Selma * * * *

Up until the 1960's, in some parts of America, black people could not vote. They can now - that’s what this film is about: showing us how they changed things in Alabama so that the African-American could actually practice their already existing legal right. A good thing too.

So now they get to vote. But they don’t get to act in films about themselves.

Okay I’m being a little facetious.  It's just that it amused me that all the lead roles in this American story  are played by English actors.  I don’t know why and I don’t suppose it matters that much, but when the starring roles of Martin Luther King, his wife Coretta, President Lyndon Johnson, Governor George Wallace are all played by English actors ….. well it just leaves you wondering.  Still, I suppose the folks that make these films know what they’re doing.

Director Ava DuVernay certainly knows what she is doing.  For a relatively new director this is a strong film of a hugely important time in recent American history.  It is beautifully shot and acted and the story unfolds with clarity and passion.  You will get indignant and angry when you watch this.  That a proud nation could trample upon its own magnificent Bill Of Rights (written for every citizen) and treat it’s own people so appallingly; that some people could be so openly cruel and violent with impunity. That there was a systematic procedure of condescension, bullying and oppression on the black people for no reason other than the colour of their skin.  It was a difficult time in the history of America and it is a credit that they have recreated the awfulness - and liberation from it - without restraint or sentimental exaggeration.   It’s also an education - well it was for me.  Most would be aware of the March On Washington with Dr King’s legendary speech but this critical event is perhaps one that not all of us are necessarily aware of.  I wasn’t.  The town of Selma in Alabama was 45% black with only 2% of them being able to vote, and without voting rights how can you make change? To register to vote one had to attend the City Hall in Montgomery across the river.  So Dr King and his supporters determined that they would go to Selma and lead the people in a march across the bridge to Montgomery.  It’s hard to believe that such a simple and legitimate act could result in cops using batons to smash the heads and break the bones of anyone in the march but such was the time.  This is an important, respectful and very moving film with an uplifting ending.