Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is remembered today as an American hero: a bridge-builder, a shrewd political tactician, and a moral leader. Yet throughout his history-altering political career, he was often treated by U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies like an enemy of the state. In this virtuosic documentary, award-winning editor and director Sam Pollard (Editor, 4 LITTLE GIRLS, MO’ BETTER BLUES; Director/Producer, EYEZ ON THE PRIZE, SAMMY DAVIS, JR.: I’VE GOTTA BE ME) lays out a detailed account of the FBI surveillance that dogged King’s activism throughout the ’50s and ’60s, fueled by the racist and red-baiting paranoia of J. Edgar Hoover. In crafting a rich archival tapestry, featuring some revelatory restored footage of King, Pollard urges us to remember that true American progress is always hard-won.
6 July 1925, San Mateo, California, USA
January 8, 1931 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
20 November 1925, Brookline, Massachusetts, USA
August 30, 1901 in St. Louis, Missouri, USA
31 October 1931, Wharton, Texas, USA
15 January 1929, Atlanta, Georgia, USA
29 May 1917, Brookline, Massachusetts, USA
27 April 1927, Marion, Alabama, USA
27 August 1908, Stonewall, Texas, USA
12 March 1932, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA
25 August 1919, Clio, Alabama, USA
4 October 1943, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, USA
1 January 1895, Washington, District of Columbia, USA
6 February 1911, Tampico, Illinois, USA
