-189. Call 469-573-079
