In this Movie Memory Machine: Five For mini-episode, Landen and Truman offer five films that better explore the Black American experience across decades of U.S. history—without reducing it to presidential cameos. Where The Butlerflattens complexity into a highlight reel, these films bring depth, agency, and artistry to the stories of civil rights, political power, and generational struggle.
Films Discussed:
Selma (2014)
All the Way (2016)
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (1974)
Malcolm X (1992)
John Lewis: Good Trouble (2020)
Topics Covered:
Why The Butler’s episodic structure feels like a history PowerPoint
How Selma balances legacy and interiority in portraying Martin Luther King Jr.
The dynamic between Bryan Cranston’s LBJ in All the Way vs. Liev Schreiber’s in The Butler
Cicely Tyson’s powerhouse performance and visual symbolism in Miss Jane Pittman
The scope and clarity of Spike Lee’s Malcolm X as a gold standard for biopics
Why Good Trouble is a rare political documentary that feels energized, not sanitized
Key Takeaways:
The Butler makes presidents the main characters of a story that isn’t about them
These five films center Black agency, voice, and resistance in ways The Butler doesn’t
We need stories that aren’t afraid to slow down and sit in the discomfort of history
You deserve better than watching a parade of wax museum cameos in aging prosthetics
Listener Prompt:
What film helped you understand American history in a new way? Tell us using #MovieMemoryMachine.
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