That was an excellent one.

Powerful

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

It's funny how a person can criticize about this movie being stereotypical of black women in the worst way and also being degrading to a black men as well. These are the same females,(make no mistake about it) that watch Atlanta Houswives, Real Housewives Of Basketball players, DC housewives, Divorce Court and a whole lot of other reality, bullshit, degrading, demeaning, illiterate, "Err,"Err, "Good Morting", slave sounding stupidity that you can muster up. Man up, woman up, and let a well intended movie from a different point of view breath. With that being said, It rare that we see a positive movie about blacks period. "A Day In September" staring Sidney Portier and Diane Carrol was a positive movie about blacks falling in love later in life. The real world is full of many types of people, different shades of all races and nationalities, it's what is called being different that makes us all the same.

I stopped channel surfing to watch this movie, thinking, "Finally, a movie that will explore the real issues in Black relationships and Black families." How wrong I was! This documentary is so one-sided and the images of Black women are so stereotypical, it's extremely sad! And the mini-movie that plays between real-life interviews is so comically unrealistic, I felt like I was watching a Tyler Perry play. The main woman is more of a caricature of a woman with undiagnosed Bipolar disorder than an example of a real Black woman. (and apparently, the director has something against Asian women, too, because even they aren't safe.) The men and women who can speak proper English and give valid, unbiased points are few and far between. Most of the people interviewed are embarrassingly ignorant. Most of the men are angry and bitter, themselves. They refer to themselves as the N-word. They refer to women as the B-word. One guy even uses the B-word when talking about his own mother. Another guy actually said "The Child Support system was put in place to cause a great divide between the Black Man and the Black woman." Really? (this statement alone makes it seem as if most Black men would not take care of their kids, and are angry that they're being forced to.) The worse part is that they return to the most ignorant of the bunch and ignore the ones who actually thought before they spoke (instead of just spewing nonsensical rants for 10 minutes.) It's as if the director purposefully focused on those interviewees who were saying things (regardless of how absurd they were) that validated his point of the movie: That most Black men were decent, hardworking, faithful men, and that most Black women were nagging, unhappy, manhood-destroying creatures that pushed them away.This movie was a wasted opportunity to dive into real issues about a really important subject, from all different perspectives. Instead, all it does is further the damaging stereotypes of Black women (and, unintentionally, of Black men as well) and allow the director (a man,with a lot of hurt and baggage) to get revenge on not only his ex-wife, but the rest of Black womanhood. Unfortunately for those of us who are Black (and a couple of other races), all must feel the fury of this (Black) man scorned.

Lately, the conversations around the demise of the black family and black relationships have mostly given a voice to black women. Even more specifically, the focus has been narrowed to a sub-population of women, financially and academically successful black women, as if the rest of the community has no voice and does not matter.Finally, Diary of a Tired Black Man explodes on to the scene to shake the dust off of the trite "good black man shortage" formula and open up the dialog to the entire community. What really caught my attention is how we finally get to hear from black men speaking with black men. No, it's not locker-room talk about sexual escapades. Rather, these men are giving first hand accounts of their struggles within relationships.The film is an entertaining and illuminating collage of street interviews and short vignettes. The vignettes, illustrative autobiographical shorts that highlight the struggles of the film maker's past relationship, bring together the myriad of thoughts, confessions, and accounts of the real people who are interviewed. I found that the theatrical interludes worked well juxtaposed with the impromptu interviews. I gave it one less star than ten because I didn't think that all the the acting was executed as well as it could have been.Diary of a Tired Black Man is an important piece that I'm sure will make an impression on anyone who views it. For the first time, I could see very clearly how: * The notorious "attitude" that many men complain about is actually very common, contrary to my previous belief. * The "attitude" often manifests as misdirected anger and verbal abuse. * The broad generalizations about women that sound unfair to my ears actually come from the hurt that men have experienced in past/ current stressful relationships and family experiences.I gave this film a 7/10 stars because I love the intent and the approach and I believe it's an important project, but the acting was lacking and the accompanying online forum contains a suspicious amount of hype-generation/ hoaxing from fictitious writers.

It is because the film is highly rated with real people (its intended audience) and not professional film snobs like most of the people who rate films here. It is not a movie for critics, but a message to real people - most of which do not review films here. You will need to see it for yourself. Most of the real world reviews are positive because real people like the film. But I do have bad reviews as well from people who missed the film's true intent - and that was not to be a Hollywood or a textbook climatic film - but a deep cutting message. And that I accomplished as evident by the numerous positive reviews. Thanks for pointing that out. I hope I cleared it up.