Backlash: The Murder of George Floyd

This documentary tells the story of what happened after the killing of George Floyd by American policemen, but especially exploring why it had an effect in Britain. Of course I knew all about the event before watching the film, but I had avoided watching the video footage of his death, which is totally shocking even when you know what's coming. Otherwise, it's a perfectly servicable documentary. At one point an interviewee states the sadly banal truth, that ethnic minority communities (on both sides of the Atlantic) are over-policed but under-protected, and that did make me wonder, what does good look like? What is the model we should be following, or indeed, is any such model possible in a materially unqueal society? To put it another way, the documentary focuses on the symptoms of failure, which is understanable as it was those symptoms that brought the people out onto the streets, but less on the deeper causes (or rather it assumes that racism is the one primaeval cause). But perhaps this is nit-pciking when, sadly, one can still have little confidence that our states will truly act as if black lives matter.

The documentary's description: "Five years since the murder of George Floyd - the police killing that set America on fire with rage and sparked a wave of protests around the world, the film explores one of the most important and defining events in modern history."

The documentary's content: A focus on British policing and events in Britain.

I expected to see some exploration of the events of the day. I expected to see some exploration of the worldwide effects of the events of the day. Instead what I got was a monotonous repetition of the documentary-maker's agenda with a bizarre emphasis on tangentially relevant matters in the UK.

For a more relevant documentary on this topic, watch The Fall of Minneapolis (2023).