Selma 2014
I wanted to see this movie when it came out, not least because one part of it was filmed near my house, so I knew about it before it ever came out. I am glad to see a movie about this critical part of the Civil Rights movmement, with so many key characters involved, many of whom are household names in Atlanta like Martin Luther King and his wife Coretta, Ralph Abernathy, John Lewis, and Hosea Williams plus James Orange who I missed somehow, but lived here his whole life (he doesn’t have any roads named after him like the others). I knew about the Bloody Sunday part of Selma, but really not much else, not realizing it was an ongoing campaign and there were three separate marches. And while I did not think anyone died at Bloody Sunday, the movie shows there were deaths in the overall campaign. You also see the leaders making decisions, including some uneasy relationships. And you see how King was basically finding situations where he could provoke and exploit and how ruling whites in those places played into his hand perfectly, albeit at a serious cost. In this case, the horrible behaviour displayed in Selma helped the Voting Rights Act pass with overwhelming bipartisan approval. They mostly keep everything pretty accurate except even Andrew Young says it was an unfair portrayal of Lyndon Johnson. My only other quibble is that so many of these characters are played by British actors, including Martin Luther King, Coretta Scott King, George Wallace, and Lyndon Johnson. They are all very good actors, but the accents were off. I am seeing the movie four years after it came out, but I still hope that maybe some of these giants of the Civil Rights era can be revisited in more movies.
Written: 08 Sep 2018
Owned on: Digital