 |
| Directed by Ava DuVernay Written by Paul Webb |
Is it just me, or has there not been a Martin Luther King biopic before this? The story of his life is chock full of big dramatic set-pieces, it makes for an actor's showcase, it can't help but be a powerful work of cinema, so why is Selma the first big production to tackle this subject? Maybe it's because the man's speeches are under copyright, and it's nigh impossible to do anything with his legacy without the I Have A Dream speech. Or maybe its because there aren't that many black name actors that are known for dramatic work. Or maybe it's because of the monolithic stature that Dr. King and his legacy still hold in American culture as the embodiment of the idea that peaceful protest can actually change things.
Selma is a film about that legacy, and how, as hard as it can be to believe sometimes, that protest can work. That this country and the ideals it was founded on can work. It's also an amazing film that comes incredibly close to being perfect. If it had gotten a wide release then, it would have easily been on and possibly topped my best of 2014 list, and it is likely the only one of this year's Best Picture nominees that will be remembered once the Oscars have come and gone. Because it is the only one of them that, for better and for worse, is fueled by the emotions of the time in which it was made.
The film opens in 1965 with Dr. King attempting to convince President Johnson to put a voting rights act up for vote in Congress that would bring the hammer of federal oversight down on certain Southern states with a history of denying the franchise to their black populations. He's unwilling to do this because, or at least the film implies, doing so would cost him the votes of Southern states that would resent the increase in federal power, so he turns down Dr. King's request. Frustrated by Johnson's apparent lack of concern for the well being of his citizens over his political clout, he and his supporters plan a march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, moving through one of the most notoriously segregated states in the union, and that's a part of his plan.
Selma strips away the romanticized version of Martin Luther King that we all learned about in history class to show us the imperfect human being underneath - as impeccably played by David Oyelowo - and show that he was much more of a radical than we usually think of him as being, which serves to infuse this biopic with much more weight than is usually expected in the middle of Oscar season. It also takes a different one of those aforementioned values, a free and independent press, and shows how Dr. King was able to manipulate it to boost the reach of his protests and speeches. He doesn't choose Selma as a starting point just because it's the right thing to do, he chooses it because it's one of the most egregious offenders, he knows that his celebrity status will bring the press there, and that as a result the American public will see the bloody reality of the Jim Crow South for the first time and be appropriately outraged by it.
Said reality is another place where Selma doesn't waste any time with the sanitized version of civil disobedience. Depictions of the protests, marches, and subsequent police actions against them are uncompromisingly brutal and don't shy away from that brutality for a second. I'm sure that there will be, if there hasn't already, much wringing of hands and shouting over how there are almost no Southern whites in this movie that aren't portrayed as bigoted bloodthirsty monsters, and I'll admit that detail sticks out in what is an otherwise incredibly uncompromising depiction of this time and place. With the killing of black men by police almost perpetually in the news for the latter part of 2014, these scenes cannot help being quietly powerful, but this would have been a great film no matter when it was released, because it is a seriously impressive piece of cinema with fantastic direction and a solid cast.
Ava DuVernay's Selma is hands down, no caveats, the best film currently playing in theaters, and gets my wholehearted recommendation.
Have a nice day.
Greg.B
No comments:
Post a Comment