Every Denzel Washington Movie Ranked Worst To Best

In his second effort as director, Washington stars in The Great Debaters as Melvin Tolson, a professor who runs a Black college debate team in 1930s Texas.

Though it doesn't live up to the high bar set by his directorial debut five years earlier, Washington's empowering drama carries with it much of the same insightful ideas about life and injustice, and is surely one of the actor's most uplifting projects.

Sure, it's a tad syrupy, as all true story movies are, but The Great Debaters finds Washington on commendable form both in front and behind the camera.