USPS Vintage Black Cinema

USPS on 16 July 2008 issued a set of five First Day Cover stamps entitled  "Vintage Black Cinema". These commemorative stamps depicted movie posters from African-American films made in the 1920s through 1940s. Art director Carl Herrman designed the set.

In the 1921 silent "The Sport of the Gods", the family of a wrongfully convicted man flees Virginia in disgrace only to face immorality and temptation in New York City. Based on a Paul Laurence Dunbar novel, the film was produced by the Reol Motion Picture Corp., which made several movies for black audiences.

 

Duke Ellington's first screen appearance in 1929's "Black and Tan" features three songs by him and his Cotton Club Orchestra. Playing himself, Ellington is in danger of having his piano repossessed. His fatally ill girlfriend dances at a nightclub and saves Ellington's music. She asks to hear his "Black and Tan Fantasy" on her deathbed.

One of only four movies to star American-born entertainer Josephine Baker, "Princess Tam-Tam" tells the story of a novelist who discovers a simple African woman, played by Baker, and presents her as a princess to Parisian society. Released in France in 1935, this French-language feature remains a rare film showcase for Baker's singing and dancing.

 

"Hallelujah" was one of the first major studio films to feature an all-black cast. This is a dramatic story of a field laborer seduced from his community by worldly temptations. Noted for its portrayal of the rural African-American religious experience, 1929's "Hallelujah" earned King Vidor a nomination for Best Director.

 

Highlighting the talents of singer, saxophonist, and "jump blues" bandleader Louis Jordan, the 1945 short "Caldonia" is often cited as a precursor of today's music videos. The film's four musical numbers also appeared as individual "soundies," or short films shown on video jukeboxes at nightclubs and restaurants during the 1940s.

Source: USPS