Documentary

King: A Filmed Record... Montgomery to Memphis

Commonwealth United Entertainment

United States of America

Deutsch

English

Martin Luther King Jr.

Coretta Scott King

A.D. King

Dexter King

Yolanda King

Martin Luther King III

Bernice King

Ralph Abernathy

Joan Baez

James Baldwin

Harry Belafonte

Tony Bennett

Leonard Bernstein

Marlon Brando

H. Rap Brown

Kwame Ture

Diahann Carroll

Wilt Chamberlain

Xernona Clayton

Bull Connor

Bill Cosby

Sammy Davis Jr.

Ruby Dee

James Garner

Ben Gazzara

Dick Gregory

Al Hibbler

Charlton Heston

Hubert H. Humphrey

Jesse Jackson

Mahalia Jackson

Gunnar Jahn

James Earl Jones

Lyndon B. Johnson

Ethel Kennedy

Jacqueline Kennedy

Robert F. Kennedy

Burt Lancaster

John Lewis

Elaine May

Eugene McCarthy

Robert Moseley

Mike Nichols

Paul Newman

Richard Nixon

John M. Patterson

Anthony Perkins

Sidney Poitier

A. Philip Randolph

Frederick Reese

Nipsey Russell

Bayard Rustin

Anthony Quinn

Fred Lee Shuttlesworth

Nina Simone

Paul Stookey

Mary Travers

Leslie Uggams

C.T. Vivian

Clarence Williams III

Paul Winfield

Joanne Woodward

Peter Yarrow

Andrew Young

Wendell Franklin

Al Gramaglia

Joe Dalisera

James Perdue

Gary Leibman

John Carter

Lora Hays

Jack Sholder

Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson

Sidney Lumet

Joseph L. Mankiewicz

Richard Kaplan

Ely A. Landau

CinemaSerf

I’m not sure this is an actual documentary. It has no editorial or narrative structure per se, what it presents us with is as comprehensive a chronology of Dr. Martin Luther King as it is possible to get. From his humble beginnings in an Alabama ridden with bigotry and strife, through to his assassination in 1968, this uses a phenomenal amount of archive research to illustrate the power of his oratory. His speeches are powerful and emotional, but they never come across as angry or provocative of violence. His strength of character and purpose in the face of a long-established racial belligerence is really quite well captured as the film includes the large scale “I Have a Dream” set-pieces to far more intimate and poignant comments to smaller groups, churches or even just to his aides and friends as he travels the length and breadth of the country extolling the virtues of freedom for all. That all isn’t just for folks of colour, but those being persecuted for their religious beliefs too, or being disadvantaged because of their sex or social status. It’s hard to imagine who might actually watch all of this now, it is a long haul, but it goes quite some way to testifying just how effective oratory can be when delivered confidently and proudly to an audience eager to engage. There is enough annotation to help advise on the locations and timelines, and there are a few - slightly unnecessary, I felt - staged readings from the likes of Charlton Heston and James Earl Jones to help, as does the latter archive footage, demonstrate that his optimism wasn’t just inspiring those African Americans, but plenty from the descendants of it’s European immigrant population too. It doesn’t attempt to analyse the man, his motives or his personal life but I don’t think that was anyone’s plan. It’s a vehicle for his passion, and it works powerfully.

King: A Filmed Record... Montgomery to Memphis – Trailer

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King: A Filmed Record... Montgomery to Memphis

Cast & Crew

Videos

Cast

Martin Luther King Jr.

Coretta Scott King

A.D. King

Dexter King

Yolanda King

Martin Luther King III

Bernice King

Ralph Abernathy

Joan Baez

James Baldwin

Box office

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