This is a strong documentary from directors Sabaah Folayan and Damon Davis about the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement after the shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.
The film utilizes stock footage of protesters and their standoffs against militarized cops, and shows you how things got mightily out of hand. It also replays the interview with Darren Wilson, the officer who riddled Brown with bullets after he had raised his hands into the air to surrender.
It’s still chilling to hear the man recount how Brown had “a demon’s eyes” when he was coming at him. Yeah pal, maybe that’s because you were putting bullets into a kid who was trying to surrender. I’d imagine an unarmed man getting repeatedly shot would have some ungodly expressions upon his face.
The film also focusses on protester Brittany Ferrell and her obsessive pursuit of justice for her hometown. This documentary does what it should do. It fuels arguments, it doesn’t fully take sides, and it makes you think long and hard about the ramifications of Brown’s death. The kid stole a bunch of cigars, and walked in the middle of the street when a cop ordered him to the side of the road. His behavior may’ve earned him a trip to the police station and a couple of fines, not a body full of bullets.
This is a movie that will piss you off, and I’m thinking that would be appropriate.
This article appears in Aug 17-23, 2017.
https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/file…
Yes, tlglenn, they recommended against prosecuting a white cop for shooting an unarmed black man. What a surprise!
Regardless, Darren Wilson is a racist piece of shite who, in the bad old days, would have spent his time harassing, intimidating, beating and shooting black boys while on the clock and then wearing the pointy white hood on the weekends. (Oh, wait a minute–looks like the bad old days are making a comeback…)
The Dept. of Justice also conducted thorough investigations of the Ferguson Police Dept. and several others (Cleveland, Baltimore, et al.) and found that they were all rife with institutional racism that routinely and as a matter of policy and professional culture violated the civil rights of people of color in those communities. Some of these police departments were then forced to submit to supervision under consent decrees because they could not be trusted to reform themselves.
Some things have not changed a while lot since the bad old days…but they might now, if the good people of the world push back hard against the racism that still poisons our nation and its institutions at all levels.