Shoot the People (2025) Movie Script
1
[tense music]
- There has been
another shooting,
this time in Las Vegas.
- You can see police here,
now firing tear gas
into the crowd.
-[gunshots]
-[yelling]
- Migrants crossing
the Southern US border
are once again
reaching record levels.
- Europe's migrant crisis.
- Both sides.
- The deputy prime minister
describes it as an invasion.
- It's our country,
and we are getting pushed out.
I understand how the Native
Indians felt in America.
- Build that wall.
Build that wall.
- When I look around
what is happening today,
it's hard not to feel helpless.
- This is the darkest hour
for Europe since World War II.
- I've never known a time when
humans have been more divided.
It seems as though we're
heading towards something
truly catastrophic.
- Protests turning violent as
rioters set fire to a police car
and destroyed downtown streets.
- And chanting things
like, burn it down.
- Protesters
and counter-protesters
were attacking each other.
It was complete and utter chaos.
[tense music]
[camera shutter clicks]
[yelling]
- What am I to tell my son
when he grows up?
I don't have faith
in anything here anymore.
- If history
teaches us anything,
when humanity
has been confronted
by a big challenge
or a big injustice,
those struggles
only move forward
if large numbers of ordinary
people stand up and say,
enough is enough, and no more.
- We are sick and tired of this.
We are sick and tired
of being sick and tired.
- Protests are a
political statement.
Protests are a wake-up call.
[yelling]
- We shouldn't deny that
we're in a really dark moment
for humanity.
Treason! Treason! Treason!
- He wanted the war.
They were going to
give you the war.
- I think the revolution
should be televised.
I think the revolution
should always be documented
so that we know that the rights
and privileges we enjoy today
were not always present.
- The images
of people protesting
help people see
that they're not alone
in being frustrated
with the way things are.
Misan's work does
two ends of that,
demonstrating the injustice
and suggesting the possibility
of an alternative.
- Misan is able to capture
the complexity
of social protests of racism
in a way that's also beautiful.
That's the power of art
to expand our imagination,
to say another world is possible
and we have the power
to change things.
[tense music]
[birds chirping]
[camera shutter clicking]
- This is on 90, so it's kind
of-- almost up your nostrils.
- Your energy changes
when you're behind the camera.
- Oh, completely.
I get into a trance-like thing.
Completely.
You could travel
the world with this thing
and just bear witness.
[intriguing music]
I fell in love
with the camera late.
I do what I love, my work,
which is observing
the human condition,
and making art that has purpose
is also my passion.
[intriguing music]
I do portraiture in the
form of the protest images,
but then the kind
of celeb portraiture
that people also know me for.
The attention economics of
today's internet-connected world
is something I understand.
I would not be here today
if it wasn't for putting my
images online, on social media,
and it's changed
my life completely.
Hey, it's me. Hey. Hey. Hey.
I wanted to make a quick video.
When I take a picture, and
I put it out into the internet,
and I see millions of people be
deeply moved by it, that, to me,
is something I'm very proud of.
[intriguing music]
- When the
Black Lives Matter protests
began in London last summer,
one photographer,
with his intimate
black and white reportage style,
captured the mood of the
unfolding events like no other.
Born in Nigeria but raised
in the UK, where he developed
a lifelong love of the arts
from an early age,
Misan Harriman's work
behind the camera,
inspired by photographers
including Gordon Parks
and Eve Arnold,
is entirely self-taught.
Now, imagine going from being
an amateur photographer
to shooting the cover of Vogue
in just three years.
- Earlier this week, I spoke to
the editor of British Vogue.
The cover was shot
by Misan Harriman,
the first Black photographer
to shoot the front
of the September issue.
- I remember all these moments
before taking these images
and how nervous I was
or excited I was.
All this is part of the journey.
- You're quite
an anomaly, sadly.
- Sadly, yeah.
I've somehow managed
to tiptoe around the minefield
of being a visible voice
and a Black voice
in a Britain that usually allows
a very specific type of noise
to come out of the mouths
of someone
that has the same hue as me.
And somehow,
I've been quite loud
and able to function
in a society
that doesn't usually
accept that.
There has been an evolution
to my whole being.
Every few months, I feel
like I'm a different person.
As an activist,
you start off very scared
because you don't realize there
are more than a few people
that feel the same way
as you do.
And now I know
there are millions of people,
so it gives me the confidence
to be better at what I do
and learn and learn and learn.
- Remember,
we're here with the turn.
- Free! Free!
- Palestine!
- Free! Free!
- Palestine!
- Free! Free!
- Palestine!
1, 2, 3, 4!
Occupation no more!
5, 6, 7, 8!
Israel is a terrorist state.
- Early doors at Bank Station
for the beginning of what
I think is going to be
the biggest protest ever
for ceasefire in London.
-Ceasefire!
- What do we want?
- Ceasefire!
- When do we want it?
- Now!
- What do we want?
- I believe
in the network effect
of solidarity, empathy.
I believe that it's infectious.
The osmosis of activism is real.
I'm not a world leader.
I'm not a politician,
but this is how I play my part.
And a lot of the times...
I'll say 10% of my time
is actual taking photographs.
The rest is just
being in it, you know?
[yelling]
- I follow you on Instagram.
You seem to use your voice
quite a lot on Instagram,
and I'm here for it.
I'm here for every second of it.
- Hey. Thank you.
- What do we want?
- Ceasefire!
- When do we want it?
- Now!
- What do we want?
- Ceasefire!
- When do we want it?
- Now!
- What do we want?
- Nice to meet you.
- Someone to follow
on Instagram.
- Okay. The chocolate bar or--
- Second time?
- [overlapping chatter]
- Everything, everything.
Can we get a picture?
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Is that all right?
- Yeah.
[yelling]
- Excuse me.
Thank you. Oh, hold on.
Hold on. Hold on.
You're too fast.
You're too fast.
Can't keep up.
One more, one more.
[camera shutter clicks]
It feels like
a Michael Mann movie.
- Hey.
- Right.
- Yeah. You guys look good.
Looking Hollywood.
Oh, my lord.
Do you mind if I-- Is that okay?
Thank you.
For me, there's nothing more
important than the people,
so I'm just waiting for
them to walk past me
and seeing if any signs, faces,
feelings, emotions speak to me.
And-- Ooh.
Sorry.
Sorry. That sign
is just extraordinary.
Do you mind if I-- Yeah.
Oh, wow. Thank you.
Thank you very much.
- Every time the government
is not listening,
your voice grows louder.
This is the power of the people.
[cheering]
- I show all of these movements,
and they have a way
of fizzling out.
This one isn't, at all.
And it's becoming harder
and harder to ignore,
and that is the whole
reason to protest.
If our leaders
won't do anything,
the people will hold them
to account on the streets.
It's a very powerful thing.
- Ceasefire now!
- Ceasefire now!
- Ceasefire now!
Ceasefire now!
Ceasefire now!
- Hey, so I've left them,
the protests.
I did some photography,
and what I saw
were families coming out,
people that worship
different gods,
that have different
lived experiences,
that are trying
to figure out a way
for this violence to deescalate.
[clicks tongue]
Let's hope it does.
[birds chirping]
[pensive music]
I'm not neurotypical at all
in how I process the world.
The way I would
describe myself is
that I have to work hard
just to be normal, to fit in,
and this has been my experience
since I was a little boy
sent from Nigeria
to boarding school in England.
[pensive music]
My father,
he didn't know his father
and was brilliant academically
and going to Cambridge
and becoming
the success he became.
But there was a whole missing
part of how to be a father.
I needed that closeness that
wasn't there, that I don't think
he was capable of giving,
even if he tried,
because he had never
received it himself.
It's not just my father.
There were plenty of adults
all around me
that could have been
a little bit more kind,
and could have been
a bit more tender.
It was tough for me.
All the traumatic experiences
that I had--
At the time,
I mean, cognitively,
I didn't even know
what the meaning of trauma was.
And I think most children don't,
so they manage themselves
and package it away.
When you're young,
you know, this--
I was in boarding school in the
'80s in the English countryside.
You just want to fit in.
You know, you just wanna fit in.
You don't want to be different.
So when people keep telling you
that your hair is different,
that your lips are big,
your country that you come from
is simple,
you feel lesser than.
I think my existence
was in the notes of songs
and in the pages of books,
in the scenes of films,
without question.
That was my family.
[intriguing music]
Nellie, what do you see?
What do you see?
Sit, sit.
Paw. Good boy.
Good boy.
- I don't know who's showing up,
darling, you or Nelson.
- I can't believe he did that.
[laughs] He never does that.
- He must be so hot.
- That's what I was thinking.
- Well, well done, both of you.
- Good boy.
- Well, you know,
you get to your 20s,
and you're a young man.
And what does
everyone want to do?
So many of my friends
went into banking,
and they were at Deutsche Bank,
Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs.
I got into recruitment
because there was a low bar,
frankly, of entry.
And when I started being
a success in that industry,
it was the same thing.
You were living in London.
You want to be members
of whatever members club
that it was at the time.
You're going clubbing
with your friends.
You're just spending money
or going to Ibiza
and all of these things.
But there was always a choice,
in my inner voice,
possibly my inner child,
that said, "Misan,
you're not comfortable
with all of this.
Beyond the accumulation
of wealth, who are you?"
[intriguing music]
I am a great example
of finding out
who you are supposed
to be in real time.
I mean, it wasn't long ago
that it was lockdown,
and I didn't know
who I was supposed to be.
Something about that moment
when we were all stuck at home
and having repeated moments
of deep self-reflection
meant that we couldn't
pretend we were okay,
and our traumas
started climbing out of us.
[tense music]
[camera shutter clicking]
And after the murder
of George Floyd--
And I remember watching
the livestream, and I was like,
"Oh, this is
a modern-day lynching."
- A group of Minneapolis Police
officers
have been placed on leave
after one of the officers
was caught on video
pressing his knee into the neck
of a Black man
who was handcuffed
and subdued on the ground,
pleading with officers
that he could not breathe.
- I can't breathe.
Please, anybody.
I can't breathe. Shit.
- Bro, get up.
Get in the car, man.
- I will.
- Get up. Get in the car.
- I can't move.
- Get in the car.
- Mama.
- Get up
and get in the car, mate.
- Please. [sobs]
- America has reached
boiling point.
The fury and frustration has
seen another night of clashes
and looting across the country.
- So it was across America,
from Minneapolis to New York,
where police turned on crowds,
at times with what seemed like
little provocation.
This scene in Brooklyn
of a police car
ramming a baying crowd
went viral.
In New York, what
started out peacefully,
quickly became ugly, as police
suddenly turned on the crowd,
beating demonstrators
with batons.
- Good day. We're coming
on the air with breaking news.
An arrest has been made
in the death of George Floyd.
[tense music]
- With that level of honesty,
to walk the streets
and start shooting
your own trauma
was an extraordinary thing.
[intriguing music]
[camera shutter clicks]
I could feel everybody's rage.
Being there with my camera
gave me a sense of purpose
and belonging.
But I do wonder sometimes
about the difference
I'm actually making.
Self-doubt is never
far away from me.
When I think back
to the start of my journey,
the image
that resonated globally
was my shot of Darcy Bourne
asking the question
with that placard.
It was shared by Martin Luther
King III, and it went viral.
It left me
with a deeper question.
What do protest movements
truly achieve
if people are still demanding
the same basic human rights?
[pensive music]
- The reasons
for separation of the races
are very important in the South.
We want the Negroes
to have full opportunity
for self-advancement,
but see no reason
why this necessarily
entails their forced inclusion
into places
where they are not suited.
[tense music]
- You're not a Texan
unless you're for segregation.
You're not a Texan
if you're not for segregation.
- Well, I have a little girl
that went to Catholic school
for four years,
and this year,
since they integrated it,
I put her in the public school.
I don't want my children
to go with the Negroes.
- Can you imagine
the future of America,
with all the white children
being driven out of
our public schools
to a life of immorality
and indecency
with these filthy little Negroes
who don't know what legitimacy
means in the first place?
We are ready.
We're going to use
the force of the police
against these good people
when they come out to protest.
- Racial injustice
is a global issue,
but it remains a painful part
of America's dark history.
The images
from the Civil Rights era
still resonate
with me to this day.
More than 50 years have passed
between Martin Luther King's
assassination
and the murder of George Floyd,
but the fight for equality
remains.
[intriguing music]
Every day, I'm learning
more about activism.
So meeting the man who
helped give my images a voice
may bring a deeper meaning
to my journey.
The world will claim ownership
on Dr. Martin Luther King,
but he's just Dad to you.
- So I was 10 years old
when Dad was killed in Memphis.
His last book was entitled
Where Do We Go From Here:
Chaos or Community?
We are in chaos right now.
Dad used to say
we must learn nonviolence
or we may face non-existence.
While that does not sound like
something we want to embrace,
if we don't change our behavior,
that's a real possibility.
- Is there a weight
of responsibility
with this great
inheritance, really,
that you have
of your father's legacy?
- If I woke up every morning
trying to fill the shoes of Dad,
I would feel miserable.
But I also would say that to
him or her that much is given
is also much required.
- The imagery of your father and
the whole Civil Rights movement
is tattooed into
the consciousness
of generations of people.
And also, listen, the imagery
of George Floyd
still calling
the policeman "sir."
How important is us
bearing witness with photographs
and videos and showing truth
when sometimes truth
is a needle in a haystack?
- Well, thank goodness
that there is
documented evidence
to at least give one the
opportunity to be able to see--
George Floyd was showing respect
against someone who was not
showing him any respect.
I'm grateful to imagery
and those things
that you have
captured, personally,
to begin to create change
in our nation and world.
- So I wanted
to show you something
that I'm going to
bring it around to you.
The connection my story
has with your family.
- The global protests after
the death of George Floyd
is something none of us
would have expected,
and my lens was there.
Martin Luther King III
had somehow come across
one of my images
and posted it on his Twitter,
and then the world
discovered me.
[applause]
- Wow.
I have goosebumps.
Something just went through--
Like, wow.
You know what it says is
there are a lot of connections,
and nothing
is necessarily coincidental.
I wonder if you were
thinking about that
after you took the photograph.
That image is such
a powerful image, as you know.
What you're doing
is extraordinarily powerful
because the images
will be here forever.
Now, in 2020, George Floyd
was a catalyst
for a lot of positive activity
for a short period of time.
Now, what you would hope is
when change comes,
- it is sustained.
- Yep.
- But it is not today.
I wish that we as a nation
and world were further.
The work just is
nowhere near complete.
This is not going to come
from any one person.
The community has to say,
"This is what we want.
This is what we want to see."
And if people are not engaged
and talking and at the table,
we will not be successful.
At the end of the day, it's
about bringing people together
to do something bigger
than themselves.
- Could we take
one step back, sir?
- Now, I'm not one to lose hope.
I keep on hoping.
And I still have faith
in the future.
I've gone through a lot of soul
searching and agonizing moments,
and I've come to see
that we have
many more difficult days ahead.
And some of the old optimism
was a little superficial,
and now it must be tempered
with a solid realism.
I feel that there is a need
for a revolution of values
in America.
[tense music]
- This generation stood up
and said,
"We have had enough of seeing
our brothers and sisters
killed in the street."
And they're speaking to those
who are in positions of power
and saying, "Hear our voice.
We have had enough
of the senseless killing."
- USA! USA! USA!
- Protest, as we know it now,
arises in the last 150 years.
It was when it really starts to
become one of the central ways
that human beings
respond to injustice,
or the perceived
abuse of power by elites.
- We are going to
change history today.
- Game over.
- I think it is possible to tell
the story of the 21st century,
really, as the story
of unexpected
- mass protest explosions.
- Hands up!
- Shoot back!
- Hands up!
- Shoot back!
- Move! Move! Move! Move!
- You need
to stop throwing fireworks
and disperse immediately.
- It's an ongoing struggle,
but there is no doubt
that because of protest
and people's determination
to right the wrongs
in our society,
we do have a better society,
a more just
and more dignified society
than we otherwise would have.
[intriguing music]
This is all about
justice and equality.
We just have to look back
at history,
and sometimes there will be
an attempt to roll that back.
- Fires of frustration
and discord
are burning in every city,
North and South,
where legal remedies
are not at hand.
Redress is sought
in the streets.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Dr. King teaches us that the
power of the masses of people
has to be centered in the work
to make radical
or real change in society.
[indistinct chatter]
[eerie music]
- As a young boy,
I came across the images
of apartheid South Africa.
These images shook me
to my core.
And then I went on a journey
of understanding
what it all actually meant.
[eerie music]
- Get away from him.
- South African people
are people of protest,
people of resistance.
It's-- It's in the soil.
It's in the ground now.
- There's Mr. Mandela.
Mr. Nelson Mandela,
a free man taking his first
steps into a new South Africa.
That is the man who the world
has been waiting to see.
[cheering]
- This is all
within my lifetime.
This isn't something
that's in the history books
from a long time ago.
[eerie music]
[camera shutter clicks]
Peter Magubane's
pictures changed my life.
They helped me understand
what inequality truly is.
[camera shutter clicks]
The visual poetry of his work
has shaped so much
of why I do what I do.
[camera shutter clicks]
[eerie music]
I'm so excited to go into
your world, Peter's world.
- Well, it's wonderful
to have you,
and you know, your work
that you've been doing
Peter would be so proud of.
- We lost Peter
January this year, 2024.
And now I'm meeting David,
the man who, for 30 years,
was the custodian of all of
the stories he had captured.
And they went through
everything together.
- So basically,
this was in June 1976...
Soweto uprising.
And this was in a place
called Alex that--
The police had asked him
to expose his film to light,
and he refused.
And...
they subsequently
broke his nose.
And obviously, he relented, and
the film was exposed to light.
He would shake his head,
and he'd go,
You know, "Dave, my nose healed,
but those images,
I lost them forever.
- That was our history."
- Mm.
- "Those fools
lost our history."
- Would you call Peter
an activist?
- Magubane, to me, when you
use a word like an activist,
you're belittling what he did.
He was a freedom fighter.
His camera was his gun.
He was a messenger of the truth.
He exposed the injustice
of apartheid,
showed the world
how apartheid operates.
So this is one of his
most iconic images.
- Well, it's one of the
most important pictures
that's ever been taken.
- He took this in a very
affluent area in Sandton.
And if you look at this image,
this tells you exactly
what apartheid was all about.
- Everything, everything.
- And this is--
This is
a very interesting image.
This was June 16, 1976,
the beginning
of the Soweto uprising.
These children didn't want him
to take pictures.
He calmed them down,
and he said to them,
"A struggle without
documentation is no struggle."
He's saying,
never forget your history.
Otherwise, we don't
know where we're going.
Well, it's published
all over the world.
And he always said
those children
brought South Africa's struggle
to the world.
- And he was doing
it at huge cost.
- At a great cost to his life.
He just-- I think from
years of it, since 1954,
seeing abuse of people,
seeing people killed
and in the most inhumane ways,
and also him being detained 586
days in solitary confinement--
He has a record in South Africa.
He was beaten up many times,
made to stand on bricks
for four days and four nights
until he passed out
and urinated blood.
But he was determined.
He wanted to show the world what
was going on in his country.
Well, I grew up
in a privileged South Africa.
I was white,
I grew up very privileged.
Everything was nice
for me, you know?
For him, it wasn't.
And for his children,
it wasn't either.
And him and his children,
you know, family to me.
I had a big resentment
for my own people,
- for white people.
- Really?
- For what had been done
and what I'd seen
to a man I dearly love.
You know, just seeing the way
he was treated by white people.
Still in a condescending way.
"We know better than you.
We know--"
Where he's the one
leading the way.
And he is the one
that told me not to hate,
have hatred towards
especially your own people.
- Yeah. Well, he had--
In many ways,
he had no good reason
to let you in the way he did.
- Yes, he did.
- He did.
That's a remarkable
human being, isn't it?
After seeing all he did,
after being through all that,
to take me under his wing
and go,
"Come here, young man.
I wanna show you my country.
Your country.
This is your country, too.
We can work together."
All those years ago.
I mean, it's been a blessing,
and it's hard for me
to talk about sometimes.
- Yeah.
- But he didn't have hatred.
He didn't have-- He always
said if-- And I asked him.
I said, "Baba,
you've been through so much.
Why you don't hate?"
It's-- He said hating would stop
him from doing his job properly.
[atmospheric music]
- In many ways,
he trained me, Peter,
- without ever meeting me.
- Yeah.
- You know, there are pieces
of how he sees the world
that I certainly feel
that have showed me
how to hold the camera.
And then give me your eyes.
Lovely.
Goodness.
Stay there.
In terms of my work,
I am but a young pup.
I hope I'm able to carve with
the pictures that I take.
But the stakes were much higher
for Peter than I will ever face.
He put his life at risk almost
every time he held the camera.
He was swimming
upstream all the time.
- I will never,
never forget 1976,
when the police
had left me for dead.
I am grateful to those people.
Had it not been for them,
I would not be alive
to show you the history.
[crying]
[intriguing music]
- It's easy to forget
how little equality
there was in South Africa,
especially for people
that looked just like me.
They had to fight
for the basic rights
that all human beings deserve.
[intriguing music]
- Well, after an overnight lull,
violence erupted once again,
with vehicles being stoned
and set alight
and roadblocks being set up,
which made crossroads
inaccessible
to all but police vehicles
and those of residents.
[gunshots]
[yelling]
- Since June last year,
229 people have been killed,
2,599 injured in
Johannesburg's Black townships.
And these are the figures given
by the South African police.
United Nations estimates
are over 1,000 dead.
In Soweto,
their graves are unmarked.
[somber music]
- If you think of South Africa
from post-apartheid,
30 years is nothing.
It's always heartbreaking for me
because you can see
what was taken.
You can feel what was taken.
[somber music]
[indistinct chatter]
The ghosts of the past
are all still here.
[group chanting]
- No reparation?
- No vote.
- No reparation?
- No vote.
Down, our human dignity is down.
Down with inequality.
- Down!
- Down.
- Down with inequality.
- Down.
- Down.
- Down with injustice.
- We are with pensioners
that are all survivors
of apartheid,
survivors
of really unspeakable violence.
And what's tragic
is they haven't had the support
from the government
that they so richly deserve.
And they're living in squalor.
Two of them have
just passed away.
- Now!
- Redress us. Redress us now.
- Now!
- [non-English speech]
- We fought for years in order
to get rid of apartheid regime.
When we wanted to go
and get a vote in 1994,
people were killed. People died.
People were disappeared.
People were raped.
We are not happy because now
our government ignores us.
[group chanting]
- It's 178 days, now,
we are here.
And it's too much now.
It's seven months now.
We are catching
seven months now.
Our government
is doing nothing to us
because before,
we had people who are evil.
We get rid of them,
out of our country.
But now we still have another
evil people like before.
Why? God must help us.
[cheering]
[somber music]
[camera shutter clicks]
[group singing and clapping]
[pensive music]
[indistinct chatter]
- Stay there.
Stay there.
That's great. That's great.
[camera shutter clicks]
[group singing]
- Comrade, comrade.
[non-English]
- [crowd chanting]
- Wow.
It reminds me of how we changed
this place many years ago.
I want to tell you that history
has a way of repeating itself
for the worst, as we see what
Palestine is going through,
but also for the good.
You saw what those
universities in America did.
It was only a matter of time
that it was going to become
a global crusade against
oppression and genocide
in the 21st century.
You students are making history.
Stand up for the Palestinians
because the universities
in the 1980s, 1970s
stood up against apartheid
for our liberation.
And we saw the tide turning
in the '80s, and, voila,
we got our freedom.
It's a matter of time
that we're going to see
the tide turning there.
Let's be counted
as part of a global crusade.
You are brave. You are bold.
Do it in solidarity
for the absolute brutality
and slaughter of a people--
Of a government who do things
in the name of a people.
And many of the Jewish people
say, "Not in our name."
- Thank you.
- [cheering]
- Palestine will be free.
Free, free Palestine!
- So I'm here,
and I've been photographing
and spending time
with the students,
who are using art and their
voice in solidarity with--
For a free for Palestine.
And what's so powerful
about being here today
is that this university...
Yes, this university used to be
an all-white university.
It was only
for one type of person.
And now look at it.
And it's very emotional
knowing that there is hope.
During the time of apartheid,
everyone I'm looking at
would not be welcome
in this space
to educate themselves
and thrive.
All religions, all ethnicities.
And it just gives me hope.
It wasn't long ago when
only white people
were allowed
to even be educated here.
And it's a reminder of progress
and positive change
and the importance
of universities and protests
and student voices.
- Palestine will be free!
[crowd chanting]
- Well, I will not
stand aside and watch.
I will not be silent
while the world is on fire.
Will you?
[cheering]
- I believe student activism,
historically and in the present,
has shown to be one
of the most powerful elements
of resistance to injustice.
[crowd chanting]
- The country shouldn't function
while this war is going on,
and we hope that people
all over the country
will take actions like this,
will close down their factories,
will close down their offices,
as long as the war goes on.
[crowd chanting]
- To those militant radicals
who would disrupt and destroy
and burn the colleges
of the United States,
demonstrations in the streets
of this country
are not the way of this country.
- To every college president,
I say, vanquish the radicals
and take back our campuses
for all of the normal students--
- [chanting]
[non-English]
- Shame, shame. Shame on you.
Shame, shame, shame on you.
- Young people
at university campuses
are standing up for justice
on a scale never before seen
in the United States.
They have something that
older activists don't have,
and that is they can
bring new perspectives
on old, intractable problems.
- Get out of the way.
- The disruption of the
status quo is always important.
What protests do
is they expand our imagination.
They get us to think
about what is possible.
[crowd chanting]
And without protests,
things would stay the same.
In fact, things
would actually regress.
So even when protests,
perhaps, are violent
or they're disruptive
to the social order,
they're actually necessary
for how societies
improve and move forward.
- I think
it's quite disappointing
that the powers that be have
not found a more effective way
of responding to protests.
Their first response is always
to respond with brutal force,
to respond with the
militarization of our campuses.
- USA! USA! USA! USA!
- I don't think
it has ever been fair.
- Peaceful.
- Peaceful.
- Oh, my God.
- Those who are in power,
those who are governing,
have a responsibility
to govern those
that have placed them
in their positions of power
and influence.
- ...will be arrested
and charged with trespassing.
- This is the--
- [crowd chanting]
- I think
it's a beautiful awakening
to see students, in some ways,
just put at risk their careers,
their college degrees.
The fact that students
had this kind of uprising
speaks to the power of protest
and to the power of organizing.
[cheering]
[birds chirping]
- Many people don't know
where to look anymore.
They feel that the internet
has become too toxic for them.
News media is controlled
by three or four men.
And then they see this dad
that takes nice pictures,
is doing his best.
And it travels further than
even I ever thought it would.
Hello. Like many of you,
I'm just so concerned
about the escalation
of military hostility
between Israel and Iran.
WCNSF. This is an acronym
unique to Gaza.
"Wounded child,
no surviving family."
I mean, in March and April,
some 860,000 people
did not receive humanitarian aid
in Kordofan, Darfur,
and Khartoum due to violence.
So when I see the hostages being
taken in the way that they were,
when I see how young--
Some of them were babies
under the age of one.
That's unacceptable to me.
It's unacceptable,
and is not how
a future of some
kind of shared humanity can be.
[eerie music]
My first film as a director has
been nominated for an Oscar.
And that will put
a lot more eyeballs,
millions more eyeballs on me.
Naturally,
this leaves me exposed
for the best and the worst
of what this type of visibility
will bring.
[eerie music]
I tried to drown out
the vitriol, the abuse,
the hate that I receive
on a daily basis online
from a mixture of real people
and an army of trolls.
But it is a choice, and I will
take what fate throws at me.
Hey, just finished
shooting something.
My phone was blowing up,
and I saw the videos
coming out of Gaza...
Well, coming out
of Rafah in particular.
And you know, I'm not even
recommending you watch it.
If you trust me,
I can say that, by some margin,
these are the worst videos
I've ever seen since October 7.
Keep asking. Keep emailing.
Keep WhatsApping.
Keep posting
and sharing on social media.
It's a very least you can do
because what I've just seen...
No, no. It's unacceptable.
You ready?
Time for a walk, buddy.
[somber music]
Go on. Good boy.
It's quite hard right now
to not be worried about this--
This world.
But worry mustn't turn into
the type of fear
that makes you retrench,
which can lead
to so much damage.
- How are you emotionally?
- Up and down, up and down.
But, you know, the good thing
about understanding
my emotional engine
is that even at the depths
of my lowest points,
I feel I can carve out
the purpose
that I feel I'm here for.
You know, the trees don't give
a damn about the Academy Awards.
Neither does my dog.
They do care about
what sort of human being I am,
what sort of friend,
father I am.
[somber music]
- Welcome back, everyone.
We are counting down
to the Academy Awards
next month.
Among the films nominated for
the coveted Oscars, The After,
which is up for Best Live Action
Short Film and the movie,
starring David Oyelowo,
is directed by Misan Harriman.
[somber music]
[siren wailing]
[somber music continues]
- How are you finding
the whole thing?
Because it's unlike most events
that happen in the world,
the Oscars.
- It's up there on its own.
- It's completely unique.
And it's-- To be recognized
in this way by the Academy--
We've all-- I was in my PJs,
as a little boy,
watching the Oscars.
It's something that is globally
sort of tattooed
into the consciousness
of anyone that likes the movies.
And that's pretty much everyone.
- Do you feel that this film,
in a sense,
is one part
of your activist mind?
- Absolutely, absolutely.
Activism, to me, isn't just
marching the streets with signs.
It's recognizing the journey
that you need to go on.
And sometimes we need
to just take a step back
and make sure that empathy and
humanity doesn't leave the room.
- Having made this film,
how are you doing?
- I'm okay. I'm okay.
I'm simmering.
I've been a little anxious,
but I'm simmering
and trying
to live in the present.
[horn honking]
[crowd chanting]
- Well, back here at home,
Hollywood is getting ready
for the 96th Academy Awards.
- And that means rolling out
the red carpet
and getting Oscar ready
for his close-up.
Road closures are in effect on
and around Hollywood Boulevard,
and security is ramping up,
as the LAPD says they are
preparing for protesters
who are aiming to take
the spotlight away
from the glitz and glamour
of Hollywood's biggest night.
While you're watching,
bombs are dropping.
- This system
wants us to be divided,
and tries to convince us that
our issues are somehow separate
and detached
from what's happening
thousands of miles away in Gaza.
But we know the truth.
We know that we are not free
until we put an end
to the capitalist system and
imperialism worldwide.
[horns honking]
Because when you wage a genocide
against the people of Palestine,
you're waging a war against
women all over the world.
[horns honking]
- Hey, hey! Ho, ho!
[crowd chanting]
[horns honking]
- Hey, hey! Ho, ho!
- It's funny because Misan--
Whatever he sees
goes on in the world--
and, you know, even
being here, you can see the--
There was a protest
going on yesterday.
He went to one when
he first arrived a week ago.
Also, you know,
you travel around LA,
and you see a lot of injustice.
You see a lot of people
having a tough time.
All of these things
always affect him a lot.
- And that's the thing
about this conflict now.
Because when I see people
post "I stand with Israel,"
or "I stand with Palestine,"
for me, it isn't that binary.
You know, that this is just
a tragic, tragic, human story.
And you-- You need, first,
to stand for humanity.
And if humanity means that you
recognize what's been going on
happened a long time
before October 7, that's fine.
If your humanity means that you
recognize that it is horrific
for Hamas to take hostages,
particularly 9-month-old Kfir,
who I post every week--
- A nine-month-old?
- Mm.
- It's mad.
- Well, it's not
about taking sides.
- It's about--
- It's about humanity.
Like, we cognitively
disassociate ourselves
from what we are willfully able
to look away from.
It's tragic. It really is.
- Yeah.
Hi, Sule. Oh, look at you.
- How are you doing?
- You look amazing.
- Mwah.
- Exactly.
I have to get used to that one.
No, no. No, no, no, no.
- It's Nigerian colors now.
- Oh, yeah. It's great.
- Just push me a bit. Yeah.
- When else are you going
to wear them, you know?
- Exactly.
- Today's the day.
- Today's the day.
- You're so chill.
- Mm. Well, there's a war
going on inside.
- So internalizes things.
- There's turmoil.
- I've practiced my speech
to 36 seconds.
- Okay.
- Do you want some toast?
- Yes, thank you.
- Or should I turn
into a Niger uncle?
- [laughs]
I was just going to say--
- Hello.
- Niger. [non-English]
- We will finish this in--
Whenever I bloody like.
- Yeah.
- [laughs]
- I have a wife here, but if--
- Don't make me laugh right now.
- Maybe I'm looking for others.
Okay, very good.
First of all,
I have seven degrees--
- [laughs]
- And I want to do Star Wars.
- I mean, let's play it safe.
- [laughs]
- Let's play it safe.
- [laughs]
- Ooh!
Damn.
- Oh, my God.
- You like?
- Damn.
- Wow.
- It's gorgeous.
- Oh, thank you.
- Finish up.
I'm going to get changed.
But I will need you at some
point. Where are my braces?
- Oh, yes.
Let me just get those.
One second.
You were so relaxed before,
and now suddenly
it feels last minute.
What do you say?
- You look good.
- And the Oscar
for Best Ironing goes to Misan.
- Oh.
- That will do.
- Are you feeling
like an Oscar winner?
- I'm feeling like a man...
- You certainly look like one.
- He certainly looks like one.
- ...who has a point of view.
- [laughs] I can feel--
- Blue steel.
- No, but I can feel
the nerves in this car.
We suddenly went really quiet.
[laughs]
- It's game time.
- Oh, look--
- What time is it?
- Game time.
- You all right, darling?
Are you feeling it?
- I'm feeling okay.
- Yeah?
- Yeah.
- Hello.
Yes. Just don't leave me.
I'm here.
- Yeah.
- [laughs]
- Yes.
I'm claiming you.
- Hey, can you do me a favor
and tell Robert De Niro
he's a little bitch?
[laughter]
Let him know I'm out here, okay?
[laughter]
- Oh, my God.
[horns honking]
- Driver, window down, please.
The protest is here.
Can we slow down?
Can we slow down?
Sir.
- Oscars, Oscars, shame on you.
- Oscars, Oscars, shame on you.
- Your hands are bloody, too.
- Your hands are bloody, too.
- Oscars, Oscars, shame on you.
- Oscars, Oscars, shame on you.
- Your hands are bloody, too.
- Your hands are bloody too.
- Oscars, Oscars, choose a side.
- Oscars, Oscars--
- With an hour to go
before the Oscars,
police have created a buffer
between the protesters
and the auditorium,
keeping them
from the red carpet.
We cover the Oscars every year.
I've covered
the Oscars since 1985.
I've covered at least 35.
This is the biggest
police presence I've seen.
- Your hands are bloody, too!
- Oscars, Oscars, choose a side.
- Wow, there's more here--
There's more here
by the red carpet. Look.
Can you slow down? Sir?
Can you come around here?
Look at this.
- Oh, my God,
this is looking kind of wild.
[crowd chanting]
- Never again for anyone.
Never again, is now.
Never again, for anyone.
Never again, is now.
Never again, for anyone.
Never again--
[crowd chanting]
[atmospheric music]
- Ready?
- Do what I say.
- Ready?
- [non-English]
[background chatter]
- Even those
who don't take home statues
won't go home empty handed.
This year's Oscar gift bag
is worth over $170,000.
[blasting]
[horns honking]
[blasting]
[background chatter]
- Free, free Palestine.
- Free, free Palestine.
[background chatter]
[horns honking]
[dramatic music]
- Last night was intense.
I was disappointed for me.
Yes, of course.
It's only human.
But for me, it's about
keeping the intentionality,
the humility, you know.
Well, when we were
in the car yesterday,
it took everything in me
to just not take...
Because I had the big camera
in the bag.
...not take that and go,
you know,
from the entrance
of the red carpet
and try and join the protesters
and at least shoot them.
But I think I would have
been arrested
and maybe not allowed
into the Oscars.
But that itch was there.
Jonathan Glazer's speech
almost broke me
because here is a Jewish man
that has made a film, you know.
Zone of Interest
is an observation
of the horrors of the Holocaust.
In fact, let me read it
because it's a remarkable
statement.
"We stand as men
who refute their Jewishness
and the Holocaust being hijacked
by an occupation that has led
to conflict for so many people,
whether the victims
of October 7 in Israel
or the ongoing attack on Gaza."
And when filmmakers
like Jonathan Glazer
get on stage at the Oscars,
it becomes a gigantic act
of activism in itself.
- Would you have done
something similar?
- Yeah. You know, it's funny
because that gave me courage
because there's a tightrope
that you walk.
- Are you ever worried about the
repercussions of your actions?
- Well, I think as an artist,
you put it out into the ether
knowing that many
will love what you do,
and many will hate what you do.
So I'm ready to bear those scars
and sacrifice
whatever fate throws at me.
[atmospheric music]
[whispering]
I think we live in
an age now where
it's all too easy to have
all this power and influence,
but literally
stand from nothing.
The veneer of what I thought
the world was supposed to be
has clearly come off,
and I'm seeing
how much needs to be changed.
[somber music]
I realized that
I've lived a privileged life,
and that often collides
with my activism,
and often wonder whether
it's possible to inhabit
both of these worlds.
I could be jumping from one film
and fashion party to the other.
I have plenty of, I guess,
celebrity friends
that I could be
hanging around with
and just turn my head
away from the pain
and inequality of the world.
- But when people
strip that away,
why should they see you
as any different
from that group of people
that uphold a certain system?
- If you are telling me
that you can't be kind
because you were born into
wealth, I would disagree.
I think because
you're born into privilege,
it actually gives you the tools
to rewrite the rule book
for others
because you understand
how the deck is so stacked
against the many
if you're part of the few.
[tense music]
[crowd praying]
[tense music]
[camera shutter clicking]
[PA announcement]
[tense music]
What I've learned is that
human beings can be monsters,
much scarier than the monsters
that were supposed to be
under your bed.
We are capable of, I think,
even frightening the devil.
I've learned that. I've seen it.
[tense music]
- Riots involving hundreds
of far-right
anti-immigration protesters
have erupted
in several towns and cities.
- But those monsters are still
and always have been
in the minority.
In general, people have
a goodness in them,
and sometimes that needs
to be fed almost like a plant
so it can grow.
The images we have all seen
of horrific racist attacks...
- Save the children.
Call for a ceasefire
in Gaza and Israel.
- Apathy is lethal.
I'm politely begging all of us,
whether we have
50 or 50 million followers,
we can carve out a future that
our children deserve to inherit.
- We're here to stop genocide,
and that's why Aaron Bushnell
self-immolated.
- Aaron understood that through
this one act of self-sacrifice,
he could stun the world
into action.
- We stand with them.
- We have to stand up
for generations
of young Black people.
They don't have to suffer the
racism that we've had to suffer.
[cheering]
- Politicians need to say,
it is the racists...
This is London at its best.
This is a London
that I know and love.
That's my job, really,
to amplify important moments
like this.
Look, I was in the Oscars
four days ago,
and I can tell you that this
is more important than anything
that I was attending
in California.
This is the work.
This is the bearing witness.
[pensive music]
[sirens wailing]
- Four years ago today,
George Floyd was murdered
in Minneapolis
by then Minneapolis
police officer Derek Chauvin.
Chauvin knelt
on Floyd's back and neck
for more than nine minutes.
The chilling video
of George Floyd's final moments
triggered protests across the
country and around the world,
and escalated demands
on addressing
deadly police encounters.
In the four years since Floyd's
murder, reform has been slow.
According to the ACLU,
at least 1,247 people
were killed by police in 2023,
more than any previous year
on record.
[camera shutter clicks]
[dramatic music]
- This is perfect.
So facing me straight on.
It's good.
[camera clicking]
- When George Floyd was murdered
in front of the world's eyes,
it, for us, unearthed
a lot of trauma.
It reaffirmed what many of us
have been talking about
in regards to the police
brutality and mistreatment
that our communities
were experiencing for decades.
I think there was
a missed opportunity,
as many of us look back
on making a real progress,
but it has not brought
about the kind of change
that we desperately
wanted to see.
When you think
about these things
and you have a community
that also experiences--
[thunder rumbling]
[laughs] It is responding
to our trauma.
- That's what it's doing.
- Gosh.
- Ah, I can hear God's wrath.
- Yeah.
- He's definitely Black.
- [laughs]
- [laughs]
- So when you think about
these things and you--
You add the systematic ways
in which we have
a boot on our neck,
you have to ask the question,
why is it that people
do not want
to share the prosperity with us?
Why is it that we do not create
the kind of policies
that allow for all of us
to thrive?
Why is there a sense of pushback
when we're always only asking
for the bare minimal?
And the question is,
we've never been seen as equal
in the eyes of the law,
and we've never been seen
as equal
in the eyes of our counterparts
in the society that we live in.
The idea that you only expect
people who are oppressed--
Who are experiencing
oppression directly
to be the ones that stand up
says something about
how deprived you are of humanity
and the ability to see
others' liberation
as part of your liberation.
There's always a connection
to another human being,
and I think
the biggest connection
is that we all bleed the same.
[laughs]
We all breathe the same.
And we all dream the same.
And we shouldn't be so tribal
in the way in which we see
each other's humanity.
We should think
of each other as one.
- You stand
on the shoulders of giants.
You knew John Lewis himself.
And of course, you know the
legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King
and Nelson Mandela,
to name a few.
How do you carry that baton
in order to pass it on
to your children's generation?
- I think my generation
is passing on...
Is what the past generation
of movement creators and
change makers have passed on,
which is to stay focused
and to march on.
And that's what
I tell young people.
- Well, you're not afraid to
cause good trouble yourself.
- No, and it's always fun
to cause good trouble.
[atmospheric music]
- Love has never been
a popular movement,
and no one's ever wanted,
really, to be free.
The world is held together...
Really, it is held together
by the love and the passion
of very few people.
Otherwise, of course,
you can despair.
Walk down the street of any city
any afternoon,
and look around you.
[somber music]
What you got to remember is what
you're looking at is also you.
Everyone you're looking at
is also you.
[somber music continues]
You could be that person.
You could be that monster.
You could be that cop.
And you need to decide
in yourself not to be.
[somber music continues]
[camera shutter clicks]
[yelling]
[horns honking]
- George Floyd's death
sparked a racial reckoning
across the country
and around the world,
and the organizers of his day of
remembrance say it's important
we never forget
what happened here,
at 38th and Chicago
on that fateful day.
[somber music]
[horns honking]
- This is the only way we're
gonna get heard, is in numbers.
We need to be seen.
You know, enough of us--
If we're able...
If we're healthy and able,
we need to be out here on
the streets doing the work.
- Hands up! Hands up!
- Don't shoot! Don't shoot!
- Hands up! Hands up!
- Don't shoot! Don't shoot!
- Hands up! Hands up!
- Don't shoot! Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
[birds chirping]
[somber music]
- So I'm here at
38th and Chicago,
four years after the loss
of George Floyd.
And I'm literally here
where we lost him,
learning about progress
in solidarity with the community
here on the ground.
So I'm very happy to be here.
[somber music]
Leslie, a real pleasure.
It's a huge deal for me
to be here with you.
So tell me what has happened
in the last four years
and what's happening now.
- We've come too far
to turn back now.
When you have so many people
and entities
that are attacking
affirmative action,
that are still attacking
people's everyday humanity,
we have to keep the fight
for justice going.
We're here in
George Floyd Square.
There's George Floyd's face
right there. And it's like--
I was telling somebody,
he wasn't just a figure.
He was a family member
to people.
He was a human being.
- What will
real progress look like?
- You see George Floyd?
We won't be sitting
at another memorial,
because I always say,
the only real form of justice is
if George Floyd
was still alive today.
And so, for me,
real change and transformation
mean that Black lives matter.
Amen.
It's not an org--
It's not just an organization.
It really is, like,
a declaration
that has not been true
in America
since they've been
bringing us here like cargo.
It just hasn't been true.
And, at this point,
I would just even settle for,
stop murdering us, amen?
Baby steps,
because there's
so many levels and layers to it.
- Look over there.
Chin slightly up.
Beautiful.
[somber music]
- The summer of 2020, I painted
169 names on the street
here at George Floyd Square.
It's called the Morning Passage.
And every spring, we do
a repaint with communities,
so we repainted 169 names today.
It's a way to take the streets.
It is a way to show, also,
the grand, unending nature
of police crimes and police
violence in the United States.
It's never going
to be a finished list.
I could paint all
the way to downtown,
and this list
would never be finished.
[chanting and drumming]
- 3, 2.
Derek, many people
I've spoken to today
say they felt heavy
when they woke up this morning,
knowing what happened on this
corner of 38th and Chicago
on that fateful day.
In the same breath,
they say they feel like
they're in community
every time they come
to George Floyd Square.
That's exactly what organizers
wanted this space to be,
a space for people to come
and feel all the emotions
and know it is okay
and come to be together.
[drumming]
- Say his name.
- George Floyd!
- Say his name.
- George Floyd.
- George! George!
- Floyd! Floyd!
- George! George!
- Floyd! Floyd!
- Fist in the air, one time.
Fist in the air, one time.
That's the first level of fight.
You got to put your hand up.
217 people get killed every day.
- Keep your hands up.
- That is 170,000 people a year.
When I say, George,
you say Floyd.
- George.
- Floyd!
- George!
- Floyd!
- George!
- Floyd!
- If George had a choice
and he knew,
he would still choose to go
the way he went
for the cause that he went for,
but he was a gentle giant,
wouldn't really to hurt nobody.
- It's beautiful that they
keep his memory alive,
that they just didn't let it go
after the first year,
the second year, the third
year, the fourth year.
You know what I mean?
To know that they support him,
that's like supporting us,
supporting
our whole neighborhood,
supporting where we come from.
- And it's good that we're here,
and we're going to fight the
fight, but let's keep it going.
Let's keep it going.
- Yeah, if you look
at the state now
and state four years ago,
ain't much changed.
Police brutality still here.
Unnecessary killings still here.
Racial profiling still existing.
Like, America got to get
honest with itself first.
You got to tell the truth.
- And even though
we might not be around
to see the change
that's going to come--
But the change
is going to come, though.
It was just the seed
had been planted.
- Yeah. You just got to keep
watering it, keep grooming it,
you know what I'm saying?
Keep harvesting it.
And we're going to get
what we put in.
- When I say,
power to the people,
you say, power to the people.
Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Let's go y'all. Clap it up.
Clap it up.
[clapping]
- Say his name.
- George Floyd.
- Who can defeat us?
- Nobody!
- Who can defeat us?
- Nobody!
- We are one.
- We are--
- One!
- We are--
- One!
- What I've learned
from shooting protests
on three continents now
is that we're better together.
It's the global village
of well-intentioned,
well-meaning people
that are open
to learning about
our collective past
and our present in order
to shape a better future.
I've always questioned things,
but it takes time
to get to a level
of emotional security
to say that this is ridiculous,
and it took a while for me
to get there.
My worldview
has completely changed,
and it will continue
to keep changing.
[hopeful music]
[cheering]
- Say his name!
- George Floyd!
- Say his name!
- George Floyd!
- Say his name!
- George Floyd!
[band playing]
- Here we are--
[muffled speech]
--in 2024.
Thank you.
[muffled speech]
And we have a few
names of people.
[band playing upbeat song]
- No justice, no peace.
No justice, no peace.
No justice, no peace.
No justice, no peace!
[cheering]
[Nicholas Britell's "Agape"
playing]
[camera shutter clicking]
[emotional music]
Inside the frame
There's a picture in view
Got me questioning life
And searching for truth
It's easy to turn a blind eye
And forget about the news
Who are you to me?
Who am I to you?
Does someone have to win
And everybody lose?
This is not a game
We shouldn't have to choose
Are we still standing
Waiting for help to come?
Will we face our fears
In the lens of a setting sun?
Shoot the people
That's something
That I heard them say
Shoot the people
Just don't let them
Get away
Shoot the people
'Cause we're running
Out of time
Shoot the people
'Cause everything
Is on the line, line, line
We can't stay silent
History's the proof
Lies are getting louder
And fear's on the loose
Let us do our very best
To keep humanity in the room
Are we still standing
Waiting for a change
To come?
Or will we face our fear
In the lens of a setting sun?
[camera shutter clicking]
Shoot the people
It's something
That I heard them say
Shoot the people
Just don't let them
Get away
Shoot the people
'Cause we're running
Out of time
Hey
Shoot the people
'Cause everything
Is on the line
Let me see your hands up
Face down
Ten toes on the ground
Let me see your hands up
Face down
Ten toes on the ground
Shoot the people
Hey
Shoot the people
Everyone
Should have freedom
We all deserve
The right to liberty
And live a peaceful life
Remember
That we are all human
And we live in a world
Where everyone is equal
If we take the time
We can be kind
And hate will go away
[tense music]
- There has been
another shooting,
this time in Las Vegas.
- You can see police here,
now firing tear gas
into the crowd.
-[gunshots]
-[yelling]
- Migrants crossing
the Southern US border
are once again
reaching record levels.
- Europe's migrant crisis.
- Both sides.
- The deputy prime minister
describes it as an invasion.
- It's our country,
and we are getting pushed out.
I understand how the Native
Indians felt in America.
- Build that wall.
Build that wall.
- When I look around
what is happening today,
it's hard not to feel helpless.
- This is the darkest hour
for Europe since World War II.
- I've never known a time when
humans have been more divided.
It seems as though we're
heading towards something
truly catastrophic.
- Protests turning violent as
rioters set fire to a police car
and destroyed downtown streets.
- And chanting things
like, burn it down.
- Protesters
and counter-protesters
were attacking each other.
It was complete and utter chaos.
[tense music]
[camera shutter clicks]
[yelling]
- What am I to tell my son
when he grows up?
I don't have faith
in anything here anymore.
- If history
teaches us anything,
when humanity
has been confronted
by a big challenge
or a big injustice,
those struggles
only move forward
if large numbers of ordinary
people stand up and say,
enough is enough, and no more.
- We are sick and tired of this.
We are sick and tired
of being sick and tired.
- Protests are a
political statement.
Protests are a wake-up call.
[yelling]
- We shouldn't deny that
we're in a really dark moment
for humanity.
Treason! Treason! Treason!
- He wanted the war.
They were going to
give you the war.
- I think the revolution
should be televised.
I think the revolution
should always be documented
so that we know that the rights
and privileges we enjoy today
were not always present.
- The images
of people protesting
help people see
that they're not alone
in being frustrated
with the way things are.
Misan's work does
two ends of that,
demonstrating the injustice
and suggesting the possibility
of an alternative.
- Misan is able to capture
the complexity
of social protests of racism
in a way that's also beautiful.
That's the power of art
to expand our imagination,
to say another world is possible
and we have the power
to change things.
[tense music]
[birds chirping]
[camera shutter clicking]
- This is on 90, so it's kind
of-- almost up your nostrils.
- Your energy changes
when you're behind the camera.
- Oh, completely.
I get into a trance-like thing.
Completely.
You could travel
the world with this thing
and just bear witness.
[intriguing music]
I fell in love
with the camera late.
I do what I love, my work,
which is observing
the human condition,
and making art that has purpose
is also my passion.
[intriguing music]
I do portraiture in the
form of the protest images,
but then the kind
of celeb portraiture
that people also know me for.
The attention economics of
today's internet-connected world
is something I understand.
I would not be here today
if it wasn't for putting my
images online, on social media,
and it's changed
my life completely.
Hey, it's me. Hey. Hey. Hey.
I wanted to make a quick video.
When I take a picture, and
I put it out into the internet,
and I see millions of people be
deeply moved by it, that, to me,
is something I'm very proud of.
[intriguing music]
- When the
Black Lives Matter protests
began in London last summer,
one photographer,
with his intimate
black and white reportage style,
captured the mood of the
unfolding events like no other.
Born in Nigeria but raised
in the UK, where he developed
a lifelong love of the arts
from an early age,
Misan Harriman's work
behind the camera,
inspired by photographers
including Gordon Parks
and Eve Arnold,
is entirely self-taught.
Now, imagine going from being
an amateur photographer
to shooting the cover of Vogue
in just three years.
- Earlier this week, I spoke to
the editor of British Vogue.
The cover was shot
by Misan Harriman,
the first Black photographer
to shoot the front
of the September issue.
- I remember all these moments
before taking these images
and how nervous I was
or excited I was.
All this is part of the journey.
- You're quite
an anomaly, sadly.
- Sadly, yeah.
I've somehow managed
to tiptoe around the minefield
of being a visible voice
and a Black voice
in a Britain that usually allows
a very specific type of noise
to come out of the mouths
of someone
that has the same hue as me.
And somehow,
I've been quite loud
and able to function
in a society
that doesn't usually
accept that.
There has been an evolution
to my whole being.
Every few months, I feel
like I'm a different person.
As an activist,
you start off very scared
because you don't realize there
are more than a few people
that feel the same way
as you do.
And now I know
there are millions of people,
so it gives me the confidence
to be better at what I do
and learn and learn and learn.
- Remember,
we're here with the turn.
- Free! Free!
- Palestine!
- Free! Free!
- Palestine!
- Free! Free!
- Palestine!
1, 2, 3, 4!
Occupation no more!
5, 6, 7, 8!
Israel is a terrorist state.
- Early doors at Bank Station
for the beginning of what
I think is going to be
the biggest protest ever
for ceasefire in London.
-Ceasefire!
- What do we want?
- Ceasefire!
- When do we want it?
- Now!
- What do we want?
- I believe
in the network effect
of solidarity, empathy.
I believe that it's infectious.
The osmosis of activism is real.
I'm not a world leader.
I'm not a politician,
but this is how I play my part.
And a lot of the times...
I'll say 10% of my time
is actual taking photographs.
The rest is just
being in it, you know?
[yelling]
- I follow you on Instagram.
You seem to use your voice
quite a lot on Instagram,
and I'm here for it.
I'm here for every second of it.
- Hey. Thank you.
- What do we want?
- Ceasefire!
- When do we want it?
- Now!
- What do we want?
- Ceasefire!
- When do we want it?
- Now!
- What do we want?
- Nice to meet you.
- Someone to follow
on Instagram.
- Okay. The chocolate bar or--
- Second time?
- [overlapping chatter]
- Everything, everything.
Can we get a picture?
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Is that all right?
- Yeah.
[yelling]
- Excuse me.
Thank you. Oh, hold on.
Hold on. Hold on.
You're too fast.
You're too fast.
Can't keep up.
One more, one more.
[camera shutter clicks]
It feels like
a Michael Mann movie.
- Hey.
- Right.
- Yeah. You guys look good.
Looking Hollywood.
Oh, my lord.
Do you mind if I-- Is that okay?
Thank you.
For me, there's nothing more
important than the people,
so I'm just waiting for
them to walk past me
and seeing if any signs, faces,
feelings, emotions speak to me.
And-- Ooh.
Sorry.
Sorry. That sign
is just extraordinary.
Do you mind if I-- Yeah.
Oh, wow. Thank you.
Thank you very much.
- Every time the government
is not listening,
your voice grows louder.
This is the power of the people.
[cheering]
- I show all of these movements,
and they have a way
of fizzling out.
This one isn't, at all.
And it's becoming harder
and harder to ignore,
and that is the whole
reason to protest.
If our leaders
won't do anything,
the people will hold them
to account on the streets.
It's a very powerful thing.
- Ceasefire now!
- Ceasefire now!
- Ceasefire now!
Ceasefire now!
Ceasefire now!
- Hey, so I've left them,
the protests.
I did some photography,
and what I saw
were families coming out,
people that worship
different gods,
that have different
lived experiences,
that are trying
to figure out a way
for this violence to deescalate.
[clicks tongue]
Let's hope it does.
[birds chirping]
[pensive music]
I'm not neurotypical at all
in how I process the world.
The way I would
describe myself is
that I have to work hard
just to be normal, to fit in,
and this has been my experience
since I was a little boy
sent from Nigeria
to boarding school in England.
[pensive music]
My father,
he didn't know his father
and was brilliant academically
and going to Cambridge
and becoming
the success he became.
But there was a whole missing
part of how to be a father.
I needed that closeness that
wasn't there, that I don't think
he was capable of giving,
even if he tried,
because he had never
received it himself.
It's not just my father.
There were plenty of adults
all around me
that could have been
a little bit more kind,
and could have been
a bit more tender.
It was tough for me.
All the traumatic experiences
that I had--
At the time,
I mean, cognitively,
I didn't even know
what the meaning of trauma was.
And I think most children don't,
so they manage themselves
and package it away.
When you're young,
you know, this--
I was in boarding school in the
'80s in the English countryside.
You just want to fit in.
You know, you just wanna fit in.
You don't want to be different.
So when people keep telling you
that your hair is different,
that your lips are big,
your country that you come from
is simple,
you feel lesser than.
I think my existence
was in the notes of songs
and in the pages of books,
in the scenes of films,
without question.
That was my family.
[intriguing music]
Nellie, what do you see?
What do you see?
Sit, sit.
Paw. Good boy.
Good boy.
- I don't know who's showing up,
darling, you or Nelson.
- I can't believe he did that.
[laughs] He never does that.
- He must be so hot.
- That's what I was thinking.
- Well, well done, both of you.
- Good boy.
- Well, you know,
you get to your 20s,
and you're a young man.
And what does
everyone want to do?
So many of my friends
went into banking,
and they were at Deutsche Bank,
Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs.
I got into recruitment
because there was a low bar,
frankly, of entry.
And when I started being
a success in that industry,
it was the same thing.
You were living in London.
You want to be members
of whatever members club
that it was at the time.
You're going clubbing
with your friends.
You're just spending money
or going to Ibiza
and all of these things.
But there was always a choice,
in my inner voice,
possibly my inner child,
that said, "Misan,
you're not comfortable
with all of this.
Beyond the accumulation
of wealth, who are you?"
[intriguing music]
I am a great example
of finding out
who you are supposed
to be in real time.
I mean, it wasn't long ago
that it was lockdown,
and I didn't know
who I was supposed to be.
Something about that moment
when we were all stuck at home
and having repeated moments
of deep self-reflection
meant that we couldn't
pretend we were okay,
and our traumas
started climbing out of us.
[tense music]
[camera shutter clicking]
And after the murder
of George Floyd--
And I remember watching
the livestream, and I was like,
"Oh, this is
a modern-day lynching."
- A group of Minneapolis Police
officers
have been placed on leave
after one of the officers
was caught on video
pressing his knee into the neck
of a Black man
who was handcuffed
and subdued on the ground,
pleading with officers
that he could not breathe.
- I can't breathe.
Please, anybody.
I can't breathe. Shit.
- Bro, get up.
Get in the car, man.
- I will.
- Get up. Get in the car.
- I can't move.
- Get in the car.
- Mama.
- Get up
and get in the car, mate.
- Please. [sobs]
- America has reached
boiling point.
The fury and frustration has
seen another night of clashes
and looting across the country.
- So it was across America,
from Minneapolis to New York,
where police turned on crowds,
at times with what seemed like
little provocation.
This scene in Brooklyn
of a police car
ramming a baying crowd
went viral.
In New York, what
started out peacefully,
quickly became ugly, as police
suddenly turned on the crowd,
beating demonstrators
with batons.
- Good day. We're coming
on the air with breaking news.
An arrest has been made
in the death of George Floyd.
[tense music]
- With that level of honesty,
to walk the streets
and start shooting
your own trauma
was an extraordinary thing.
[intriguing music]
[camera shutter clicks]
I could feel everybody's rage.
Being there with my camera
gave me a sense of purpose
and belonging.
But I do wonder sometimes
about the difference
I'm actually making.
Self-doubt is never
far away from me.
When I think back
to the start of my journey,
the image
that resonated globally
was my shot of Darcy Bourne
asking the question
with that placard.
It was shared by Martin Luther
King III, and it went viral.
It left me
with a deeper question.
What do protest movements
truly achieve
if people are still demanding
the same basic human rights?
[pensive music]
- The reasons
for separation of the races
are very important in the South.
We want the Negroes
to have full opportunity
for self-advancement,
but see no reason
why this necessarily
entails their forced inclusion
into places
where they are not suited.
[tense music]
- You're not a Texan
unless you're for segregation.
You're not a Texan
if you're not for segregation.
- Well, I have a little girl
that went to Catholic school
for four years,
and this year,
since they integrated it,
I put her in the public school.
I don't want my children
to go with the Negroes.
- Can you imagine
the future of America,
with all the white children
being driven out of
our public schools
to a life of immorality
and indecency
with these filthy little Negroes
who don't know what legitimacy
means in the first place?
We are ready.
We're going to use
the force of the police
against these good people
when they come out to protest.
- Racial injustice
is a global issue,
but it remains a painful part
of America's dark history.
The images
from the Civil Rights era
still resonate
with me to this day.
More than 50 years have passed
between Martin Luther King's
assassination
and the murder of George Floyd,
but the fight for equality
remains.
[intriguing music]
Every day, I'm learning
more about activism.
So meeting the man who
helped give my images a voice
may bring a deeper meaning
to my journey.
The world will claim ownership
on Dr. Martin Luther King,
but he's just Dad to you.
- So I was 10 years old
when Dad was killed in Memphis.
His last book was entitled
Where Do We Go From Here:
Chaos or Community?
We are in chaos right now.
Dad used to say
we must learn nonviolence
or we may face non-existence.
While that does not sound like
something we want to embrace,
if we don't change our behavior,
that's a real possibility.
- Is there a weight
of responsibility
with this great
inheritance, really,
that you have
of your father's legacy?
- If I woke up every morning
trying to fill the shoes of Dad,
I would feel miserable.
But I also would say that to
him or her that much is given
is also much required.
- The imagery of your father and
the whole Civil Rights movement
is tattooed into
the consciousness
of generations of people.
And also, listen, the imagery
of George Floyd
still calling
the policeman "sir."
How important is us
bearing witness with photographs
and videos and showing truth
when sometimes truth
is a needle in a haystack?
- Well, thank goodness
that there is
documented evidence
to at least give one the
opportunity to be able to see--
George Floyd was showing respect
against someone who was not
showing him any respect.
I'm grateful to imagery
and those things
that you have
captured, personally,
to begin to create change
in our nation and world.
- So I wanted
to show you something
that I'm going to
bring it around to you.
The connection my story
has with your family.
- The global protests after
the death of George Floyd
is something none of us
would have expected,
and my lens was there.
Martin Luther King III
had somehow come across
one of my images
and posted it on his Twitter,
and then the world
discovered me.
[applause]
- Wow.
I have goosebumps.
Something just went through--
Like, wow.
You know what it says is
there are a lot of connections,
and nothing
is necessarily coincidental.
I wonder if you were
thinking about that
after you took the photograph.
That image is such
a powerful image, as you know.
What you're doing
is extraordinarily powerful
because the images
will be here forever.
Now, in 2020, George Floyd
was a catalyst
for a lot of positive activity
for a short period of time.
Now, what you would hope is
when change comes,
- it is sustained.
- Yep.
- But it is not today.
I wish that we as a nation
and world were further.
The work just is
nowhere near complete.
This is not going to come
from any one person.
The community has to say,
"This is what we want.
This is what we want to see."
And if people are not engaged
and talking and at the table,
we will not be successful.
At the end of the day, it's
about bringing people together
to do something bigger
than themselves.
- Could we take
one step back, sir?
- Now, I'm not one to lose hope.
I keep on hoping.
And I still have faith
in the future.
I've gone through a lot of soul
searching and agonizing moments,
and I've come to see
that we have
many more difficult days ahead.
And some of the old optimism
was a little superficial,
and now it must be tempered
with a solid realism.
I feel that there is a need
for a revolution of values
in America.
[tense music]
- This generation stood up
and said,
"We have had enough of seeing
our brothers and sisters
killed in the street."
And they're speaking to those
who are in positions of power
and saying, "Hear our voice.
We have had enough
of the senseless killing."
- USA! USA! USA!
- Protest, as we know it now,
arises in the last 150 years.
It was when it really starts to
become one of the central ways
that human beings
respond to injustice,
or the perceived
abuse of power by elites.
- We are going to
change history today.
- Game over.
- I think it is possible to tell
the story of the 21st century,
really, as the story
of unexpected
- mass protest explosions.
- Hands up!
- Shoot back!
- Hands up!
- Shoot back!
- Move! Move! Move! Move!
- You need
to stop throwing fireworks
and disperse immediately.
- It's an ongoing struggle,
but there is no doubt
that because of protest
and people's determination
to right the wrongs
in our society,
we do have a better society,
a more just
and more dignified society
than we otherwise would have.
[intriguing music]
This is all about
justice and equality.
We just have to look back
at history,
and sometimes there will be
an attempt to roll that back.
- Fires of frustration
and discord
are burning in every city,
North and South,
where legal remedies
are not at hand.
Redress is sought
in the streets.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Fight what?
- Fight force.
- Dr. King teaches us that the
power of the masses of people
has to be centered in the work
to make radical
or real change in society.
[indistinct chatter]
[eerie music]
- As a young boy,
I came across the images
of apartheid South Africa.
These images shook me
to my core.
And then I went on a journey
of understanding
what it all actually meant.
[eerie music]
- Get away from him.
- South African people
are people of protest,
people of resistance.
It's-- It's in the soil.
It's in the ground now.
- There's Mr. Mandela.
Mr. Nelson Mandela,
a free man taking his first
steps into a new South Africa.
That is the man who the world
has been waiting to see.
[cheering]
- This is all
within my lifetime.
This isn't something
that's in the history books
from a long time ago.
[eerie music]
[camera shutter clicks]
Peter Magubane's
pictures changed my life.
They helped me understand
what inequality truly is.
[camera shutter clicks]
The visual poetry of his work
has shaped so much
of why I do what I do.
[camera shutter clicks]
[eerie music]
I'm so excited to go into
your world, Peter's world.
- Well, it's wonderful
to have you,
and you know, your work
that you've been doing
Peter would be so proud of.
- We lost Peter
January this year, 2024.
And now I'm meeting David,
the man who, for 30 years,
was the custodian of all of
the stories he had captured.
And they went through
everything together.
- So basically,
this was in June 1976...
Soweto uprising.
And this was in a place
called Alex that--
The police had asked him
to expose his film to light,
and he refused.
And...
they subsequently
broke his nose.
And obviously, he relented, and
the film was exposed to light.
He would shake his head,
and he'd go,
You know, "Dave, my nose healed,
but those images,
I lost them forever.
- That was our history."
- Mm.
- "Those fools
lost our history."
- Would you call Peter
an activist?
- Magubane, to me, when you
use a word like an activist,
you're belittling what he did.
He was a freedom fighter.
His camera was his gun.
He was a messenger of the truth.
He exposed the injustice
of apartheid,
showed the world
how apartheid operates.
So this is one of his
most iconic images.
- Well, it's one of the
most important pictures
that's ever been taken.
- He took this in a very
affluent area in Sandton.
And if you look at this image,
this tells you exactly
what apartheid was all about.
- Everything, everything.
- And this is--
This is
a very interesting image.
This was June 16, 1976,
the beginning
of the Soweto uprising.
These children didn't want him
to take pictures.
He calmed them down,
and he said to them,
"A struggle without
documentation is no struggle."
He's saying,
never forget your history.
Otherwise, we don't
know where we're going.
Well, it's published
all over the world.
And he always said
those children
brought South Africa's struggle
to the world.
- And he was doing
it at huge cost.
- At a great cost to his life.
He just-- I think from
years of it, since 1954,
seeing abuse of people,
seeing people killed
and in the most inhumane ways,
and also him being detained 586
days in solitary confinement--
He has a record in South Africa.
He was beaten up many times,
made to stand on bricks
for four days and four nights
until he passed out
and urinated blood.
But he was determined.
He wanted to show the world what
was going on in his country.
Well, I grew up
in a privileged South Africa.
I was white,
I grew up very privileged.
Everything was nice
for me, you know?
For him, it wasn't.
And for his children,
it wasn't either.
And him and his children,
you know, family to me.
I had a big resentment
for my own people,
- for white people.
- Really?
- For what had been done
and what I'd seen
to a man I dearly love.
You know, just seeing the way
he was treated by white people.
Still in a condescending way.
"We know better than you.
We know--"
Where he's the one
leading the way.
And he is the one
that told me not to hate,
have hatred towards
especially your own people.
- Yeah. Well, he had--
In many ways,
he had no good reason
to let you in the way he did.
- Yes, he did.
- He did.
That's a remarkable
human being, isn't it?
After seeing all he did,
after being through all that,
to take me under his wing
and go,
"Come here, young man.
I wanna show you my country.
Your country.
This is your country, too.
We can work together."
All those years ago.
I mean, it's been a blessing,
and it's hard for me
to talk about sometimes.
- Yeah.
- But he didn't have hatred.
He didn't have-- He always
said if-- And I asked him.
I said, "Baba,
you've been through so much.
Why you don't hate?"
It's-- He said hating would stop
him from doing his job properly.
[atmospheric music]
- In many ways,
he trained me, Peter,
- without ever meeting me.
- Yeah.
- You know, there are pieces
of how he sees the world
that I certainly feel
that have showed me
how to hold the camera.
And then give me your eyes.
Lovely.
Goodness.
Stay there.
In terms of my work,
I am but a young pup.
I hope I'm able to carve with
the pictures that I take.
But the stakes were much higher
for Peter than I will ever face.
He put his life at risk almost
every time he held the camera.
He was swimming
upstream all the time.
- I will never,
never forget 1976,
when the police
had left me for dead.
I am grateful to those people.
Had it not been for them,
I would not be alive
to show you the history.
[crying]
[intriguing music]
- It's easy to forget
how little equality
there was in South Africa,
especially for people
that looked just like me.
They had to fight
for the basic rights
that all human beings deserve.
[intriguing music]
- Well, after an overnight lull,
violence erupted once again,
with vehicles being stoned
and set alight
and roadblocks being set up,
which made crossroads
inaccessible
to all but police vehicles
and those of residents.
[gunshots]
[yelling]
- Since June last year,
229 people have been killed,
2,599 injured in
Johannesburg's Black townships.
And these are the figures given
by the South African police.
United Nations estimates
are over 1,000 dead.
In Soweto,
their graves are unmarked.
[somber music]
- If you think of South Africa
from post-apartheid,
30 years is nothing.
It's always heartbreaking for me
because you can see
what was taken.
You can feel what was taken.
[somber music]
[indistinct chatter]
The ghosts of the past
are all still here.
[group chanting]
- No reparation?
- No vote.
- No reparation?
- No vote.
Down, our human dignity is down.
Down with inequality.
- Down!
- Down.
- Down with inequality.
- Down.
- Down.
- Down with injustice.
- We are with pensioners
that are all survivors
of apartheid,
survivors
of really unspeakable violence.
And what's tragic
is they haven't had the support
from the government
that they so richly deserve.
And they're living in squalor.
Two of them have
just passed away.
- Now!
- Redress us. Redress us now.
- Now!
- [non-English speech]
- We fought for years in order
to get rid of apartheid regime.
When we wanted to go
and get a vote in 1994,
people were killed. People died.
People were disappeared.
People were raped.
We are not happy because now
our government ignores us.
[group chanting]
- It's 178 days, now,
we are here.
And it's too much now.
It's seven months now.
We are catching
seven months now.
Our government
is doing nothing to us
because before,
we had people who are evil.
We get rid of them,
out of our country.
But now we still have another
evil people like before.
Why? God must help us.
[cheering]
[somber music]
[camera shutter clicks]
[group singing and clapping]
[pensive music]
[indistinct chatter]
- Stay there.
Stay there.
That's great. That's great.
[camera shutter clicks]
[group singing]
- Comrade, comrade.
[non-English]
- [crowd chanting]
- Wow.
It reminds me of how we changed
this place many years ago.
I want to tell you that history
has a way of repeating itself
for the worst, as we see what
Palestine is going through,
but also for the good.
You saw what those
universities in America did.
It was only a matter of time
that it was going to become
a global crusade against
oppression and genocide
in the 21st century.
You students are making history.
Stand up for the Palestinians
because the universities
in the 1980s, 1970s
stood up against apartheid
for our liberation.
And we saw the tide turning
in the '80s, and, voila,
we got our freedom.
It's a matter of time
that we're going to see
the tide turning there.
Let's be counted
as part of a global crusade.
You are brave. You are bold.
Do it in solidarity
for the absolute brutality
and slaughter of a people--
Of a government who do things
in the name of a people.
And many of the Jewish people
say, "Not in our name."
- Thank you.
- [cheering]
- Palestine will be free.
Free, free Palestine!
- So I'm here,
and I've been photographing
and spending time
with the students,
who are using art and their
voice in solidarity with--
For a free for Palestine.
And what's so powerful
about being here today
is that this university...
Yes, this university used to be
an all-white university.
It was only
for one type of person.
And now look at it.
And it's very emotional
knowing that there is hope.
During the time of apartheid,
everyone I'm looking at
would not be welcome
in this space
to educate themselves
and thrive.
All religions, all ethnicities.
And it just gives me hope.
It wasn't long ago when
only white people
were allowed
to even be educated here.
And it's a reminder of progress
and positive change
and the importance
of universities and protests
and student voices.
- Palestine will be free!
[crowd chanting]
- Well, I will not
stand aside and watch.
I will not be silent
while the world is on fire.
Will you?
[cheering]
- I believe student activism,
historically and in the present,
has shown to be one
of the most powerful elements
of resistance to injustice.
[crowd chanting]
- The country shouldn't function
while this war is going on,
and we hope that people
all over the country
will take actions like this,
will close down their factories,
will close down their offices,
as long as the war goes on.
[crowd chanting]
- To those militant radicals
who would disrupt and destroy
and burn the colleges
of the United States,
demonstrations in the streets
of this country
are not the way of this country.
- To every college president,
I say, vanquish the radicals
and take back our campuses
for all of the normal students--
- [chanting]
[non-English]
- Shame, shame. Shame on you.
Shame, shame, shame on you.
- Young people
at university campuses
are standing up for justice
on a scale never before seen
in the United States.
They have something that
older activists don't have,
and that is they can
bring new perspectives
on old, intractable problems.
- Get out of the way.
- The disruption of the
status quo is always important.
What protests do
is they expand our imagination.
They get us to think
about what is possible.
[crowd chanting]
And without protests,
things would stay the same.
In fact, things
would actually regress.
So even when protests,
perhaps, are violent
or they're disruptive
to the social order,
they're actually necessary
for how societies
improve and move forward.
- I think
it's quite disappointing
that the powers that be have
not found a more effective way
of responding to protests.
Their first response is always
to respond with brutal force,
to respond with the
militarization of our campuses.
- USA! USA! USA! USA!
- I don't think
it has ever been fair.
- Peaceful.
- Peaceful.
- Oh, my God.
- Those who are in power,
those who are governing,
have a responsibility
to govern those
that have placed them
in their positions of power
and influence.
- ...will be arrested
and charged with trespassing.
- This is the--
- [crowd chanting]
- I think
it's a beautiful awakening
to see students, in some ways,
just put at risk their careers,
their college degrees.
The fact that students
had this kind of uprising
speaks to the power of protest
and to the power of organizing.
[cheering]
[birds chirping]
- Many people don't know
where to look anymore.
They feel that the internet
has become too toxic for them.
News media is controlled
by three or four men.
And then they see this dad
that takes nice pictures,
is doing his best.
And it travels further than
even I ever thought it would.
Hello. Like many of you,
I'm just so concerned
about the escalation
of military hostility
between Israel and Iran.
WCNSF. This is an acronym
unique to Gaza.
"Wounded child,
no surviving family."
I mean, in March and April,
some 860,000 people
did not receive humanitarian aid
in Kordofan, Darfur,
and Khartoum due to violence.
So when I see the hostages being
taken in the way that they were,
when I see how young--
Some of them were babies
under the age of one.
That's unacceptable to me.
It's unacceptable,
and is not how
a future of some
kind of shared humanity can be.
[eerie music]
My first film as a director has
been nominated for an Oscar.
And that will put
a lot more eyeballs,
millions more eyeballs on me.
Naturally,
this leaves me exposed
for the best and the worst
of what this type of visibility
will bring.
[eerie music]
I tried to drown out
the vitriol, the abuse,
the hate that I receive
on a daily basis online
from a mixture of real people
and an army of trolls.
But it is a choice, and I will
take what fate throws at me.
Hey, just finished
shooting something.
My phone was blowing up,
and I saw the videos
coming out of Gaza...
Well, coming out
of Rafah in particular.
And you know, I'm not even
recommending you watch it.
If you trust me,
I can say that, by some margin,
these are the worst videos
I've ever seen since October 7.
Keep asking. Keep emailing.
Keep WhatsApping.
Keep posting
and sharing on social media.
It's a very least you can do
because what I've just seen...
No, no. It's unacceptable.
You ready?
Time for a walk, buddy.
[somber music]
Go on. Good boy.
It's quite hard right now
to not be worried about this--
This world.
But worry mustn't turn into
the type of fear
that makes you retrench,
which can lead
to so much damage.
- How are you emotionally?
- Up and down, up and down.
But, you know, the good thing
about understanding
my emotional engine
is that even at the depths
of my lowest points,
I feel I can carve out
the purpose
that I feel I'm here for.
You know, the trees don't give
a damn about the Academy Awards.
Neither does my dog.
They do care about
what sort of human being I am,
what sort of friend,
father I am.
[somber music]
- Welcome back, everyone.
We are counting down
to the Academy Awards
next month.
Among the films nominated for
the coveted Oscars, The After,
which is up for Best Live Action
Short Film and the movie,
starring David Oyelowo,
is directed by Misan Harriman.
[somber music]
[siren wailing]
[somber music continues]
- How are you finding
the whole thing?
Because it's unlike most events
that happen in the world,
the Oscars.
- It's up there on its own.
- It's completely unique.
And it's-- To be recognized
in this way by the Academy--
We've all-- I was in my PJs,
as a little boy,
watching the Oscars.
It's something that is globally
sort of tattooed
into the consciousness
of anyone that likes the movies.
And that's pretty much everyone.
- Do you feel that this film,
in a sense,
is one part
of your activist mind?
- Absolutely, absolutely.
Activism, to me, isn't just
marching the streets with signs.
It's recognizing the journey
that you need to go on.
And sometimes we need
to just take a step back
and make sure that empathy and
humanity doesn't leave the room.
- Having made this film,
how are you doing?
- I'm okay. I'm okay.
I'm simmering.
I've been a little anxious,
but I'm simmering
and trying
to live in the present.
[horn honking]
[crowd chanting]
- Well, back here at home,
Hollywood is getting ready
for the 96th Academy Awards.
- And that means rolling out
the red carpet
and getting Oscar ready
for his close-up.
Road closures are in effect on
and around Hollywood Boulevard,
and security is ramping up,
as the LAPD says they are
preparing for protesters
who are aiming to take
the spotlight away
from the glitz and glamour
of Hollywood's biggest night.
While you're watching,
bombs are dropping.
- This system
wants us to be divided,
and tries to convince us that
our issues are somehow separate
and detached
from what's happening
thousands of miles away in Gaza.
But we know the truth.
We know that we are not free
until we put an end
to the capitalist system and
imperialism worldwide.
[horns honking]
Because when you wage a genocide
against the people of Palestine,
you're waging a war against
women all over the world.
[horns honking]
- Hey, hey! Ho, ho!
[crowd chanting]
[horns honking]
- Hey, hey! Ho, ho!
- It's funny because Misan--
Whatever he sees
goes on in the world--
and, you know, even
being here, you can see the--
There was a protest
going on yesterday.
He went to one when
he first arrived a week ago.
Also, you know,
you travel around LA,
and you see a lot of injustice.
You see a lot of people
having a tough time.
All of these things
always affect him a lot.
- And that's the thing
about this conflict now.
Because when I see people
post "I stand with Israel,"
or "I stand with Palestine,"
for me, it isn't that binary.
You know, that this is just
a tragic, tragic, human story.
And you-- You need, first,
to stand for humanity.
And if humanity means that you
recognize what's been going on
happened a long time
before October 7, that's fine.
If your humanity means that you
recognize that it is horrific
for Hamas to take hostages,
particularly 9-month-old Kfir,
who I post every week--
- A nine-month-old?
- Mm.
- It's mad.
- Well, it's not
about taking sides.
- It's about--
- It's about humanity.
Like, we cognitively
disassociate ourselves
from what we are willfully able
to look away from.
It's tragic. It really is.
- Yeah.
Hi, Sule. Oh, look at you.
- How are you doing?
- You look amazing.
- Mwah.
- Exactly.
I have to get used to that one.
No, no. No, no, no, no.
- It's Nigerian colors now.
- Oh, yeah. It's great.
- Just push me a bit. Yeah.
- When else are you going
to wear them, you know?
- Exactly.
- Today's the day.
- Today's the day.
- You're so chill.
- Mm. Well, there's a war
going on inside.
- So internalizes things.
- There's turmoil.
- I've practiced my speech
to 36 seconds.
- Okay.
- Do you want some toast?
- Yes, thank you.
- Or should I turn
into a Niger uncle?
- [laughs]
I was just going to say--
- Hello.
- Niger. [non-English]
- We will finish this in--
Whenever I bloody like.
- Yeah.
- [laughs]
- I have a wife here, but if--
- Don't make me laugh right now.
- Maybe I'm looking for others.
Okay, very good.
First of all,
I have seven degrees--
- [laughs]
- And I want to do Star Wars.
- I mean, let's play it safe.
- [laughs]
- Let's play it safe.
- [laughs]
- Ooh!
Damn.
- Oh, my God.
- You like?
- Damn.
- Wow.
- It's gorgeous.
- Oh, thank you.
- Finish up.
I'm going to get changed.
But I will need you at some
point. Where are my braces?
- Oh, yes.
Let me just get those.
One second.
You were so relaxed before,
and now suddenly
it feels last minute.
What do you say?
- You look good.
- And the Oscar
for Best Ironing goes to Misan.
- Oh.
- That will do.
- Are you feeling
like an Oscar winner?
- I'm feeling like a man...
- You certainly look like one.
- He certainly looks like one.
- ...who has a point of view.
- [laughs] I can feel--
- Blue steel.
- No, but I can feel
the nerves in this car.
We suddenly went really quiet.
[laughs]
- It's game time.
- Oh, look--
- What time is it?
- Game time.
- You all right, darling?
Are you feeling it?
- I'm feeling okay.
- Yeah?
- Yeah.
- Hello.
Yes. Just don't leave me.
I'm here.
- Yeah.
- [laughs]
- Yes.
I'm claiming you.
- Hey, can you do me a favor
and tell Robert De Niro
he's a little bitch?
[laughter]
Let him know I'm out here, okay?
[laughter]
- Oh, my God.
[horns honking]
- Driver, window down, please.
The protest is here.
Can we slow down?
Can we slow down?
Sir.
- Oscars, Oscars, shame on you.
- Oscars, Oscars, shame on you.
- Your hands are bloody, too.
- Your hands are bloody, too.
- Oscars, Oscars, shame on you.
- Oscars, Oscars, shame on you.
- Your hands are bloody, too.
- Your hands are bloody too.
- Oscars, Oscars, choose a side.
- Oscars, Oscars--
- With an hour to go
before the Oscars,
police have created a buffer
between the protesters
and the auditorium,
keeping them
from the red carpet.
We cover the Oscars every year.
I've covered
the Oscars since 1985.
I've covered at least 35.
This is the biggest
police presence I've seen.
- Your hands are bloody, too!
- Oscars, Oscars, choose a side.
- Wow, there's more here--
There's more here
by the red carpet. Look.
Can you slow down? Sir?
Can you come around here?
Look at this.
- Oh, my God,
this is looking kind of wild.
[crowd chanting]
- Never again for anyone.
Never again, is now.
Never again, for anyone.
Never again, is now.
Never again, for anyone.
Never again--
[crowd chanting]
[atmospheric music]
- Ready?
- Do what I say.
- Ready?
- [non-English]
[background chatter]
- Even those
who don't take home statues
won't go home empty handed.
This year's Oscar gift bag
is worth over $170,000.
[blasting]
[horns honking]
[blasting]
[background chatter]
- Free, free Palestine.
- Free, free Palestine.
[background chatter]
[horns honking]
[dramatic music]
- Last night was intense.
I was disappointed for me.
Yes, of course.
It's only human.
But for me, it's about
keeping the intentionality,
the humility, you know.
Well, when we were
in the car yesterday,
it took everything in me
to just not take...
Because I had the big camera
in the bag.
...not take that and go,
you know,
from the entrance
of the red carpet
and try and join the protesters
and at least shoot them.
But I think I would have
been arrested
and maybe not allowed
into the Oscars.
But that itch was there.
Jonathan Glazer's speech
almost broke me
because here is a Jewish man
that has made a film, you know.
Zone of Interest
is an observation
of the horrors of the Holocaust.
In fact, let me read it
because it's a remarkable
statement.
"We stand as men
who refute their Jewishness
and the Holocaust being hijacked
by an occupation that has led
to conflict for so many people,
whether the victims
of October 7 in Israel
or the ongoing attack on Gaza."
And when filmmakers
like Jonathan Glazer
get on stage at the Oscars,
it becomes a gigantic act
of activism in itself.
- Would you have done
something similar?
- Yeah. You know, it's funny
because that gave me courage
because there's a tightrope
that you walk.
- Are you ever worried about the
repercussions of your actions?
- Well, I think as an artist,
you put it out into the ether
knowing that many
will love what you do,
and many will hate what you do.
So I'm ready to bear those scars
and sacrifice
whatever fate throws at me.
[atmospheric music]
[whispering]
I think we live in
an age now where
it's all too easy to have
all this power and influence,
but literally
stand from nothing.
The veneer of what I thought
the world was supposed to be
has clearly come off,
and I'm seeing
how much needs to be changed.
[somber music]
I realized that
I've lived a privileged life,
and that often collides
with my activism,
and often wonder whether
it's possible to inhabit
both of these worlds.
I could be jumping from one film
and fashion party to the other.
I have plenty of, I guess,
celebrity friends
that I could be
hanging around with
and just turn my head
away from the pain
and inequality of the world.
- But when people
strip that away,
why should they see you
as any different
from that group of people
that uphold a certain system?
- If you are telling me
that you can't be kind
because you were born into
wealth, I would disagree.
I think because
you're born into privilege,
it actually gives you the tools
to rewrite the rule book
for others
because you understand
how the deck is so stacked
against the many
if you're part of the few.
[tense music]
[crowd praying]
[tense music]
[camera shutter clicking]
[PA announcement]
[tense music]
What I've learned is that
human beings can be monsters,
much scarier than the monsters
that were supposed to be
under your bed.
We are capable of, I think,
even frightening the devil.
I've learned that. I've seen it.
[tense music]
- Riots involving hundreds
of far-right
anti-immigration protesters
have erupted
in several towns and cities.
- But those monsters are still
and always have been
in the minority.
In general, people have
a goodness in them,
and sometimes that needs
to be fed almost like a plant
so it can grow.
The images we have all seen
of horrific racist attacks...
- Save the children.
Call for a ceasefire
in Gaza and Israel.
- Apathy is lethal.
I'm politely begging all of us,
whether we have
50 or 50 million followers,
we can carve out a future that
our children deserve to inherit.
- We're here to stop genocide,
and that's why Aaron Bushnell
self-immolated.
- Aaron understood that through
this one act of self-sacrifice,
he could stun the world
into action.
- We stand with them.
- We have to stand up
for generations
of young Black people.
They don't have to suffer the
racism that we've had to suffer.
[cheering]
- Politicians need to say,
it is the racists...
This is London at its best.
This is a London
that I know and love.
That's my job, really,
to amplify important moments
like this.
Look, I was in the Oscars
four days ago,
and I can tell you that this
is more important than anything
that I was attending
in California.
This is the work.
This is the bearing witness.
[pensive music]
[sirens wailing]
- Four years ago today,
George Floyd was murdered
in Minneapolis
by then Minneapolis
police officer Derek Chauvin.
Chauvin knelt
on Floyd's back and neck
for more than nine minutes.
The chilling video
of George Floyd's final moments
triggered protests across the
country and around the world,
and escalated demands
on addressing
deadly police encounters.
In the four years since Floyd's
murder, reform has been slow.
According to the ACLU,
at least 1,247 people
were killed by police in 2023,
more than any previous year
on record.
[camera shutter clicks]
[dramatic music]
- This is perfect.
So facing me straight on.
It's good.
[camera clicking]
- When George Floyd was murdered
in front of the world's eyes,
it, for us, unearthed
a lot of trauma.
It reaffirmed what many of us
have been talking about
in regards to the police
brutality and mistreatment
that our communities
were experiencing for decades.
I think there was
a missed opportunity,
as many of us look back
on making a real progress,
but it has not brought
about the kind of change
that we desperately
wanted to see.
When you think
about these things
and you have a community
that also experiences--
[thunder rumbling]
[laughs] It is responding
to our trauma.
- That's what it's doing.
- Gosh.
- Ah, I can hear God's wrath.
- Yeah.
- He's definitely Black.
- [laughs]
- [laughs]
- So when you think about
these things and you--
You add the systematic ways
in which we have
a boot on our neck,
you have to ask the question,
why is it that people
do not want
to share the prosperity with us?
Why is it that we do not create
the kind of policies
that allow for all of us
to thrive?
Why is there a sense of pushback
when we're always only asking
for the bare minimal?
And the question is,
we've never been seen as equal
in the eyes of the law,
and we've never been seen
as equal
in the eyes of our counterparts
in the society that we live in.
The idea that you only expect
people who are oppressed--
Who are experiencing
oppression directly
to be the ones that stand up
says something about
how deprived you are of humanity
and the ability to see
others' liberation
as part of your liberation.
There's always a connection
to another human being,
and I think
the biggest connection
is that we all bleed the same.
[laughs]
We all breathe the same.
And we all dream the same.
And we shouldn't be so tribal
in the way in which we see
each other's humanity.
We should think
of each other as one.
- You stand
on the shoulders of giants.
You knew John Lewis himself.
And of course, you know the
legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King
and Nelson Mandela,
to name a few.
How do you carry that baton
in order to pass it on
to your children's generation?
- I think my generation
is passing on...
Is what the past generation
of movement creators and
change makers have passed on,
which is to stay focused
and to march on.
And that's what
I tell young people.
- Well, you're not afraid to
cause good trouble yourself.
- No, and it's always fun
to cause good trouble.
[atmospheric music]
- Love has never been
a popular movement,
and no one's ever wanted,
really, to be free.
The world is held together...
Really, it is held together
by the love and the passion
of very few people.
Otherwise, of course,
you can despair.
Walk down the street of any city
any afternoon,
and look around you.
[somber music]
What you got to remember is what
you're looking at is also you.
Everyone you're looking at
is also you.
[somber music continues]
You could be that person.
You could be that monster.
You could be that cop.
And you need to decide
in yourself not to be.
[somber music continues]
[camera shutter clicks]
[yelling]
[horns honking]
- George Floyd's death
sparked a racial reckoning
across the country
and around the world,
and the organizers of his day of
remembrance say it's important
we never forget
what happened here,
at 38th and Chicago
on that fateful day.
[somber music]
[horns honking]
- This is the only way we're
gonna get heard, is in numbers.
We need to be seen.
You know, enough of us--
If we're able...
If we're healthy and able,
we need to be out here on
the streets doing the work.
- Hands up! Hands up!
- Don't shoot! Don't shoot!
- Hands up! Hands up!
- Don't shoot! Don't shoot!
- Hands up! Hands up!
- Don't shoot! Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
- Hands up!
- Don't shoot!
[birds chirping]
[somber music]
- So I'm here at
38th and Chicago,
four years after the loss
of George Floyd.
And I'm literally here
where we lost him,
learning about progress
in solidarity with the community
here on the ground.
So I'm very happy to be here.
[somber music]
Leslie, a real pleasure.
It's a huge deal for me
to be here with you.
So tell me what has happened
in the last four years
and what's happening now.
- We've come too far
to turn back now.
When you have so many people
and entities
that are attacking
affirmative action,
that are still attacking
people's everyday humanity,
we have to keep the fight
for justice going.
We're here in
George Floyd Square.
There's George Floyd's face
right there. And it's like--
I was telling somebody,
he wasn't just a figure.
He was a family member
to people.
He was a human being.
- What will
real progress look like?
- You see George Floyd?
We won't be sitting
at another memorial,
because I always say,
the only real form of justice is
if George Floyd
was still alive today.
And so, for me,
real change and transformation
mean that Black lives matter.
Amen.
It's not an org--
It's not just an organization.
It really is, like,
a declaration
that has not been true
in America
since they've been
bringing us here like cargo.
It just hasn't been true.
And, at this point,
I would just even settle for,
stop murdering us, amen?
Baby steps,
because there's
so many levels and layers to it.
- Look over there.
Chin slightly up.
Beautiful.
[somber music]
- The summer of 2020, I painted
169 names on the street
here at George Floyd Square.
It's called the Morning Passage.
And every spring, we do
a repaint with communities,
so we repainted 169 names today.
It's a way to take the streets.
It is a way to show, also,
the grand, unending nature
of police crimes and police
violence in the United States.
It's never going
to be a finished list.
I could paint all
the way to downtown,
and this list
would never be finished.
[chanting and drumming]
- 3, 2.
Derek, many people
I've spoken to today
say they felt heavy
when they woke up this morning,
knowing what happened on this
corner of 38th and Chicago
on that fateful day.
In the same breath,
they say they feel like
they're in community
every time they come
to George Floyd Square.
That's exactly what organizers
wanted this space to be,
a space for people to come
and feel all the emotions
and know it is okay
and come to be together.
[drumming]
- Say his name.
- George Floyd!
- Say his name.
- George Floyd.
- George! George!
- Floyd! Floyd!
- George! George!
- Floyd! Floyd!
- Fist in the air, one time.
Fist in the air, one time.
That's the first level of fight.
You got to put your hand up.
217 people get killed every day.
- Keep your hands up.
- That is 170,000 people a year.
When I say, George,
you say Floyd.
- George.
- Floyd!
- George!
- Floyd!
- George!
- Floyd!
- If George had a choice
and he knew,
he would still choose to go
the way he went
for the cause that he went for,
but he was a gentle giant,
wouldn't really to hurt nobody.
- It's beautiful that they
keep his memory alive,
that they just didn't let it go
after the first year,
the second year, the third
year, the fourth year.
You know what I mean?
To know that they support him,
that's like supporting us,
supporting
our whole neighborhood,
supporting where we come from.
- And it's good that we're here,
and we're going to fight the
fight, but let's keep it going.
Let's keep it going.
- Yeah, if you look
at the state now
and state four years ago,
ain't much changed.
Police brutality still here.
Unnecessary killings still here.
Racial profiling still existing.
Like, America got to get
honest with itself first.
You got to tell the truth.
- And even though
we might not be around
to see the change
that's going to come--
But the change
is going to come, though.
It was just the seed
had been planted.
- Yeah. You just got to keep
watering it, keep grooming it,
you know what I'm saying?
Keep harvesting it.
And we're going to get
what we put in.
- When I say,
power to the people,
you say, power to the people.
Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Power to the people!
- Let's go y'all. Clap it up.
Clap it up.
[clapping]
- Say his name.
- George Floyd.
- Who can defeat us?
- Nobody!
- Who can defeat us?
- Nobody!
- We are one.
- We are--
- One!
- We are--
- One!
- What I've learned
from shooting protests
on three continents now
is that we're better together.
It's the global village
of well-intentioned,
well-meaning people
that are open
to learning about
our collective past
and our present in order
to shape a better future.
I've always questioned things,
but it takes time
to get to a level
of emotional security
to say that this is ridiculous,
and it took a while for me
to get there.
My worldview
has completely changed,
and it will continue
to keep changing.
[hopeful music]
[cheering]
- Say his name!
- George Floyd!
- Say his name!
- George Floyd!
- Say his name!
- George Floyd!
[band playing]
- Here we are--
[muffled speech]
--in 2024.
Thank you.
[muffled speech]
And we have a few
names of people.
[band playing upbeat song]
- No justice, no peace.
No justice, no peace.
No justice, no peace.
No justice, no peace!
[cheering]
[Nicholas Britell's "Agape"
playing]
[camera shutter clicking]
[emotional music]
Inside the frame
There's a picture in view
Got me questioning life
And searching for truth
It's easy to turn a blind eye
And forget about the news
Who are you to me?
Who am I to you?
Does someone have to win
And everybody lose?
This is not a game
We shouldn't have to choose
Are we still standing
Waiting for help to come?
Will we face our fears
In the lens of a setting sun?
Shoot the people
That's something
That I heard them say
Shoot the people
Just don't let them
Get away
Shoot the people
'Cause we're running
Out of time
Shoot the people
'Cause everything
Is on the line, line, line
We can't stay silent
History's the proof
Lies are getting louder
And fear's on the loose
Let us do our very best
To keep humanity in the room
Are we still standing
Waiting for a change
To come?
Or will we face our fear
In the lens of a setting sun?
[camera shutter clicking]
Shoot the people
It's something
That I heard them say
Shoot the people
Just don't let them
Get away
Shoot the people
'Cause we're running
Out of time
Hey
Shoot the people
'Cause everything
Is on the line
Let me see your hands up
Face down
Ten toes on the ground
Let me see your hands up
Face down
Ten toes on the ground
Shoot the people
Hey
Shoot the people
Everyone
Should have freedom
We all deserve
The right to liberty
And live a peaceful life
Remember
That we are all human
And we live in a world
Where everyone is equal
If we take the time
We can be kind
And hate will go away