Diandrea "Dee" Rees (born February 7, 1977) is an American screenwriter and director. She is known for her feature films Pariah (2011), Bessie (2015), Mudbound (2017), and The Last Thing He Wanted (2020). Rees has also written and directed episodes for television series, including Empire, When We Rise, and Philip K. Dick's Electric Dreams. Rees is the first African-American woman nominated for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, for Mudbound. She has also received Primetime Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Writing and Outstanding Directing for a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie, and won the Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing – Miniseries or TV Film for Bessie. Rees received a United States Artists Fellowship in 2011. Spike Lee was Rees's mentor throughout her time at NYU Tisch, and the two worked on films together such as Inside Man (2006) and When The Levees Broke (2006). Lee also worked as a producer on Rees's breakout film, Pariah. Rees is a lesbian, and lives in Harlem with her wife, National-Book-Award-winning writer Sarah M. Broom. Description above from the Wikipedia article Dee Rees, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Biography from TMDB.
- February 7, 1977 (49)
- Nashville, Tennessee, USA
- Director, writer and producer
- 12 on MovieCove · 19 credits in all
What are Dee Rees' films like?
Across their 5 MovieCove titles with a thematic analysis, their films lean Self and Bonds.
Themes
What they feel like to watch
Ironic 0 · Wry 0 · Earnest 4
Light 1 · Serious 0 · Dark 3
Grounded 4 · Stylized 0 · Heightened 0
Gentle 0 · Charged 1 · Intense 3
Steady 0 · Shifting 4 · Whiplash 0
Straight-faced 4 · Some laughs 0 · Funny 0
Slow burn 1 · Even-paced 3 · Relentless 0
Casual 0 · Engaged 4 · Full focus 0
Easy watch 0 · Affecting 0 · Heavy 4
Resolved 2 · Open-ended 2 · Ambiguous 0
Moods and endings
- Bittersweet3
- Tragic1
- Other1
AI-generated from each title's plot synopsis and cast list, with extra plot summaries, reviews and Parents Guide notes for titles the model may not know, and the model's own knowledge of the ones it recognizes. Only analyzed titles count, so this covers part of the filmography; the feel axes count films only for now.
Where can I watch Dee Rees' films?
As of October 24, 2026, 10 of their 12 MovieCove titles stream on a subscription or free service, most on Hulu (4).
Subscription and free streaming for Dee Rees' titles on MovieCove; rent and buy are not counted. Titles are listed by Midcredits score, highest first, at most 12 per service; a dashed chip is a producer credit or a minor one, such as a thanks. A service opens the browse page, which counts movies only, so its number can differ.
Filmography
19 credits, 12 with a MovieCove page; 1 appearance as themselves is hidden until asked for.
Masters of the Air(2024)
Midcredits score: 83rd percentile of all shows
Saint X(2023)
Midcredits score: 27th percentile of all shows
Midcredits score: 89th percentile of all films
Space Force(2020)
Midcredits score: 34th percentile of all shows
Upload(2020)
Midcredits score: 78th percentile of all shows
The Last Thing He Wanted(2020)
Midcredits score: 3rd percentile of all films
The Box (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2018)
Mudbound(2017)
Midcredits score: 93rd percentile of all films
Electric Dreams(2017)
Midcredits score: 60th percentile of all shows
When We Rise(2017)
Midcredits score: 57th percentile of all shows
Bessie(2015)
Midcredits score: 71st percentile of all films
Empire(2015)
Midcredits score: 67th percentile of all shows
Boys On Film 9: Youth in Trouble (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2013)
Pariah(2011)
Midcredits score: 89th percentile of all films
Eventual Salvation (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2009)
Colonial Gods (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2009)
Pariah (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2007)
Orange Bow (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2006)
An Uncivil War (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)
Career shape
A full career of 19 titles, 18 of them dated from 2006 to 2024.
Counts from TMDB across their full career, self appearances out; a title counts in every role they held on it. The ring is the typical Midcredits score (the median percentile) of the role's titles that are on MovieCove, shown from 5 scored.
How do Dee Rees' films land?
Their typical MovieCove film has a Midcredits score in the 89th percentile, the median of all 5; across a limited sample of 4 films with reception data, the typical film sits in the 81st percentile for acclaim.
- 75th and up5
- 50th to 74th4
- 25th to 49th2
- Below 25th1
Shape of the crowd
7 of their 12 titles are Crowd Pleasers.
- Universally Panned1
- Crowd Pleaser7
- Mixed4
Reviewers score the atmosphere 75/100 and the pacing 39/100 in their films, across 4 reviewed titles. The element that speaks to their work as a director.
Percentiles are each film's standing among all films on MovieCove; the typical film is the median, so one outlier cannot drag it. Percentiles and reviewer scores count the films IMDb credits them on, for now; the Midcredits score bands, the shape of the crowd and the two cards count their MovieCove titles, shows included (a show ranked among shows), appearances as themselves left out. A descriptor is the shape of a title's IMDb rating distribution against the catalog; "most divisive" needs a spread wider than half of all titles, and a card names only a principal credit: a craft role, and on a show a crew role or a run of episodes, never a courtesy credit or a one-off guest spot.
Is Dee Rees' work okay for kids?
Across a limited sample of up to 4 MovieCove titles with content scores.
Severity 0–100 from the Content Guide. Categories with under 10 votes on a title are not counted.
Who does Dee Rees work with?
People who share at least 2 of Dee Rees' MovieCove titles, grouped by what they did on them; Mako Kamitsuna shares the most, 3.
Composers and editors
- Mako KamitsunaShared titles: The Last Thing He Wanted (2020), Mudbound (2017), Pariah (2011)See all 3 shared titles with Mako Kamitsuna
- Tamar-kaliShared titles: The Last Thing He Wanted (2020), Mudbound (2017), Pariah (2011)See all 3 shared titles with Tamar-kali
Producers
- Cassian ElwesShared titles: The Last Thing He Wanted (2020), Mudbound (2017)See all 2 shared titles with Cassian Elwes
