It’s been a long five years since the horrific murder of George Floyd – long enough to have forgotten the international uprising it provoked, perhaps, but also to ask what the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement really achieved. As the title hints, it’s been a bumpy ride.
This unfussy but hardworking British-made documentary is by no means a definitive answer but it provides a timely recap, and a human scale to one of the most momentous events in modern history. Its focus is mainly on the UK side of the story, but it begins and ends in the US; first with police bodycam footage of that fateful day in Minneapolis, as officers pull a confused and anxious Floyd from his car and lay him on the pavement, and also the now-infamous bystander footage of officer Derek Chauvin mercilessly kneeling on Floyd’s neck.
