In the context of a widely perceived decrease in knowledge of the Arabic Literary Heritage among recent generations of Arab youth, it is fascinating to examine recent transformations of Arabic Literary Heritage into screen media, specifically of the story of `Antara bn Shaddad and his poetry originally attributed to the Pre-Islamic era. This paper examines how five twentieth century films and recent Arabic television serial, amongst a wave of such transformations of material from the literary heritage into screen media, recast complex narrative and poetic material relating to `Antara ibn Shaddad and Ayyam al-Arab, with admixtures from related folk epics/siyar, to offer contemporary versions of these stories and their heroes, through curated selections of poetry attributed to personalities in these stories, and reproduce a racially fraught episode from foundational Arabic myth, with carefully crafted emotional, social and political messages for the modern audience. This paper interrogates how these productions negotiate with issues of race, slavery, tribal identity, belonging and exclusion from the Arab past they reimagine, and contribute to the discourse of race in modern and contemporary Arab societies. The screen productions under consideration include “Antar and Abla” (1945), “The Adventures of Antara and Abla” (1948), “Antar Raids the Desert” (1960), “Antara ibn Shaddad: The Black Prince” (1961), “Antar, Knight of the Desert” (1974), and the most recent 2008 television serial “Antara ibn Shaddad.” The screen versions must also be framed within the context of the social, historical, and political circumstances of their production. In the transformation and mythologization of Arabic literary material for modern audiences via recasting the cultural heritage for the screen, we must ask what curated selections, and expurgations of source material have occurred in these transformations into modern media, and what interpolations added, to what effect? In these film and television reimaginings of the life of `Antara and his contemporaries and their roles in the War of Dahish and al-Ghabraa’, what contemporary messages are inserted through the speech, poetry selections and actions of `Antara, `Urwa bn al-Ward, Shanfara, Sulayk and others, as deployed in the production for the modern audience? What do casting choices, filming locations, costumes, script writing, and make-up contribute to the negotiations and constructions of race in the various films? And what messages, both explicit and implicit are to be found in these productions with respect to racial identity, belonging, social hierarchy, human rights, and the contemporary societies which these productions address.