In 1964, Martin Luther King Jr. accepts the Nobel Peace Prize while the civil rights movement keeps running into obstacles across the American South. Annie Lee Cooper tries to register to vote in Selma, Alabama, and is turned away by the white registrar. King meets with President Lyndon B. Johnson to ask for federal legislation that would guarantee the vote, but Johnson wants to focus on another priority. The film follows the campaign King and other activists launch in Selma, with the march from Selma to Montgomery at its center, amid rising tension with local and state authorities.

How it was made

The project began with an original idea by screenwriter Paul Webb about King and Johnson, and passed through several hands before Ava DuVernay came on board and rewrote much of Webb's script. Among the changes were King's speeches, whose rights were licensed to another studio, so DuVernay drafted alternative versions that evoke the originals without copying them. Oprah Winfrey, who also plays Annie Lee Cooper, joined as a producer. The cast includes David Oyelowo as King, Tom Wilkinson as Johnson and Tim Roth as George Wallace. Filming began in May 2014 in Atlanta, with locations including the Edmund Pettus Bridge and Montgomery, and cinematography was by Bradford Young.

Reception and legacy

The film premiered in November 2014 at an American Film Institute event, opened in limited release in late December and returned to theaters in March 2015 for the fiftieth anniversary of the march. It earned a Best Picture Oscar nomination and won Best Original Song. At the Golden Globes it received four nominations, including Best Motion Picture - Drama, Best Director and Best Actor. Its place in film history is tied mainly to its revisiting of the fight for the right to vote in recent biographical cinema.

Stills

Trailer

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Trivia

Rewritten speeches

DuVernay estimated that she rewrote 90 percent of Webb's original script. Because the rights to King's speeches were held by other studios, she drafted alternative speeches that evoke the historic ones without violating copyright.

A choice by Daniels

Lee Daniels had financing in place for Selma, but he had to choose between this project and The Butler, and he chose The Butler.

More films by Ava DuVernay

A Wrinkle in Time2018

13th2016

Original Cinematopedia text based on Wikipedia (es) and Wikipedia (en) and Wikidata.