2011 Black History Month: An Introduction

By: Luke Florence
February was always my least favorite month of the year. Think about it. For a guy who loves being outside, February in the Midwest is a disaster. Coldness, snowness, and miserableness all clumped together to make February just an awful 28 days.

But, as a wise man once said, "I get by with a little help from my friends."

Enter Matt Barnes.

Enter Black History Month.

And enter another King of Arguments list.

In 2005 it started simply enough as I sent Barnes a different song each day with the word "black" in the title. No list, no order, just random "black" songs.

We got ourselves a little more organized four years later as I compiled a list of my favorite black television characters. Then in 2010 I attempted to put together a list of my favorite black sporting moments. The list was created, but never finalized on the blog.

Now we our back at it again, as Matt Barnes asked me to compile a list of my favorite black actor performances in film. He gave me no criteria, although he practically begged that I include a female on the list (I've never had a female on any of my BHM lists ... go ahead call me a sexist). So, I was left to my own devices to formulate an appropriate criteria.

#1 - I had to actually watch the movie. This seriously hurt the chances of Sidney Poitier making the list because although he is considered one of the best African-American actors of all-time, I've never watched a single movie he was in.
#2 - Actors and actresses are allowed on the list multiple times. Usual suspects apply here. Technically I could have put one actor or actress on my list 28 times and called it a day. However, I have more respect for the list-making process and Black History Month in general to allow that.

#3 - I leaned heavily on movies I enjoyed. There are no performances on this list that come from movies I disliked. In fact, the top five performances all come from movies that are probably safe in my top twenty all-time favorite movies.

#4 - Reputation helps. If you are a great African-American actor or actress and I haven't seen a lot of your movies, I tried to include a notable performance that I had seen and placed that in the list. This really only applies to the bottom-half of my list, but it needed to be noted.

Now that you know my criteria, also know that as with almost every list I make, I try to do three things: make you think, make you laugh, and make you debate. I love putting lists together, and each one presents it's own set of challenges. I had an extremely tough time with the top ten, and even though I've written them down, they could still be changed.

We will post one performance a day, starting on Wednesday, and we will attempt to do one-a-day for the entire month. Hopefully Barnes will do a better job of putting up a response post than he did the year prior. Not gonna lie, the fact he only put up three posts took away from my BHM experience in 2010.

Quiz time: Of my 28 black actor/actress performances, five got on the list more than once. Can you name them all?

I'll see you back here on Wednesday when I unveil my #28 favorite black performance in a movie.

Hint for #28: Sports movie, early 1990s, nominated for two MTV movie awards, including best on-screen duo. "It ain't easy being this good."

Until next time, "read it, roll it, hole it."