I suppose 2017 is as good time as any for a movie like Detroit, an intensely gripping, true account of the riots that took place in the now distant 1967 Americana Motown city. Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker, Zero Dark Thirty) directs an excellent script from Mark Boal, which focuses on a specific incident at the Algiers Motel in the summer of the aforementioned year, when three African Americans were brutally murdered by the police in a scandal that didn't shy away from corruption and major violation of human rights.
Will Poulter is particularly effective as the trigger happy crooked police officer Philip Krauss, and John Boyega - so memorable as Fin in the new revamped Star Wars saga - gives his Melvin Dismukes a subtle humanity that is beautifully understated in its simplicity. The controversial incident at Algiers, which is at the center of Detroit's narrative, is a dark chapter in America's civil rights history, and watched through Bigelow's eyes, it contains an audacity and tension like few American movies this year. It is a simultaneously gut wrenching and revelatory examination of a crime that never should have been, if not for the incompetence for a few police officers - a societal issue that still resonates in that same society today.
Detroit is epic-like in its scope of characters, setting and topic timeliness, and, possessing a less-than-happy ending (a major trial does not get the verdict that we all want), it's bound to create discussions both far and wide. It's just such a shame that a movie this good did not find a bigger audience; here's hoping it gets a second life on Bluray and digital streaming.
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