Nothing But a Man

This little seen film is often regarded as one of the first honest portrayals of African American life in America. Made in 1964, it's an independent, understated, realist film -- it feels like life. Duff is a railroad hand in the South who falls in love and marries preachers daughter. It's not a film that offers easy solutions, in fact it's not even a film that points out problems (racially speaking, that is), it merely presents the lives of its few characters and the everyday struggles that they face, some of which are racial. Duff is a proud, stubborn man with a troubled family history, who equates his job with his masculinity. So when he loses his job for insinuating the idea of unionizing, he finds it difficult to get a new job which sends him into a kind of depression, because he is the man and must provide for his family. In it's own, understated way, the film presents the struggles of the family as a combination of personal and societal, which leads to a lovely, little conclusion. I consider this to be one of the best films of its kind because of its honesty and integrity, while not resorting to anger and simplistic, liberal solutions to problems which turn out to be more complex than one might at first notice.