Annual American Black Film Festival Features Discussions with Denzel Washington and Ava DuVernay, And Debuts Several New Films
For the last 28 years, the American Black Film Festival (ABFF) has been a cultural hub for Black creators in the TV and film industries, inviting fans and creatives alike to attend film premieres, contests and conversations with industry legends for a near-week long festival in South Florida. This year, the festival went from June 12th-16th, and welcomed debut screenings of several films such as “The Waterboyz,” as well as documentaries on Wu Tang Clan, among others. The 28th ABFF also featured presentations from big-name celebrities including Denzel Washington, Issa Rae and Ava DuVernay.
Founded in 1997 by Jeff and Nicole Friday, Byron Lewis and Warrington Hudlin, ABFF’s mission is to create a space for members of ‘Black Hollywood’ to gather and collaborate and to celebrate Black cinema. In the early years, the festival was held in Acapulco, Mexico, but transitioned to the South Florida area in 2002, and is now held annually in Miami. Every year the exclusive event brings tons of high-profile celebrity appearances, with at least one prominent actor or creative hosting the event as its presenter, including previous hosts Robert Townsend, Kim Whitley and Isaac Hayes, to name a few. Denzel Washington hosted the event in 1998, during one of the high points in his career, and the early days of the ABFF. Two decades later, he returned as this year’s host.
This year’s festival included a career retrospective of Denzel Washington – featuring an exclusive interview with the actor where he reflected on his time in the industry, with the primary goal of examining how he went from a relatively unknown actor in the seventies and early eighties, to being hailed as “the greatest American actor of the 21st century” by the New York Times. Now, with a career that has spanned five decades and roughly 65 films, winning two Academy Awards and three Golden Globes, the actor returned to the ABFF in a full-circle moment. During his career retrospective, Washington walked audience members through his on and off-screen highlights, disclosing that he only watches his movies once because he’s really “never been a big movie person.” He also discussed the path he envisions for the rest of his career, with plans to move away from acting in order to focus on directing and behind-the-scenes work.
Issa Rae (now the creative director for ABFF) hosted a brand-new segment during the festival, called ‘Creator Conversations,’ featuring an on-stage discussion with two special guests: Ava DuVernay and Kenya Barris. The trio of industry icons explored their creative processes and talked about previous projects – including DuVernay’s “Origin” and Barris’ “Black-ish” franchise as well as his directorial debut, “You People.”
The American Black Film Festival ended last weekend, but there is an online segment that began airing on June 17th, and will go through the 24th – you can find it on abffplay.com if you want to check it out.
