I AM MLK Jr
US, 2018, 95 minutes, Colour/ black and white.
Directed by John Barbisan, Michael Harrison.
For all those interested in the life and non-violent aims for Civil Rights and the career of Martin Luther King, here is a 95 minute compendium. It can be viewed along with the fine documentary, King in the Wilderness, as well as the feature films, Boycott (2001) and Selma (2014).
The I am series has generally focused on film stars and media celebrities. This one is quite different although, of course, there is high admiration for Martin Luther King.
Always valuable is the amount of newsreel footage from the period as well as footage taken by friends. Which means then that we see sequences of the boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, a focus on the March on Washington, and, in dramatic climax, Martin Luther King coming to Memphis in support of sanitary workers and their desire for reunion, his final impassioned speech to them, seeming to indicate that he was resigned to being assassinated (something he had considered over the years), and the aftermath of his death, his funeral.
There are a great number of people being interviewed, those who were with him in his marches, like Jesse Jackson, quite a number of Civil Rights historians, some older, some younger. Interspersed are selections from quite a number of African-American songs and hymns, including Amazing Grace, some by individuals and requires.
The audience is reminded that at the time of the boycott in Montgomery, King was only 25. At his death he was 39.
There are glimpses of him with President Kennedy, with President Johnson, a contrast with the Alabama treatment of such law enforcers as the brutal Bull Connor, physical abuse of African-Americans, fire hoses, dogs, imprisonment for Martin Luther King and his writing a significant letter from the Birmingham jail.
The film outlines his campaigns and political career rather than his personal life. There are also speculations about his physical health, his mental health, depression, advice to seek psychiatric help, so close-ups of him looking depressed, the intensity and anguish of that final speech in Memphis.
As said, there are many more films to be watched, but this is a 95 minute compendium.
