Film

Creole Giselle

Director

Thomas Grimm

Year

1987

Dance Theatre of Harlem founder Arthur Mitchell -- the first African-American principal in a major American dance company -- sets the classic ballet of "Giselle" in Louisiana circa 1841, a time when the social status of freed black Americans was determined by their family's distance from slavery. The poor Giselle (Virginia Johnson) falls in love with the secretly upper-class Albert, but tragedy occurs when she learns they have no future.