Unashamed Documentary Chronicles Lecrae & Hip-Hop

Historical dramas have gained popularity, offering nuanced portrayals of cultural and historical figures. The Nashville Film Festival premiered the documentary Unashamed, which delves into the career of Lecrae and the 116 Movement, exploring the struggles of a young Black man navigating faith and identity. The film challenges the notion of Lecrae as an untouchable hero, instead presenting a raw and honest depiction of his journey through faith and cultural crossroads. Unashamed serves as a cultural history of Christian hip-hop and a personal narrative of Lecrae’s healing journey, emphasizing the importance of honest wrestling in deepening one’s convictions.

This past weekend, the Nashville Film Festival premiered Unashamed, a documentary that captivated the room with its honesty and gut-wrenching look at the career of Lecrae and the rise of the 116 Movement. Much like the movement itself, the film refuses to gloss over the struggles, instead pressing into the real issues shaping hip-hop and culture at the time.

While some might expect Lecrae to emerge as the untouchable hero of the 116 story, the film presents something deeper: the journey of a young Black man wrestling with his identity, his faith, and his place in the world.

The tension is intense—Lecrae and his peers were often “too Christian” for mainstream hip-hop and “too hip-hop” for the gospel world. Yet their rise drew massive support from white Evangelicals—until the cultural crossroads of the BLM movement, when Lecrae found himself “canceled” by many of the very people who had propelled him to fame.

The film highlights what spiritual writers often call “the wall” in discipleship—the crisis of faith that forces us either to walk away or to dig deeper. Lecrae’s journey through this wall, sometimes described as “deconstruction,” is less about abandoning faith and more about the painful inward work that leads to a renewed sense of purpose.