The Forty-Year-Old Version – 7.5

A consistently clever, lighthearted and authentic trip to the art world of lower-middle-class Blacks in New York City, as Rhada Blank, a/k/a “Miss B” and “RhadaMUSPrime,” bounces between playwriting and rapping while teaching a high school theater class hung up on genitalia. Filmed in black-and-white – why? to point out its racial aspects? – the film alternates between the white world of theater production and the Black world of hip-hop, never really leaving the street. The movie may be truer than it thinks: while Radha’s search for artistic integrity may be inspirational, her “attitude” leaves destruction in its wake, not just in limiting her own chances at worldly success (her choice), but damaging innocent lives around her. For comparison, today’s news is of Kyrie Irving going to a party maskless – doing his thing but at the same time jeopardizing his Nets teammates.