Filmography
Featuring well-known L.A. Rebellion works alongside rarely seen student films, this body of work represents not only the originality of the individuals whose names are on them, but a collective vision as well. Across the two decades during which they made their presence felt at UCLA, and in the decades since, individual L.A. Rebellion artists have focused on diverse topics and responded to evolving political and artistic thought through their work. Explorations of class, considerations of historical legacies, stories attentive to concerns of local communities and appreciations of other Black arts are only some of the areas of exploration. The films also display a diversity of forms, from irreverent reconfigurations of well-worn genre types, to groundbreaking experiments with cinematic language. Certain works, long out of circulation, represent rediscoveries and will certainly lead to much future scholarship.
Learn more about the UCLA Film & Television Archive’s ongoing “L.A. Rebellion” inititiative.
| Title | Year | |
|---|---|---|
 |
Hidden Memories Jacqueline Frazier’s first film confronts the issue of teenage pregnancy, remaining extremely ambiguous about all choices for young women, whether celibacy or sexual activity, abortions or marriage. |
1977 |
 |
Homeland A family searches for its identity and tries to maintain its integrity in the face of younger brother Louis’ demand that his half of the family farm, that he jointly owns with his brother, be sold. The older brother, John, lives with his wife, Emma and their son John Jr. on the farm. The story begins when Louis arrives with the news that he has been accepted to law school and plans to move to the city and become socially active. The film is set in a rural area in 1960. |
1988 |
 |
The Horse Charles Burnett employs a sparse lyricism in this haunting coming-of-age tale about an African American boy tending to a horse that is to be put down. |
1973 |
 |
Hour Glass A young African-American male rethinks his role as a basketball player for the white establishment as he reads the works of Third World theoreticians, such as Franz Fanon, in Haile Gerima’s “Project One” film. |
1971 |
 |
I & I: An African Allegory Weaving experimental, dramatic and documentary styles, Ben Caldwell’s I & I is a moving meditation on reciprocity. |
1979 |
 |
Illusions Set in Hollywood during World War II, Julie Dash's Illusions explores the nature of Hollywood fantasy and the illusion of racial identity. |
1982 |
 |
Killer of Sheep Charles Burnett’s captivating vision of 1970s Watts reveals a vibrant community living in the dusty lots, cramped houses and concrete jungles of South Los Angeles. The episodic narrative revolves around the emotional pressures faced by a factory worker; moments of humor and despair, mixed with evocative African American music, form a clear-eyed, compassionate portrait. |
1977 |
 |
The Kitchen Filmmaker Alile Sharon Larkin visualizes a mental ward as a possible equivalent to prison incarceration for women of color. |
1975 |
 |
L.A. in My Mind O.Funmilayo Makarah's captivating montage of notable Los Angeles sites, laced with free-floating names of places and people, becomes a delightful, personal canon of spiritually sustaining quantities. |
2006 |
 |
A Little Off Mark Writer-director Robert Wheaton’s story of a shy guy, Mark (Parros), trying all the wrong the moves to meet the right girl rides high on a romantic sensibility. |
1986 |
