50
Simply put, the documentary is full of cool talking heads pontificating rather than taking physical action.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
70
The New York Times by A.O. Scott
The fact that the speakers' faces are never seen produces a feeling of estrangement that is crucial to the film's effectiveness. You become acutely aware of gaps and discontinuities: between slogans and realities, between political ideals and stubborn social problems, between then and now.
80
Black nationalism lives and breathes in this remarkably fresh documentary - a standout in last spring's New Directors/New Films - assembled by Göran Hugo Olsson.
70
The Hollywood Reporter by James Greenberg
This is a film that should be seen by anyone who wants to learn where we've come from as a nation.
60
New York Daily News by Joe Neumaier
Lengthy clips of leaders including Angela Davis and Stokely Carmichael bring us back to emotional moments in this country's history.
80
The pieces here are wonderful, even if the documentary fails to make any kind of overall analytical point.
70
Los Angeles Times by Kenneth Turan
Black Power Mixtape's contemporary audio, though it tries hard to involve us, can't hold a candle to this kind of footage. But if having these current voices on board helped get the luminous glimpses of the past back on the screen, we owe them a vote of thanks.
75
Illustrates how the rhetoric of civil rights changed after the breakthroughs of Martin Luther King. With the world's media finally paying attention, critical thinkers like Carmichael, Davis, and Malcolm X were able to push back against the fretful questions about violence, and redefine the story of blacks in America over the centuries as one defined by violence.
83
Entertainment Weekly by Owen Gleiberman
A tangy raw stew of history, even if it never begins to confront the contradictions that bedeviled black militancy.