One of the last great cultural-political figures whose work straddled the noir era...whose relatively brief film career (only 23 credits) contained several landmark films, most notably ODDS AGAINST TOMORROW. (Others in a similar category would be CARMEN JONES and PORGY & BESS.) Belafonte's central presence in the civil rights movement seemed to bring his film career to a premature end, but his significance remained intact even as he mostly disappeared from movie screens.

Belafonte was 96.





Here is one of his films from the late 50s, the bombastic, apocalyptic potboiler THE WORLD, THE FLESH and THE DEVIL (1959), another of the "end of the world" genre films that cascaded onto movie screens during the height of the Cold War. Its sub-theme of racism is said to have been the reason why Belafonte attached himself to the project; while the film is ultimately rather ham-fisted, its Cinemascope visuals are used to startling effect.

Despite the film title for this YouTube post appearing in Spanish, the film is in English and does not have hard-coded subtitles.