King

The film "King" 1978 is everything one could hope for in a dramatization on the life of Martin Luther King Jr. Paul Winfield and Cicely Tyson were the perfect pairing of actors to portray MLK JR. and Coretta Scott King. They literally bring history back to life. After years of watching a pre-recorded VHS tape of this classic film, I just received the 2005 DVD (MGM) and it looks as good as ever. Winfield captures the very essence of MLK the ups and downs, the fear and the gallantry that was Dr. Martin Luther King, with a fabulous supporting cast. A perfect casting choice was also the great Ossie Davis as Martin Luther King SR. There is however one caveat that I just discovered,which is within the screenplay, about the three American civil rights workers, James Earl Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael "Mickey"Schwerner, who were murdered in the early to mid-sixties. This is concerning the actual time period when this event occurred. That said,the rest of the movie is accurate events wise, and sometimes hard to take, for the true to life aspects of this film. I highly recommend "King"

A poster here made mention that Malcolm X and Dr. King had never met, which isn't true. They had met, once, but briefly. There's even a famous picture depicting said meeting, with the two of them smiling. Had Malcolm not been assassinated, who knows what they could have accomplished together. I would love to have been a fly on the wall for whatever the conversation they had was. I like to think that theirs would have been a strong alliance of an interfaith nature, working to address the lack of human rights, not just for black people, but for all people. They would have also address poverty together, which Dr. King was already addressing. Malcolm might have also spoken out, like King,(and eventually, Muhammad Ali, who came to Islam under the tutelage of Malcolm X)against the Vietnam War. One wonders at what might have been and weeps at what took place.

Made at a time before King had achieved public sainthood and acceptance by the ruling class, this mini-series changed the way many people felt about civil rights. Expertly scripted and directed by Abby Mann, the film centers on Paul Winfield's excellent interpretation of a man who was a great poet and writer as well as a leader. If it's ever released on DVD, it will be recognized as a classic biography.

i only gave this TV movie a five star rating because the real story wasn't told a lot of missing pieces to much propaganda. the truth is the government killed MLK JR.Dr. William Francis Pepper, a friend to the late Dr. Martin Luther King and the attorney who represented King's accused murderer, James Earl Ray, in an April 1993 televised mock trial on HBO. After being arrested for King's 1968 murder, Ray was advised by his attorney, Percy Foreman, to plead guilty in a pre-trial hearing.

Ray followed Foreman's advice but three days later, Ray recanted the plea and fired Foreman. He then asked his judge for a trial but the judge refused, sentencing Ray to 99 years in prison.

The HBO special was the closest Ray ever got to defending himself in court. The mock jury found Ray not guilty of King's murder. Friend of MLK, Jr.: Government Conspiracy Killed Dr. King https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BE2e0-EDkbc

Paul Winfield effectively showed the charisma of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as a speaker and leader. He also showed as a human side to Dr. King, a man who could be scared and even cry privately, a man who could laugh and have fun with his family and friends, and yet a man who didn't understand why people wanted him to lead the movement. He didn't feel confident about his own abilities, yet he made the most of what he had and, based on what I saw here, few if any could have done better. Winfield looked too old for the younger King, and he didn't deliver the 'I have a dream' speech exactly as King did (though imitating might not have been as effective), but these are minor flaws.

And there were too many good acting performances to list. Cicely Tyson as Coretta, Ossie Davis as an angry King Sr., Dick Anthony Williams as an evil Malcolm X--just a few that I remember; there may have been others but I didn't recall the name of the characters. The only performance I was not happy with was Cliff De Young as Robert Kennedy, who came across as a whiny teenager.

This was a good presentation of the Civil Rights Movement--a little violent at times, but the violence was necessary. We saw the determination of the leaders and of ordinary people, even children. The 6-letter word starting with N was of course used a lot and no one censored it. A couple of times King's last name was changed, by opponents, to that of the small mammal with the black mask.

I was always intimidated by the length of this program, but one station in my area showed it a whole week before the King holiday, while the other waited until this past weekend. It definitely was worth seeing.