![]() The Public Enemy song also serves as a sly reference to Spike Lee’s masterpiece, Do the Right Thing, released the same year as the events shown. The hip-hop tracks give the scenes the proper context, energy and beat. ” Later, as the group of boys streams into the park, Public Enemy’s “ Fight the Power ” booms across the soundtrack. These same social tensions come through deftly in the music that DuVernay selects for the fateful night. In the context of the times, it feels like the moment is born of the combustible frictions of the social tensions of New York in the 1980s. None of the boys later arrested are involved. A middle-aged white man pops off and gets punched. A young white couple rides a tandem bike, passing the group and they get heckled by the teens. Basically, what kids their age all around the world seek out - some kinda feeling that relieves boredom and teenage anxieties.ĭuVernay wisely draws on the court record to show various incidences that will later stoke the fires of misfortune and lead to testimony against the boys. As night falls, DuVernay’s camera shows us how this doomed collection of teens, some friends and other strangers are thrown together in their pursuit of excitement, fun and teenage mischief. We see the boys and the innocence they’re about to have ripped from them. The opening episode of When They See Us provides us glimpses of life before that fateful night. When police heard initial reports of a raped white woman, the black and brown boys got blamed for the attack. At roughly the same time, a group of 20 to 30 young black and brown boys were also in Central Park. She was attacked, brutally beaten, raped and left for dead. Ironically, the facts of the case are straightforward: A 28-year-old white woman, Trisha Meili, was jogging in Central Park at night. ![]() Lives are irrevocably broken and reshaped based solely on stories that are colored by racist bias, personal ambition and a desire for blood and vengeance. Childhoods are lost when prosecutors choose to twist facts and timelines to suit the needs of the damning story they intend to tell. The conflicts she shows exist between all the stories being told. What makes DuVernay’s handling of the Exonerated Central Park Five’s story so undeniably powerful is how she focuses on the trial and injustice not as a series of unfortunate events but as a competition of stories. ![]() We call this process of biased storytelling “justice.” As one character says of the boys’ jury, which mirrored headlines of the day, “They will see a wolf pack.” This story then determines who the jury chooses to believe and who they choose to doubt, reasonably. And when they see them, they tell themselves a story about them. The latter half informs a key aspect of justice: reasonable doubt. And the jury draws conclusions and decides which story it believes - and what they’re willing to believe. Ultimately, what is a trial but a competition of stories? The prosecution presents their version of events, which they corroborate with evidence gathered by the police. The only means for the injustice to be made right was with a narrative. Once the real rapist’s confession led to their exoneration, to compensate Wise for the injustice done to him and the other four boys, the City of New York was forced by a court order to pay a $41 million settlement. The real rapist saw how Wise had been paying for his sins. It was a chance meeting that led to his freedom and their collective exoneration. He was inspired to tell the truth after he personally witnessed, in prison, the injustice being waged against one of the five boys. It wasn’t until years later, that justice was served, after the real rapist came forward. The injustice they endured is an indictment of the NYPD, legal system and media. In real life, they were 14-, 15- and 16-year-old black and brown boys from Harlem, wrongfully arrested and prosecuted for a rape they did not commit. So much so that at numerous points I had to remind myself that these were young actors. They can do a lot with just a look, a silence, a held pain. The performances that DuVernay elicits from the youthful actors are absolutely mesmerizing. The casting of the teens’ parts is commendable. Their names are Korey Wise, Yusef Salaam, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana Jr. It’s the story of the Exonerated Central Park Five. In fact, at one point early in the four-part series, a lawyer for one of the wrongfully arrested black and Latino boys says in a meeting between the boys’ various lawyers, “What we need to do more of is control the narrative.” This is a central challenge before every person of color in America. In her new Netflix series When They See Us, filmmaker Ava DuVernay shows the audience an undeniable truth for people of color in America: Our life stories get shaped by the stories other people tell, as well as the ones they prefer to believe.
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