WHAT IT'S ABOUT: Ava DuVernay ("Selma") co-wrote and directed this four-parter about the five teens convicted in the 1989 beating and raping of a jogger in Central Park. "When They See Us" tracks the lives of Antron McCray (Jovan Adepo), Kevin Richardson (Asante Blackk/Justin Cunningham), Yusef Salaam (Ethan Herisse/Chris Chalk), Korey Wise (Jharrel Jerome, "Moonlight") and Raymond Santana (Freddy Miyares) over a 25-year period, from arrest to vindication. They were prosecuted by head of the sex crimes unit of the Manhattan District Attorney's office, Linda Fairstein (Felicity Huffman) and Assistant District Attorney Elizabeth Lederer (Vera Farmiga).
MY SAY: DuVernay directs this nearly five-hour-long film with a clenched fist. That's a long stretch to be enraged, and a long stretch for viewers too, but under these circumstances, rage seems just about right. In 2002, Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau reopened the case after someone else confessed to the crime, then recommended that the five convictions be vacated. They subsequently were. It then appeared these five teens had indeed been railroaded by police and prosecutors.
If that reads like a carefully-drawn sentence linking weasel words ("it appeared") with an inflammatory one, then go to the record. It's an extensive one. Police and prosecutors continue to insist to this day that the convictions should have stood. The brunt of that record, however, does not support them. Sarah Burns' and Ken Burns' 2012 film, "The Central Park Five," explained what went wrong _ terribly wrong _ step by step, and in the process humanized the five men. In 2014, the city gave them $41 million without admitting wrongdoing.
