Long Time Comin'
1993 · 52m · Canada
Directed by Dionne Brand
Genres: documentary, essay film, LGBTQ+
Tones: contemplative, sensual, tender
African-Canadian artists Faith Nolan, a blues musician, and Grace Channer, a painter, discuss their work, urgency and friendship.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
A 52-minute conversation between two Black women artists sounds like the last thing consensus would celebrate, and that's exactly why Brand makes it necessary — this isn't vérité filler, it's an argument about urgency disguised as intimacy, and it refuses to resolve.
Brand positions this essay film in direct dialogue with structural cinema and the Black radical tradition; the sensual pacing and editorial restraint signal a filmmaker entirely aware of how image, voice, and duration compose meaning, not sentiment.
The singular choice here is letting silence and the musicians' own gestures do the theoretical work — Brand trusts two artists to think out loud without narration or score scaffolding, and that economy of means transforms a portrait into something that feels urgent rather than observed.