King in the Wilderness: a documentary about the months before the murder of MLK, Jr..

[Solly Mack]

If you haven't seen it yet - Please do. It's excellent. It's a small glimpse into the feelings and turmoil King was going through as a father, a husband, a leader, and as a human. Featuring his longtime friends and those who worked with Martin Luther King Jr., as well as footage of his life at home and on the road, we get to gain another perspective of King, the man, the leader, the father, and the husband. You will also be treated with Coretta Scott King letting the world know that yes, she is "the" wife but she is also so much more.

King in the Wilderness

King in the Wilderness chronicles the final chapters of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s life, revealing a conflicted leader who faced an onslaught of criticism from both sides of the political spectrum. While the Black Power movement saw his nonviolence as weakness, and President Lyndon B. Johnson saw his anti-Vietnam War speeches as irresponsible, Dr. King’s unyielding belief in peaceful protest became a testing point for a nation on the brink of chaos.

NewsWeek

Without any narration or talking-head historians, the documentary offers an insightful glimpse into King’s last days from the perspective of the people who knew him best, including Jesse Jackson, Xernona Clayton, Mary Lou Finley and other members of King’s civil rights organization Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). Old friends of King, including Harry Belafonte and his adviser and personal lawyer Clarence Jones, are also featured.

In interviews, King’s companions describe the successes the Atlanta native achieved after his renowned 1963 speech—like how King stood against the Vietnam War, broke racial barriers in the north by helping impoverished people of all races (to the dismay of his southern followers), and how he developed the 1966 open housing movement in Chicago, which ultimately led Congress to pass the 1968 Fair Housing Act.

Variety

There’s another, quite famous piece of footage from this period, shown in the movie, in which something that sounds like a gunshot rings out, and King ducks, his eyes darting nervously. That image has the effect of outing King’s anxiety; it captures the unbearable pressure he was under. “King in the Wilderness” includes a wealth of other material that feels revelatory: home-movie clips of King looking wary and earthbound, that solemn majestic phrasing of his now sounding like a controlled cover for fear, as well as new interviews with multiple members of his inner circle (Andrew Young, Jesse Jackson, Bernard Lafayette). Racially, America had become a cauldron that was boiling over, and King was at the center of it, to the point that his non-violent stance looked more extreme than ever. (It was now seen as a provocation.) What “King in the Wilderness” shows us, through close-up archival footage, is the sweat and dread King lived with every day — and probably did back in the Bus Boycott era, too. It just wasn’t made public.

teenVogue

So what took place in the life of this man after those accomplishments? What was he been dealing with before his death? King in the Wilderness answers those questions in an honest and authentic way, showing archival footage of King during that period of his life and interviews with his inner circle, including John Lewis, Harry Belafonte, Marian Wright Edelman, Jesse Jackson, Joan Baez, other members of King’s civil rights organization Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), and his adviser and personal lawyer, Clarence B. Jones.
In these interviews, it’s revealed that his life was no perfect dream in the last several months before his death. In fact, in the first footage viewers get to see of King, he says, “I must confess that dream I had that day has at many points turned into a nightmare.”

[heaven05]

1. thank you

I shall...

[malaise]

2. Thanks