"Just Mercy" Early Movie Review

Just Mercy is the film adaptation of attorney Bryan Stevenson's critically-acclaimed 2014 memoir Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption. Focusing primarily on Stevenson's attempts to free a wrongfully-convicted African-American man sentenced to the death penalty in Monroeville, Alabama, Just Mercy is a rarity among Hollywood movies about racism -- a savior film that features Black people being saved by a Black person. The movie highlights the astounding level of institutional racism within the Alabama (and American) justice system -- which persists to this day. Some moviegoers may initially have trouble comprehending the magnitude of the problem and believing the extraordinary lengths to which those in power went in order to uphold a system of oppression.

Interestingly enough, director Destin Daniel Cretton strongly indicts the caucasian male members of the communities involved. But though history tells a different story, the movie goes out of its way to absolve white women of any complicity in connection to the systemic racism that it depicts.

A courtroom drama that outshines genre favorites like A Few Good Men, A Time to Kill, Primal Instinct and Philadelphia, Just Mercy rivals To Kill a Mockingbird. Ironically, the author of the book on which that movie was based, Harper Lee, was a native of Monroeville.

Look for Just Mercy at a theater near you this Christmas. And look for it to snag trophies at award shows in early 2020.



SPOILER ALERT***





The movie begins with the 1987 arrest of Monroeville entrepreneur Walter McMillian, whose accused of murdering a local 18-year-old white woman, Ronda Morrison. After moving to Alabama and finding local commercial property owners reluctant to rent to an advocate for Death Row inmates, Harvard Law grad and Delaware native Stevenson moves in with the family of Eva Ansley, a local woman horrified by the Alabama justice system's mistreatment of poor defendants.

Initially refusing to work with the young attorney due to his previous lawyer's ineptitude, McMillian finally comes around following Stevenson's acceptance by his family and community.

McMillian eventually reveals that he was transported to Death Row immediately after his arrest, where he remained for more than a year before his trial. He was also at a fish fry attended by several witnesses, one of whom was a police officer, during the time of the murder. He was targeted by law enforcement and the judicial system not merely because he was African-American but because he was an African-American man who'd engaged in a public affair with a white woman.

In the absence of any physical evidence, the state's case depended entirely on witness testimony. And the primary witness, career criminal Ralph Myers, was indicted as a co-conspirator and offered a 30-year sentence in lieu of the death penalty in exchange for his testimony. Following the trial judge's decision to relocate the proceedings to a nearby overwhelmingly white county, McMillian was convicted by 11 white (with one African-American) jurors and sentenced to life in prison. Unsatisfied, the presiding judge set the jury's sentence aside and imposed the death penalty.

Stevenson's fight to secure McMillian's freedom even included a segment on 60 Minutes.

Onscreen, Stevenson endures police intimidation, legal stonewalling and reluctance to come forward on the part of witnesses to obtain justice for just one client. Would you believe he's gone on to save 125 men from death sentences?

Just Mercy should be required viewing, particularly for those concerned with the need for criminal justice reform.




Originally Posted 10/25/19