Selma

By focusing on the struggle for the black vote in the Southern town of Selma, the film shows a sliver of civil rights history and the iconic leadership of Martin Luther King. The film stars David Oyelowo, who portrays King as a doubt-filled leader with many moments of weakness, and is far removed from the typical Hollywood biographic pathos. IndieWire notes, [t]he beauty and brilliance ofSelmais how the filmmakers humanize every aspect of their story, refusing to make it a historical pageant. Staying within the theme of African-American revisionist cinema of recent years, director Ava DuVernay tells the story of African Americans and their community who take control of their future. The film dissected this difficult moment in American history at a time when the largest race riots were rolling through the United States since the 1990s, making the film's questions about the possibility and limits of social integration all the more topical.