A few hours before the grand jury decision not to indict Ferguson, Mo., Officer Darren Wilson in the Aug. 9 shooting death of Michael Brown was made public, I interviewed David Oyelowo, who portrays the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in the powerful upcoming movie "Selma."
As a matter of professional practice, I abide by studio protocol, whereby journalists who are able to view advance screenings and interview principals involved with various projects agree not to publish reviews or release details about the film until closer to the release date (it hits theaters on Christmas Day in limited release and in wide release Jan. 9).
So for now, suffice it to say that Oyelowo richly deserves the best-actor Oscar nomination that is surely coming, and that director Ava DuVernay, who was the first black woman to ever win best director honors at the prestigious Sundance Film Festival (for "Middle of Nowhere," also starring Oyelowo), has done more great work.
And when you see "Selma," which was filmed partly in metro Atlanta, the famous line from William Faulkner may spring to mind: "The past is never dead. It's not even past."
“The notion that we are in a post-racial society is a complete fallacy,” Oyelowo said. “You only have to juxtapose the images (from the Selma, Ala., violence portrayed in the movie) with those we see from those coming out of Ferguson.”
Oyelowo said he prayed before taking on the role, both alone and with King's daughter the Rev. Bernice King, who is CEO of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change.
“I took a gamble and said, ‘Dear God, I pray that something will come through me that is not of me,’” Oyelowo said.
Bernice King issued a statement regarding the grand jury decision that touched off protests and marches not only in Ferguson but in locations throughout the country, including Atlanta. It read in part:
“The progress of the revolution for social change is heavily dependent on whether we are a concerned generation, whether we are awake and on how we answer this question: Decades from now, what do we want historians to write about this moment?”
And what films, one might wonder, will artists working decades from now create to portray the times we are living through today?
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