The Summer of 1967 gave rise to one of the most violent incidents in American History. The place was Detroit at a time when race relations, albeit progressing, were as tense as ever.
The movie, Detroit, reveals what really happened on that fateful summer that cost the life of men and women and brought a city to its knees!
The new ground-breaking film, Detroit starts out with the expansion of African Americans into the North known as the Great Migration. We are shown the struggles of social acceptance and poverty that African Americans have to face on an everyday basis. Riots began to ‘insinuate’ in Detroit, which sparked a revolution toward the injustice that consumed the Detroit Police force. The city of Detroit turned into a war zone, police saw every person of color as a threat and tragically destroyed innocent lives. These race riots lead to the fateful event at the Algiers Motel, a mile away from where the riots began. This section of the film displayed the true terror of systematic racism, as Detroit Police strike fear into young, innocent victims based off their corrupt and perhaps racists attitudes and assumptions of guilt toward people of color.
This turned into one of the biggest incidents in Detroit involving the police, resulting in the deaths of three unarmed black men and multiple others were brutally beaten. The filmmaker keeps the audience on the edge of the seat as they show how the execution of three innocent black men lead to the beginning of change not only for African-Americans in Detroit, but all over the world.
This movie exemplifies the struggle of being black in America in the 60’s and makes you realize how far we have come as a society. Today, African Americans are still fighting for justice when police brutality is involved and unitedly working to explore approaches to impact the criminalization of race and poverty. This is definitely the movie of the year! If you enjoy suspenseful dramas then this is a 5 star film for you! You can catch Detroit in theaters everywhere nationwide!
Written By: Isaiah Alston
