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Poster for The Five Heartbeats

The Five Heartbeats

1991 · 121 min

A warm, bittersweet rise-and-fall saga of brotherhood and music, carrying you through triumph and heartbreak with soulful sincerity.

Directed by
Robert Townsend
Genres
Drama, Music
Overview
In the early 1960s, a quintet of hopeful, young African-American men form an amateur vocal group called The Five Heartbeats. After an initially rocky start, the group improves, turns pro, and rises to become a top flight music sensation. Along the way, however, the guys learn many hard lessons about the reality of the music industry.

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Directed by
Robert Townsend
Genres
Drama, Music
In your watch list

How it feels

Written by AI. It can be wrong.

Tone
  • melancholicstrength 2 of 3
  • warmstrength 2 of 3
  • earneststrength 2 of 3
  • darkstrength 1 of 3
Pacing
measured, 2 of 4, from slow-burn to relentless
Attention
engaged, 3 of 4, from background-friendly to demanding
Themes
  • friendship
  • music
  • betrayal
  • addiction
  • redemption
Places
  • big city
  • road trip
Era
period
Audience
adult
Form
  • ensemble
  • nonlinear
Content intensity
  • Gore none
  • Language mild
  • Violence mild
  • Sex mild
All scales, 0 to 10
Scales, 0 to 10
ScaleValue0 to 10
Action2
Horror0
Humour4
Realism7
Romance4
Tension5
Darkness6
Complexity5
Emotional weight7

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Cast

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Details

Genres
drama, music
Directed by
Robert Townsend
Written by
Keenen Ivory Wayans, Robert Townsend
Starring
Robert Townsend, Michael Wright, Leon, Harry Lennix, Tico Wells, Diahann Carroll, Harold Nicholas, John Canada Terrell
Music
Stanley Clarke
Cinematography
Bill Dill
Runtime
121 min
Country
United States of America
Languages
English

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