The 2023 Twin Cities Black Film Festival (TCBFF) is about to start October 19-22 on the Capri Theater in North Minneapolis.

Natalie Morrow’s dream of providing an everyday platform for independent Black and multicultural filmmakers and helping them grow each locally and nationally is now over twenty years old.  “That is our twenty first 12 months and we still are locally.  That is our third time doing a movie festival on the Capri,” the founder-director said.

Through the years, TCBFF has been held on local college campuses, strip malls, traditional movie houses, and downtown hotels. The Minneapolis Museum of Arts was also once a festival site.

“One in all the large ones on Friday night is the Amir Locke documentary” in regards to the killing of the 22-year-old Black man by Minneapolis police who entered a downtown apartment to serve a no-knock warrant. Locke was sleeping on the couch on the time, but he wasn’t the suspect they were on the lookout for. Locke, who was killed on February 2^, 2022. No officer was ever charged in his killing.

“That documentary is the headliner on Friday night,” continued Morrow.  “The opposite film on Friday is known as ‘Black is Beautiful’, talking about Black Lives Matter and things like that.”

As at all times, annually TCBFF highlights local Black and POC filmmakers, and this 12 months Isn’t any different, Morrow said.

“Saturday is the large day because [all scheduled films] are all Minnesota filmmakers,” she stressed.  “There’s a movie on women that you just follow them through residency to grow to be doctors and what that was like for them. [We] have a few animated ones which are super cute.”

Morrow often selects movies that run the entertainment spectrum from drama, romantic comedy, sci-fi, music videos, historical pieces, comedies, documentaries, and full-length feature movies.

“We try to pick out one of the best of one of the best,” explained Morrow.  “This 12 months we absolutely may have lower than we normally do, about 35 movies.  Often, we have now about 50.

“I feel that what we have now is a extremely good choice. Now we have a variety of shorts this 12 months, more so than features. We do have some documentaries,” said Morrow.

“We may have Best Short, Best Feature [and] Best Documentary as our awards. We’re excited for that,” she noted.

Morrow, who promoted live shows back within the Nineties, launched TCBFF in 2002. Almost twenty years later, she began the biannual Black Fashion Week MN in 2019 as a platform for local creatives—the identical 12 months Twin Cities Business named her amongst the world’s up-and-coming businesspersons.

Morrow recently announced her plans to maneuver her two ventures right into a nonprofit. “I’m attempting to learn what which means,” she said. “I’m gonna rethink this right through as a nonprofit, and let’s see what we give you.”

So far as other developments, Morrow noted, “Definitely recent branding; still on the lookout for buildings or space. Our goal is to seek out our own space.”

For ticket information and film schedules, go to https://tcbff.org.