FilmSnobReviews

Title: MLK/FBI
MPAA Rating: TV-PG
Director: Sam Pollard
Starring: Martin Luther King, J. Edgar Hoover, David Garrow
Runtime: 1 hr 44 mins

What It Is: This documentary details the dangerously rocky relationship between civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King and the (then) long-tenured director of the FBI J. Edgar Hoover. A relationship built mostly on the paranoia of Hoover and his thoughts that King was the greatest danger to the American way of life. But why? And what exactly does that even mean? In this startling documentary, we get insight into what the thought process was and how it put millions of Americans in danger.

What We Think: The thought that something like this could have happened in the United States of America is both unsurprising and disgusting. Most would chalk this up to that “being the times” but having one man in charge of the Bureau for as long as Hoover was is going to breed this manner of paranoia. Pollard does an amazing job of simply letting the facts tell the tale. As an audience we ourselves can make decisions on how these facts affect us or what we believe. Certainly a documentary like this has an agenda and it’s one I firmly think gets across beautifully. It’s also a point that should have never been a debate in the first place. The martyrdom of King and the “patriotism” of Hoover both juxtaposed against one and other.

Our Grade: A, This is a matter of fact, sobering piece. One that shows just what lengths the government of the United States will go to in order to maintain the status quo. To suppress the voice of those being suppressed. That this level and manner of harassment was allowed to occur, in spite of whatever will eventually be declassified later, is absolutely atrocious. I really can’t say how important this piece is. See it immediately.