One of this year’s highlights will be the opening-night feature film ‘The Dichotomy of Hattie McDaniel’
Writer/director Vincent Victoria’s feature film “The Dichotomy of Hattie McDaniel” will open the San Diego Black Film Festival 2025 on Thursday. Writer/director Vincent Victoria titled his feature film “The Dichotomy of Hattie McDaniel” to make a point about the woman who in 1940 became the first Black actor to win an Academy Award.
More than 100 films will be screened during the festival, including Victoria’s “The Dichotomy of Hattie McDaniel,” which premiered last October in Houston, has been on the festival circuit ever since and it stars Wykesha King in the title role. Keep in mind, Victoria reminded, that after McDaniel won her Oscar, 23 years went by before another Black actor, Sidney Poitier, was honored by the Academy for “Lilies of the Field.” And no other Black female actor won an Oscar until Whoopi Goldberg did in 1991 . McDaniel had roles in several hundred films, many of them uncredited, prior to “Gone with the Wind,” her Oscar-winning performance in that film was celebrated as a breakthrough.
A scene from Edward Morrison’s documentary short “Costume Royalty,” about three trailblazing Black film and television costume designers in the 20th century. If Victoria was able to speak to Hattie McDaniel today , what exactly would he say to the woman whose performances and courage have inspired him?
This year’s festival features films from multiple genres including comedy, drama, documentaries, animation, LGBTQ, horror, religious, foreign and African diaspora, shorts and more.
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