Film Image
Afro-punk
2003
Color
66 minutes
US
English

Afro-punk

AFRO-PUNK explores race identity within the punk scene. This film tackles hard questions, such as issues of loneliness, exile, inter-racial dating and black power. We follow the lives of four people who have dedicated themselves to the punk rock lifestyle. They find themselves in conflicting situations, living the dual life of a person of color in a mostly white community. Afro-Punk features performances by Bad Brains, Tamar Kali, Cipher, and Ten Grand. It also contains exclusive interviews by members of Fishbone, 247- spyz, Dead Kennedys, Candiria, Orange 9mm and TV on the Radio to name a few.
Bonus Features includes deleted scenes, director's commentary, additional interviews, interview with the director, theatrical trailer, and live performances.

Filmmaker James Spooner is available for speaking engagements.
Pricing & Ordering
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Reviews
"A fascinating piece of guerrilla cinema" - Vibe Magazine
"Has the exhaustive, inviting feel of a punk concert, and in it African-Americans speak about being drawn into the punk world, provisionally an environment for alienated youths to hang out together, and about the oddity of being both accepted and further alienated from other punks and other blacks because punk is viewed as so white." - The New York Times
"Four stars" - BET
"A fascinating look at a conflicted subculture." - New York Magazine
"Afro-Punk depicts the experiences of African-American punks in mostly white scenes... Throughout the film, these punks reveal their experiences of exclusion, otherness, and racism in the punk scenes in which they participated. Yet, Black punks’ cultural identification is at odds with the expectations of what Blackness should be, in punk and elsewhere." - Rubén Ramírez Sánchez, Films For the Feminist Classroom
Awards

• Audience Award, Black Harvest Film Festival, 2005
• Best Feature Documentary, Jamerican Film Fest
• Excellence in Documentary Filmmakers, Roxbury Film Festival, 2005
Screenings
• Toronto International Film Festival, 2005
• Documentary Fortnight Expanded: MoMA's Annual Festival of Nonfiction Film 2007
• Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, 2018

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TWN acknowledges that in New York we are on the unceded territory of the Lenni Lenape, Canarsie, Shinecock, and Munsee peoples and challenges the harm that continues to be inflicted upon Indigenous and People of Color communities here and abroad, which is why we all need to be part of the struggle for rights, equality and justice.

TWN is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, Color Congress, MOSAIC, New York Community Trust, Peace Development Fund, Ford Foundation, Golden Globe Foundation, Kolibri Foundation and individual donors.