Black love is an unparalleled force, but it has historically not been spotlighted in mainstream media. The term appears to refer to solely romantic love, but it is much more than that. Black love encompasses love found within the community, love found within friends, and family, which is very important to notice. Black love has been a very divisive term on the internet in recent years, so recognizing its wide range of meanings is invaluable.
“Love Jones” is a 1997 rom-com starring Nia Long and Larenz Tate. This film follows the love life of a love scorn photographer Nina and a love-sick poet Darius. Throughout the film, romantic love is shown as an addictive substance that can change one’s life in an instant. In tandem with this platonic love is shown as this safe constant in their lives. The main couple goes through multiple ups and downs but eventually realizes they were meant to be after a long break.
Constantly throughout the film, they are falling black on to their friends on what to do next with their relationship. When Nina leaves Chicago because she is offered a new job opportunity in a different town, her friend Josie calls Darius to inform him of her departure at the train station. And when Darius decides to give up on love his friend Eddie is the one to convince him to keep fighting for it.
The way the black love story was created in “Love Jones” highlights a lot of the problems of dating now almost 30 years later. With the creation of dating apps and social media, it has made finding love more difficult. The expansion of options a dating app brings leads to the process becoming slightly monotonous. In the film Nina and Darius were only able to interact face to face so it made each interaction much more important. Without the addition of seeing each other's Instagram posts while they were apart, they were truly able to grow separately as individuals.
A lot of the troubles faced during “Love Jones” are the precursor to a modern black love story that is shown in the HBO series “Insecure”. The main character Issa deals with a tumultuous relationship with her love interest Lawrence. In their story, there are plenty of ‘will they, won’t they moments?’. But in the end, they reunite once more. A huge difference between their love story and Nina and Darius’s was the fact that their friend circles overlapped so they were still in each other's lives even when they weren’t together.
Both of these love stories intentionally or not subscribe to the ‘right person, wrong time’ mentality. Which can say a lot about the states of dating maturely vs immaturely. When looking into these relationships they both start to crumble the moment things begin to remain static. Causing Nina to choose a new job opportunity and for Issa to cheat. But with time and changing scenarios, the characters grow and develop more into the people they want to be, eventually leading their paths back to each other.
Both “Insecure” and especially “Love Jones” exemplify the importance of black love. Although their romantic lives were filled with turmoil, all the characters still had their friends by their sides. Both pieces of media depict black friendships that remain constant in their lives no matter what else is happening. And even with the troubles of their romantic lives, these characters also found black love within themselves. This inner love branches out into the community and really strengthens the foundations that created it.
Black love is about the people you surround yourself with now and who you choose to grow with or for.
Written by Clark Gérôme @clark_gerome
Creative Director: Tayja Whyte @tayjaa.x
Production Manager: Chloe Kaleah Stewart @chloe.kaleah
Photography: Roberto Meadows @_.rubbertoe
Production: Mickayla Davis @_mickayladavis_ | Jazzi Almestica @shes.so.dope | K Pereira @kaleb.pereira922
PA: Elena Richardson @elfrances
Models: Mickayla Davis @_mickayladavis_ & Kedma Moise @kedma_music | Melissa Alcindor @issaivvi & Lisa Thompson @Tram3ka | Jai LePrince @jai.leprince & Cecil Atkins @its._cecil