Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am | |
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Directed by | Timothy Greenfield-Sanders |
Produced by | Johanna Giebelhaus Timothy Greenfield-Sanders Chad Thompson Tommy Walker |
Starring | Toni Morrison |
Music by | Kathryn Bostic |
Release date |
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Country | United States |
Language | English |
Box office | $903,018 [1] [2] |
Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am is a 2019 documentary film, directed by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, and produced by Johanna Giebelhaus, Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, Chad Thompson, and Tommy Walker. The film follows American novelist Toni Morrison who examines her life, her works and the powerful themes throughout her literary career. The film also features Oprah Winfrey, Russell Banks, Angela Davis, and Barack Obama.
Toni Morrison describes her life, her works, and the powerful themes she has written about throughout her literary career.
Morrison was an American novelist from Ohio. [3] In 1998 she earned the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for her work Beloved (1987), and in 1993 became the first Black woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. [3] She died on 5 August 2019, when the HuffPost , wrote that the "world lost one of its most important voices". [3]
On the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 97% based on 101 reviews, with an average rating of 8.1/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am honors its acclaimed subject with a comprehensive, illuminating, and fittingly profound overview of her life and work." [4] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 80 out of 100, based on 14 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews." [5]
Alan Zilberman of The Washington Post wrote: "The film suffers from some of the familiar bad habits of the biographical documentary. At times, Greenfield-Sanders provides too many images and too much context, almost as if he doesn’t trust his own subject. The use of music — more filler than necessary at times — is also cloying". [6] Gary Goldstein of The Los Angeles Times wrote: "The remarkable documentary 'Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am' does so many things so well that it’s often like watching several fine films at once. Look for this one to be front and center in its category come Oscar time." [7] Nick Schager of Variety wrote: "Yet, inasmuch as it locates the heart of the author’s inspirations and attitudes, as well as her guiding ethos to capture grand national truths while focusing on the complex interior particulars of individual experience, 'Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am,' at its best, serves the soul of its subject." [8] Caryn James of The Hollywood Reporter wrote: "In The Pieces I Am, the outer self is enough to let viewers know that Morrison and her novels are treasures." [9]
Joshua Brunsting of CriterionCast wrote: "It’s a captivating, if flat, meditation on one of the great artists of our time, and while it may lean into hagiography, there are moments of genuine introspection that make this more than worthy of one's time". [10] David Bax of the Battleship Pretension wrote: "The film resists analysis in its essayistic plainness. Though Morrison’s writing is alive–jumping, soaring and diving deep–Greenfield-Sanders' film lays flat on the surface." [11]
Year | Award | Category | Nominees | Result | Ref. |
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2020 | AARP Movies for Grownups Awards | Best Documentary | Timothy Greenfield-Sanders | Nominated | [12] |
Black Reel Awards | Outstanding Documentary | Timothy Greenfield-Sanders | Nominated | [13] | |
News & Documentary Emmy Awards | Outstanding Arts and Culture Documentary | Nominated | [14] | ||
Outstanding Music Composition | Kathryn Bostic | Nominated | |||
Outstanding Research | Johanna Giebelhaus | Nominated | |||
NAACP Image Awards | Outstanding Documentary | Won | [15] | ||
2019 | Critics' Choice Documentary Awards | Best Biographical Documentary | Won | [16] | |
Hollywood Music in Media Awards | Best Original Score in a Documentary | Kathryn Bostic | Nominated | [17] | |
Society of Composers & Lyricists Awards | Outstanding Original Score for an Independent Film | Kathryn Bostic | Won | [18] | |
Outstanding Original Song for Visual Media | "High Above The Water" by Kathryn Bostic | Nominated | [19] |
Chloe Anthony Wofford Morrison, known as Toni Morrison, was an American novelist. Her first novel, The Bluest Eye, was published in 1970. The critically acclaimed Song of Solomon (1977) brought her national attention and won the National Book Critics Circle Award. In 1988, Morrison won the Pulitzer Prize for Beloved (1987); she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993.
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The Hollywood Music In Media Awards (HMMA) is an award organization honoring original music in all forms visual media including film, TV, video games, trailers, commercial advertisements, documentaries, music videos and special programs. The HMMA was the first to include Outstanding Music Supervision as featured award categories. HMMA nominations and winners have historically been representative of key awards shows announced months later. The annual HMMA main event, held the week before Thanksgiving, features live music performances, celebrity presenters, tributes to music industry icons and awards for composers, songwriters and performers. The HMMA also celebrates emerging, independent artists from around the globe for creative and innovative contributions in genre categories. The 2019 winners were announced on November 20.
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