“Selma”: extremely relevant, extremely good

Last Friday, Jan. 17, Warch Cinema had a showing of Ava DuVernay’s 2014 film “Selma” as part of its Movie Series. The showing was to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. Day the following Monday. The film depicts the series of marches from Selma to Montgomery, Ala. in 1965 led by the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The film does a great job in depicting the complexities of the Civil Rights movement as well as reminding the audience that these issues have not fully left us.

The first few scenes do an amazing job at contextualizing the film for the audience. The film starts in 1964 and begins with King (David Oyelowo) receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway. During his acceptance speech, the film transitions back to the United States and depicts the 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church which tragically took the lives of four young girls. Having King’s acceptance speech introduce a scene depicting such a violent and tragic hate crime, the tone for the film is set. This is the type of hatred that is rampant in the South, and there is still a lot of work to be done. The next scene then shows the issue that will lead to the famous series of marches from Selma to Montgomery: Annie Lee Cooper (Oprah Winfrey) tries to register to vote, but she is denied.

Part of what makes this situation so frustrating is that Black people already had the right to vote. Since the signing of the Fifteenth Amendment, which was ratified in 1870, it was illegal to deny voting rights based on race. However, like so many other acts, states found loopholes so they could deny rights to their citizens. Even after the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1965, southern states, such as Alabama, either exploited loopholes or just straight up ignored the federal government. In the film, southern states getting away with ignoring these acts leads to tension between King and President Lyndon Johnson (Tom Wilkinson). Throughout the story, King tries to convince Johnson to do more to ensure these rights are enforced, and he continues to be waved off. While this element of the film is allegedly not 100% accurate, I think that it still serves as a great way of showing how politicians approach issues that are not personal to them. Even today, Black Americans, along with other minority groups, face significant hurdles in voting, such as the lack of polling places in Black communities and the removal of preclearance.

I really appreciate how this film showed the complexity of the Civil Rights Movement. The film depicts the tensions between King’s organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), and the Student Nonviolent Coordination Committee (SNCC), as well as the disagreements between King and Malcolm X. Like political movements today, there were multiple groups fighting for similar goals, but they had different ideas on how to fight for those goals. The Civil Rights Movement, like everything else in history, was not a simple straight line, but rather a whole web of people, groups and events. The film also shows the extent that Civil Rights leaders were being followed by the FBI per order of the federal government. The government was threatened by all of these activists rallying the masses for social and political change. I feel like that is a fact that many do not know, thus impacting this country’s understanding of how deep systemic racism goes.

I also love how the film portrayed King as the complex human being he was. Throughout the film, the FBI is watching King and his family, which leads to tensions between him and his wife, Coretta Scott King (Carmen Ejogo). The film touches on King’s infidelity, which the FBI uses to try to further drive a wedge between him and Scott King. The film also touches on King’s self-doubt about his strategies and his guilt when people were killed during his marches. I think it is so important to portray important leaders such as King as realistically as possible. When we immortalize human beings as God-like figures, it actively harms their legacy. Many kids in the United States are taught that King was a perfect figure who single-handedly solved racism with his “I Have a Dream” speech. Many in this country grow up accepting that as fact, which leads to people denying that systemic racism is still very much a problem in this country.

Overall, “Selma” is a great film that shows a great snippet of the history of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s and summarizes the marches from Selma to Montgomery. I think it is a great film to watch if you want to start learning about this era of history, and I highly recommend it.