SHADES

A lively and diverse group of people candidly discuss their own emoji usage and their feelings about other people’s emoji usage. Through the process, we learn both how serious and also how fun emojis can be and what our own emoji choices might say about us.

Director’s Statement

The goal of the film is spark a frank discussion about the perceptions of race in North America. The film aims to inspire the viewers to ask the aforementioned questions of themselves and to grapple with our complicated and fraught relationship to race and attitude toward cultural appropriation. The conversations and insights that could stem from such introspection are critical to understanding who we are as individuals in society and what that means to other people. Too often, we confine such necessary self-critique to our own internal dialogue. Without a sounding board, we are left alone with our thoughts, whatever they may be. By creating a space for people to talk honestly about their feelings about emoji skin color, race relations more generally, and whether this topic is even worthy of debate, this film will serve as an arena of discourse both for the people who appear in it and also for the audience at large.