The past week has been one of the hardest for everyone – and last night I was so anxious and depressed I didn’t know what to do. Instinctually, I did what I always do in times like this – I decided to watch a movie – and gravitated to Ava DuVernay’s “Selma.” I found solace in watching this film for it helped me understand the road we’ve traveled – and how much farther we need to go. It turns out DuVernay’s muscular and courageous vision and the presence of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. made for extraordinary companions.
At first take, the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis has no correlation to the film, and then again it is directly connected to DuVernay’s “Selma.” Her film focuses on the three months prior to the 1965 march from Selma, Alabama to the state capitol in Montgomery led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. — this was the culminating event that led to the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Sadly, racial violence still exists. Race discrimination is more prevalent than ever, and the need to be treated equal and with respect – to be seen – to be recognized is needed more than ever. Those ideas are eloquently expressed in DuVernay’s film.
Instead of doing a biopic of Dr. King – DuVernay smartly concentrates on a very specific moment in history involving him – as well as including activists Ralph Abernathy, Andrew Young, James Orange and Diane Nash among others. King is surrounded by community action – a band of brothers and sisters – and you see the important role they played – being the masterminds and working as a close team behind the movement. We see the strategies, the tactics, the arguments – we’re in the room where it’s all happening – where history and change is taking place. This is a drama that zeroes on how the vision and discipline was harnessed to fight for racial equality.
It comes at a price. The movie shows us in rich detail the three tries to march the 50 miles. At the first one the crowd is brutally attacked by the police – and King uses the media to document and televise the injustices happening. The scene is similar to the chaos and brutality that we’ve been witnessing from our televisions lately. DuVernay visually makes a parallel to slavery which is quite sobering – a policeman on a horse whipping a peaceful protester.
David Oyelowo is magnificent as Dr. King. It is quite a demanding role going from private moments to making a speech in front of the Capitol – and Oyelowo gets it right. The script also allows us to see Dr. King letting down his guard and showing us his vulnerability as when he calls singer Mahalia Jackson in the middle of the night to hear the Lord’s voice. There’s one powerful, intimate scene with Coretta (Carmen Ejogo) where they discuss her fears. She knows there’s danger all around them, which she refers to as “The fog of death constantly hanging over.” The scene is tender and heartbreaking as it turns to the subject of his infidelities. “Do you love any of the others?” she asks.
The movie is elegantly shot. DuVernay’s wide composition and color palette is stunning. She also follows every violent moment or death with a scene that humanizes the toll. When peaceful demonstrator Jimmy Lee Jackson is murdered, Dr. King shows up at the coroner’s office to confort the grandfather of the victim. “There are no words to soothe you. But I know one thing for certain: God was the first to cry,” Dr. King says.
Some of you may be thinking the last thing I need to do is watch this movie that deals with such painful and topical subjects. I argue we should. At a time like the one we’re encountering, we need to reflect, we need try and understand.
Dr. King: “We negotiate, we demonstrate, we resist.”
Love,
Roger
Available to watch on FXNOW and to rent on Amazon, YouTube, Google Play, Vudu, Microsoft, Redbox, iTunes, AMC Theatres On-Demand, Fandango Now, and Direct TV.
Director Ava DuVernay
Ava DuVernay was born on August 24, 1972 in Long Beach, California. As a child, DuVernay’s Aunt Denise encouraged her passion for art and creativity. Her aunt worked the night shift as a nurse so she could pursue her love for art, literature and theater during the day. She introduced DuVernay the 1961 film West Side Story, and DuVernay fell in love with it. DuVernay learned by example that art could be a vehicle for activism. Similarly, DuVernay’s mother was socially conscious and taught her to “say something through the arts.” Although DuVernay grew up in Compton with her family, she spent every summer in Lowndes County, Alabama where her father’s family lived for generations. DuVernay’s father recalled watching the historic civil rights march over the Edmund Pettus Bridge in the neighboring town of Selma, Alabama. The summers DuVernay spent there would later inspire her to direct a movie about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement.
In 1990, DuVernay graduated from Saint Joseph High School in Lakewood, California. After graduating, she attended the University of California, Los Angeles where she earned degrees in English and African American studies. While she was still a student, DuVernay became interested in producing for broadcast journalism. She began as an intern for CBS News during the O.J. Simpson trial. DuVernay remembers being assigned to watch the home of one of the members of the jury and look through their trash. Her tasks left her disappointed with journalism, so she decided to move towards the publicity industry. DuVernay was hired right out of college as a junior publicist at a small studio. From this position, she started her own public relations company called The DuVernay Agency in 1999. In addition to PR, her agency also launched several lifestyle and promotional networks including; the Urban Beauty Collective, Urban Thought Collective, Urban Eye, and HelloBeautiful. The DuVernay Agency also worked on campaigns for movies and television shows. While on film sets, DuVernay was able to observe prominent filmmakers like Steven Spielberg, Michael Mann, Clint Eastwood, Raoul Peck and Gurinder Chadha. She became interested in directing and started writing her first script in 2003.
By 2006, DuVernay made her first short film called Saturday Night Life based on her mother’s experiences. The next year, she made her first documentary called Compton in C Minor. A more cost-effective style of film, DuVernay’s next project was a documentary that she wrote, produced, and directed called This Is the Life about hip hop culture. In 2010, DuVernay released her first narrative feature film called I Will Follow. This film was released theatrically and became the official selection of the American Film Institute Fest, Pan-African Film Festival, and the Chicago International Film Festival. Her second feature film, Middle of Nowhere, premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival and won the award for Best Direction. DuVernay’s career quickly took off following this film as she steadily became a household name.
In addition to directing many TV shows, commercials, and music videos, DuVernay’s films Selma and 13th received critical acclaim and multiple awards for their portrayal of racial prejudice in the United States. She collaborated with Oprah Winfrey to create and direct the TV series Queen Sugar on the Oprah Winfrey Network, as well as the Disney live-action film, A Wrinkle in Time. In 2010, she started her own film distribution company called African-American Film Festival Releasing Movement (AFFRM) but rebranded the company in 2015 under the name ARRAY to focus on racial and gender inclusion in filmmaking. In 2019, DuVernay created, directed, and co-wrote the Netflix drama When They See Us. This five-part miniseries based on the 1989 Central Park jogger case quickly became Netflix’s number one most watched series daily in the U.S., with over 23 million viewers during its first month of release, and 16 Emmy nominations at the 71st Primetime Emmy Awards.