Best Black British Movies & TV Shows

Love Thy Neighbour is a British sitcom, which was transmitted from 13 April 1972 until 22 January 1976, spanning seven series. The sitcom was produced by Thames Television for the ITV network. The principal cast included Jack Smethurst, Rudolph Walker, Nina Baden-Semper and Kate Williams. In 1973, the series was adapted into a film of the same name, and a later sequel series was set in Australia.

When Flight KA29 is hijacked during its seven-hour journey from Dubai to London, Sam Nelson—an accomplished corporate negotiator—tries using his professional skills to save everyone on board. Will this high-risk strategy be his undoing?

When the head of a criminal organisation, Finn Wallace is assassinated, the sudden power vacuum his death creates threatens the fragile peace between the intricate web of gangs operating on the streets of the city. Now it’s up to the grieving, volatile and impulsive Sean Wallace to restore control and find those responsible for killing his father.

Some Girls is a British comedy series written by Bernadette Davis that airs on BBC Three. The show stars Adelayo Adedayo, Mandeep Dhillon, Alice Felgate, Natasha Jonas, Dolly Wells, Colin Salmon, Jassa Ahluwalia and Franz Drameh. It debuted on 6 November 2012 and the first series ran for six episodes. BBC Three announced at the end of the first series that the show would return for a second series. On 18 September 2013, they confirmed that each episode of the second series will premiere on BBC iPlayer a week ahead of being broadcast on BBC Three. The first episode became available on iPlayer on 23 September and will be broadcast on BBC Three on 30 September with the rest of the series following that trend.

Original drama series from Russell T Davies exploring the passions and pitfalls of 21st century gay life, beginning with the most disastrous date night in history.

An anthology series of five stories looking at the lives of a group of friends and their families in London’s West Indian community from the late 1960s to the early 80s.

Two twenty-somethings, both reeling from bad break-ups, connect over the course of an eventful day in South London – helping each other deal with their nightmare exes, and potentially restoring their faith in romance.

Drama telling the story of Blue, a young man of Jamaican descent living in Brixton in 1980, as he hangs out with his friends, fronts a dub sound system, loses his job, struggles with family problems and has his friendships tested by racism.

Comedy drama series portraying a generation struggling with the realities of 21st Century working life and the camaraderie and friendships that bloom in times of difficulty.

George is a small-time crook just out of prison who discovers his tough-guy image is out of date. Reduced to working as a minder/driver for high class call girl Simone, he has to agree when she asks him to find a young colleague from her King's Cross days. That's when George's troubles just start.

Iona returns to the island where she was born with her teenage son to seek refuge from a violent crime in Glasgow. Iona's return exposes her tormented son, Bull, to a way of life she rejected when she left the island and sends a shockwave through the family she left behind.

An underworld drama set in the early 1980s, about a lonely factory worker whose life is transformed when he becomes a nightclub doorman.

DI Helen Weeks grapples with pregnancy as she undertakes a very personal abduction case.

In the future, a strange fungus has changed nearly everyone into a thoughtless, flesh-eating monster. When a scientist and a teacher find a girl who seems to be immune to the fungus, they all begin a journey to save humanity.

After a ten year absence, acclaimed filmmaker Molly Dineen is back with a new feature documentary: Being Blacker; an intimate portrait of Jamaican-born reggae producer, businessman, father, son and prominent community figure, Blacker Dread. 40 years after featuring in Dineen’s first film, Blacker and his family, friends and community in South London face the combined challenges of rapid social change, gentrification, inequality, poverty, crime and racism as they seek to secure their futures. Made with intimacy and warmth, the film takes us deep into Blacker’s world as he buries his mother, closes his business and faces prison for the first time. Being Blacker offers a rarely-heard perspective on life in Britain today.

In crowded and expensive London, cash-strapped couple Gemma and Kieran open their small apartment to a third person. Somehow, their new addition, Ray, makes the flat seem bigger, not smaller. Gradually, many things become easier, nicer and better with an extra pair of hands.

Leo Regan follows his friend, photographer Lanre Fehintola, as he tries to go cold turkey (detox) from heroin in his council flat and without medication.

A 17-year-old boy, known only as HIM, caught in the limbo between childhood and adulthood is also trapped in a limbo between the two homes of his divorced parents, each now remarried with new families. Like most boys he finds it hard to process his feelings so tends to “act out”. But his behaviour is also triggered by something else - his primal struggle to contain the terrifying secret of a supernatural power he inherited from his grandfather. A power that only his ageing grandmother understands, who urges him to use his gift only for ‘good’ for she knows if he doesn’t it could end in tragedy. 

Three people, three extraordinary stories. All lived out within a hundred London streets.

This documentary by Leo Regan follows the life of his friend, photographer Lanre Fehintola, as he becomes part of the hard drug scene through researching it for his book ("Charlie Says: Don't Get High On Your Own Supply"). It shows Lanre as he becomes a character in his own book through his heroin addiction.

Brian and Charlie work for a gangster. When the boss learns they want to "leave" he sets them up to be killed, after they help rob the local Triads of their drug dealing profits. B&C decide to steal the money for themselves, but when their escape doesn't go to plan, they have to seek refuge in a Nuns' teacher training school.

While working undercover as a bodyguard to arms dealer Harry, former-soldier-turned-secret-service-agent Ewan survives a bloody shootout with a member of an Islamic terrorist cell who steals Harry's briefcase full of Semtex explosives and escapes. Ewan's spymasters task Ewan with hunting down the cell members and retrieving the briefcase.

Stephen Lawrence was a black London teenager murdered by white racists in 1993. His parents fought to have the crime properly investigated, culminating in a judicial enquiry into the event itself and also the inadequacies of the ensuing investigation by the London Metropolitan Police.

Isaac Mizrahi, one of the most successful designers in high fashion, plans his fall 1994 collection.

Ricky is just out of a young offenders institute, heading home to Hackney and determined to go straight. Instead, he heads straight for trouble when he becomes involved in a street confrontation, siding with his best friend Wisdom against a local rude boy. The trouble escalates into a series of tit-for-tat incidents that threaten to spiral out of control. Ricky's 12-year-old brother Curtis, hero-worships Ricky, though he appears smart enough to know he doesn't want to follow his example. Yet, despite the stern warnings from his mother and support from her friends in the community, might Ricky's bad boy allure be too attractive for Curtis to resist?

A married, middle-class London couple are shocked when they seem to have been blessed — or cursed — with an immaculate conception.

A British-born younger son of an immigrant family from Trinidad finds himself adrift between two cultures.

Chronically agoraphobic since the day his wife was murdered, Tommy Cowley finds himself terrorized by a gang of syringe-wielding feral children, who are intent on taking his baby daughter. Upon discovering the nightmarish truth surrounding these hooded children, he learns that to be free of his fears, he must finally face the demons of his past and enter the one place he fears the most - the abandoned tower block, known as the Citadel.

The film is a semi-biographical story based on the experiences of former prison guard Ronnie Thompson who spent seven years working in some of the UK's most dangerous prisons. Based on Thompson's book of the same name, the project stars James D'Arcy (Master & Commander), Noel Clarke (Kidulthood), Frank Harper (The Football Factory), Jamie Foreman (Layer Cake), Andrew Shim (This Is England) and Kate Magowan (Stardust). The story revolves around former soldier Sam Norwood who takes a job as a prison officer when he returns from Iraq and becomes exposed to the underworld of prison culture - including corrupt guards and drug trafficking.

Election Night 1979: Margaret Thatcher is about to come into power. A young black man is held on suspicion of murdering his pregnant wife. Officers Karn and Wilby, racist to the core and high on the prospect of a Conservative Party victory, try to lure the suspect into a quick confession. But the night has just begun...Callous humiliation gives way to a barrage of sinister violence, leading to a devastating conclusion.Written by Barrie Keefe, who was behind the British classic The Long Good Friday, SUS is an emotionally charged and incredibly tense crime drama that serves as a powerful outcry against past institutional racism. But in the age of counter-terrorism SUS also begs the question: has history caught up with us?

A group of twenty-somethings, one of whom is a single father with a precious daughter, have been unsuccessful in getting into a certain club so they can have a chance to DJ there and start a career out of it. A series of events has lumbered them with a dog napping scheme gone badly wrong, ending up with them owning a particular pooch belonging to a dog-loving local drug dealer.

Layla, a 15-year-old living in Brixton, London, becomes involved with a gang and must set up a boy to be killed.

Jumah is about to turn 16 and is already in need of a fresh start. Burdened with the shameful legacy of a past as a child soldier in the Congo, he lives with his adoptive mother in west London, where he struggles to keep a lid on his history of violence. One night, enjoying a rare carefree evening out with a new friend, Jumah witnesses something that draws him seemingly inescapably into his old ways. As he and others around him begin to question whether he can ever stop being a soldier, he’s set on a path to find out who he truly wishes to be.

In South London, tradition clashes with culture as a Nigerian father tries to instill his old-fashioned African values into his modern British family.

Kazim and Jeremiah are two young entrepreneurs in the early stages of rolling out their home delivery business Speedi-Kazz. We follow this fledgling enterprise and this awkward bromance in this sitcom.

A family give up their modern lives for one summer to experience what life was like for Caribbeans who immigrated to Britain in the postwar period. Beginning in 1948, the year the Empire Windrush arrived at Tilbury and discharged its passengers, the Irwin family travel through the 1950s and 60s, guided by presenter Giles Coren and social historian Emma Dabiri who introduce them to their new homes as well as the events of the time. Along the way the Irwins discover the food, work and entertainment of first-generation immigrants making their lives in Brixton.