With the death of Harry Belafonte, America lost a musical genius and an icon of activism, who rose from a life of poverty to a life of massive record sales and sold-out concerts, using his fame as an artist to shed light on the goals he believed. .
But Belafonte was also a major movie star, and while his filmmaking wasn’t exactly prolific—surprisingly, he appeared in fewer than two dozen feature films during his 65-year film career—he made a memorable impression every time he appeared on screen. . Below are some highlights, all available to stream.
‘Carmen Jones’ (1954)
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Belafonte’s first starring role was only his second film appearance, after a supporting turn in the Dorothy Dandridge vehicle “Bright Road.” He teamed up again with Dandridge for Otto Preminger’s film adaptation of the Oscar Hammerstein II musical ‘Carmen Jones’, itself an interpretation of Bizet’s classic opera ‘Carmen’, modernized and reimagined for an all-black cast. The production was notoriously boisterous, but Belafonte couldn’t have wished for a project more suited to his talents: the picture gave him the opportunity to stir and smolder as much emotion as young soldier Joe, proving that this wasn’t just any pop singer. was by moonlight. in movies. This was the work of a full-fledged movie star.
Yet Belafonte’s first burst of work was short-lived. After a handful of excellent dramatic turns in the late 1950s (most notably in Robert Wise’s “Odds Against Tomorrow,” sadly unavailable for streaming), Belafonte devoted his time in the 1960s to his civil rights activism. But he triumphantly returned to the screen in this delightfully strange comedy-drama, playing the title role – a heartfelt guardian angel who comes to Earth to help a poor Jewish tailor (the wonderful Zero Mostel) through a patch. of bad luck and bad faith. This kind of material can easily transition into sentimental or blasphemous, but Belafonte’s playful yet practical performance strikes the perfect balance between winking humor and gentle lesson-learning.
‘Buck and the Preacher’ (1972)
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The comedic chops Belafonte exhibited in “The Angel Levine” would define his best film work in the 1970s. Two years later, he teamed up with fellow actor-activist Sidney Poitier for what was clearly intended to be a black riff on “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” with Poitier and Belafonte in the titular roles of Wild West outlaws who lead wagon train away. of white bounty hunters. Poitier plays the straight man, as he often did in comedies, allowing Belafonte to splurge as Reverend Willis Oaks Rutherford, a con artist masquerading as a man of the cloth. When the original director, Joseph Sargent, was fired a few days into filming, Poitier took over directing duties and began a new film career.
‘Uptown Saturday Night’ (1974)
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Unsurprisingly, when Poitier directed his next comedy, he again approached Belafonte to get involved. Poitier stars alongside Bill Cosby (fair warning) in this rowdy buddy action comedy, forcing Belafonte to steal scenes galore — no mean feat when he appears with Flip Wilson and Richard Pryor — in his boisterous turn as Geechie Dan Beauford, a hot-tempered underworld boss. With “The Godfather” still fresh in moviegoers’ minds, Belafonte played the role parodying Marlon Brando’s already iconic performance as Don Vito Corleone, complete with raspy voice, puffy cheeks and pencil-thin mustache. It’s an inspired piece of comedic acting and a reminder that the serious performer was just as comfortable with broad, “Saturday Night Live”-esque silliness.
‘Kansas City’ (1996)
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Belafonte took another long hiatus—nearly two decades—from on-screen acting after “Uptown,” and even then he first appeared as himself in a pair of star-studded Robert Altman pictures (“The Player” and “Ready to wear”). But Altman got another great, full-blown performance from the artist with this historical gangster comedy-drama, set in the city and time of the director’s childhood. As the boss of Kansas City’s underworld, the beautifully named and perpetually whispering Seldom Seen, Belafonte eschews his usual warmth and comedic tendencies to play a truly menacing villain – the kind of guy who never raises his voice, because he never has to . It’s a chilling and unforgettable twist, and shows what kind of third act he could have had as a character actor had he chosen that path.
‘Sing Your Song: Harry Belafonte’ (2012)
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Instead, he chose to keep fighting. This end-of-life biographical documentary by director Susanne Rostock, made with the cooperation and blessing of the man himself, occasionally veers into hagiography, depicting the messy aspects of his long and complicated life. But there’s so much to celebrate that you can hardly blame the creators. Edited into a punchy excerpt from a wealth of rich archival footage (movie and TV clips, home videos, newsreels) and both new and archival interviews, “Sing Your Song” Belafonte celebrates the artist, but even more so, celebrates the man – and a life spent working for the causes he believed in, often risking his own career and comfort.
‘BlacKkKlansman’ (2018)
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Significantly, Belafonte’s last screen appearance came in a protest by a provocative black filmmaker. He appears in the cameo role of civil rights activist Jerome Turner in Spike Lee’s Oscar-winning adaptation of Ron Stallworth’s memoir – but he also plays himself, providing history and knowledge of the civil rights struggle. In his lone, terrifying scene, Belafonte shows not only his skill and charisma as an actor, but also the seriousness of his decades in the trenches of battle.
