Selma

The third feature from LA filmmaker Ava DuVernay chronicles Martin Luther King Jr’s legendary struggle to secure equal voting rights for African-Americans, with a focus on his frustrated efforts to lead a peaceful procession from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama in 1965.

The era’s pervading climate of racism is convincingly depicted − scenes of police brutality unsettle, as do King’s vitriolic adversaries (“He’s a political and moral degenerate,” one spouts) − but it never feels gratuitous nor does it detract from the film’s core objective: celebrating the dignity and courage with which King and his cohorts faced great injustice.

Selma is a stirring and nuanced docudrama anchored by strong performances, especially David Oyelowo as King and Tom Wilkinson as conflicted U.S. President, Lyndon Johnson. (JH) ****