The director uses previously unpublished excerpts from the unfinished book "Remember This House" by James Baldwin, the famous African-American novelist and essayist, as well as a wealth of archival film and photographs. The film features the voice of Samuel L. Jackson, the narrator of the story. "I Am Not Your Negro" won the BAFTA award for best documentary film.
The book and the film present stories of consecutive assassinations of three Baldwin's friends: Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King. Baldwin did not complete the book before his death in 1987. He left only thirty pages, and the writer's heirs entrusted the manuscript to director Raoul Peck.