Set on a college campus, this comedy is knowing and self-aware. Samantha is a student whose radio broadcasts and viral Internet videos are used to call out the hypocrisies and micro-aggressions experienced by African Americans in their dealings with well-meaning Caucasians. Her campus is a hotbed of warring identities, and she herself is a contradiction. What emerges is a sprawling narrative that juggles race, sex, privilege and power with elegant agility. USA, 2014, 108 minutes, rated R
“Justin Simien’s first feature film [Dear White People]. . . is as smart and fearless a debut as I have seen from an American filmmaker in quite some time: knowing but not snarky, self-aware but not solipsistic, open to influence and confident in its own originality” “You want to see this movie, and you will want to talk about it afterward, even if the conversation feels a little awkward. If it doesn’t, you’re doing it wrong. There is great enjoyment to be found here, and very little comfort.” – A. O. Scott, The New York Times
“Dear White People isn’t perfect. And yet the flaws really don’t matter. This is the best film about college life in a long time, satiric or straight, comedy or drama.” – Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune
“A title like that needs balls of brass to back it up. Luckily, this fiery college comedy from feature-debuting writer-director Justin Simien, loosely inspired by a series of scandalous black-face parties at all-white fraternities, is full of punchy intelligence and barely concealed anger” – Tom Huddleston, Time Out New York
“tight, funny, smart and insightful” – Richard Roeper, Chicago Sun-Times
