Biography
Amiri Baraka (born Everett LeRoi Jones October 7, 1934), formerly known as LeRoi Jones and Imamu Amear Baraka, is an African-American writer of poetry, drama, fiction, essays, and music criticism. He is the author of numerous books of poetry and has taught at a number of universities, including the State University of New York at Buffalo and the State University of New York at Stony Brook. He received the PEN Open Book Award, formerly known as the Beyond Margins Award, in 2008 for Tales of the O...
Known For
Complete Filmography
The Dutchman
2025
Original Story
A successful black businessman, haunted by his crumbling marriage and identity crisis, is drawn into a psychological game of cat and mouse with a myst...
Sing! Fight! Sing! Fight! From LeRoi to Amiri
2024
as Self
The story of how Everett Leroy Jones became Amiri Baraka, from his childhood to the mid '60s, is told through interviews recorded in the late '90s.
Ferlinghetti: A Rebirth of Wonder
2009
as Self
The poet and painter, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, is among the world's living monuments to arts and letters. For well over a half century, Ferlinghetti hel...
Obscene
2008
as Self
A look at the life and work of American publisher Barney Rosset, who struggled to bring controversial works like "Tropic of Cancer" and "Naked Lunch" ...
New York Agora: The Legacy of the 60s Counterculture
2008
as Himself
The film explores the memory and the legacy of the 60s counterculture through interviews with NY political activists, artists and people on the street...
Return to Gorée
2007
as Self
Because jazz is the miraculous product of the horror of slavery, Youssou N'Dour returned to the slave route and the music they created, in search of n...
Turn Me On
2007
as Self
Out of the underground archives and the emblematic figures of these avant-garde movements, featuring Steve Ben Israel of the Living Theater, the puppe...
Polis Is This: Charles Olson and the Persistence of Place
2007
Documentary about Charles Olson, exploring his life and the significance of Gloucester, Massachusetts.
Poets at the Living Theater
2006
as Self
With Allen Ginsberg, Frank O'Hara, Ray Bremser, Le Roi Jones, Peter Orlovsky, this film takes place in the Living Theater, 1958.
Hubert Selby Jr: It/ll Be Better Tomorrow
2006
as Self
An exploration into the life and art of the renowned author of "Last Exit To Brooklyn" and "Requiem For A Dream." Hubert Selby Jr., a self-described "...
The Pact
2006
as Himself
A gritty, provocative true-life story of three friends from the 'hood, Rameck Hunt, Sampson Davis, and George Jenkins, who made a pact in high school ...
Cecil Taylor: All The Notes
2005
as Himself
Cecil Taylor was the grand master of free jazz piano. "All the Notes" captures in breezy fashion the unconventional stance of this media-shy modern mu...
Sun Ra: Brother From Another Planet
2005
as Self
Sun Ra was born on the planet Saturn some time ago. The best accounts agree that he emerged on Earth as Herman Blount, born in Birmingham, Alabama in ...
Bulworth
1998
as Rastaman
A suicidally disillusioned liberal politician puts a contract out on himself and takes the opportunity to be bluntly honest with his voters by affecti...
Scenes from Allen's Last Three Days on Earth as a Spirit
1997
as Self
This is a video record of the Buddhist Wake ceremony at Allen Ginsberg's apartment. You see Allen, now asleep forever, in his bed; some of his close f...
James Baldwin: The Price of the Ticket
1989
as Self
James Baldwin was at once a major 20th century American author, a Civil Rights activist and, for two crucial decades, a prophetic voice calling Americ...
Langston Hughes: The Dream Keeper
1987
as Himself
One in a series of 13 documentaries on renowned American poets produced by the New York Center for Visual History. Described by director St. Clair Bou...
In Motion: Amiri Baraka
1983
as Himself
This video portrait, filmed in the days leading up to Amiri Baraka’s appeal of his 90-day sentence for resisting arrest following an argument in his c...
Poetry in Motion
1982
as Self
More than 20 contemporary North American poets recite, sing, and perform their work. Early in the film, Charles Bukowski talks about the energy of poe...
I Heard It Through the Grapevine
1982
as Self
Renowned Black writer James Baldwin retraces his time in the South during the Civil Rights Movement, reflecting with his trademark brilliance and insi...
Death of a Prophet
1981
After breaking ties with the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X became a man marked for death...and it was just a matter of time before his enemies closed in....
Fried Shoes Cooked Diamonds
1979
as Self
After World War II a group of young writers, outsiders and friends who were disillusioned by the pursuit of the American dream met in New York City. A...
Black Theatre: The Making of a Movement
1978
as Self
This documentary explores the growth and development of black theatre from its earliest roots, also examining its close ties with the civil rights mov...
Medea
1973
Writer
Ben Caldwell’s Medea, a collage piece made on an animation stand and edited entirely in the camera, combines live action and rapidly edited still imag...
Nationtime
1972
as Self
A report on the National Black Political Convention held in Gary, Indiana, in 1972, a historic event that gathered Black voices from across the politi...
Nationtime
1972
Writer
A report on the National Black Political Convention held in Gary, Indiana, in 1972, a historic event that gathered Black voices from across the politi...
1 P.M.
1971
as Self
Lighter and livelier than the films Jean-Luc Godard had made in France, his U.S. collaboration with Direct Cinema documentarian D. A. Pennebaker was m...
A Fable
1971
Screenplay, Theatre Play
A black radical's ex-wife and children establish a new family unit with a Caucasian man, but he eventually returns to violently besiege them inside th...
Black Journal: 23; New-Ark
1970
as Self
A short documentary subject made for National Educational Television's Black Journal television program documenting a political rally in Newark, the 1...
The New-Ark
1969
as Self
Beginning as a city-symphony of Newark streets, buildings, and people set to wordless chanting, The New-Ark quickly arrives at its political imperativ...
The New-Ark
1969
Director, Writer
Beginning as a city-symphony of Newark streets, buildings, and people set to wordless chanting, The New-Ark quickly arrives at its political imperativ...
Black Spring
1967
Director
A short, formerly missing document of Amiri’s time in the Bay Area working with the Black Panthers and San Francisco State University’s Black Student ...
Dutchman
1966
Writer
A young conservative black man, minding his own business, rides a nearly empty subway car. The only other passenger, a blonde vixen looking for troubl...
Cellar Vigil
1966
Director
A suite of rarely seen, unreleased films by the poet, activist, and scholar Amiri Baraka.