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Best Movies To Watch For MLK Day

MLK Day 2022 Movieguide®

42

Quality:
****
Content:
-1 Caution advised for older children, including teenagers, and sensitive adults.
42 tells what happens when the Brooklyn Dodgers baseball team signed the first black player in the Major Leagues, Jackie Robinson, in 1947. 42 is an inspirational, superb movie showing how the Christian faith of both Dodgers General Manager Branch Rickey and Jackie Robinson helped end racism in professional baseball. However, there is a fair amount of foul language and some racial epithets, so caution is advised, especially for children.

ONCE UPON A TIME...WHEN WE WERE COLORED

Quality:
***
Content:
+2 Moderately questionable elements.
ONCE UPON A TIME...WHEN WE WERE COLORED, based upon the critically acclaimed book chronicles the early life of its author Clifton Taulbert. Clifton is encouraged by the Christian faith, love and kinship of his tightly knit "colored" community to overcome the racial intolerance prevalent in the deep South of the 1950s and 60's. The movie contains only moderately questionable elements while promoting Christianity, family loyalty, personal responsibility, and a biblical worldview.

SELMA

Quality:
****
Content:
-2 Extreme caution for older teenagers and adults.
SELMA is a powerful movie on Martin Luther King Jr’s march on Selma, Alabama for voting rights for African Americans. SELMA is a well-done movie with overt Christian, moral content, but it does have some intense violence and a significant amount of foul language, so strong caution is advised.

DRIVING MISS DAISY

Quality:
****
Content:
+3 Some minor questionable elements. (Media-wisdom is suggested to discuss.)
DRIVING MISS DAISY is a great character study with strong Christian values about a wealthy Jewish matron who’s befriended by her black chauffeur, a committed Christian full of wisdom. Beautifully acted by Jessica Tandy and Morgan Freeman and containing only two exclamatory curses, DRIVING MISS DAISY will not only fill you with joy and love, but also encourage you to follow Jesus Christ more closely.

AMISTAD

Quality:
****
Content:
-2 Extreme caution for older teenagers and adults.
AMISTAD is a moving and uplifting story of men battling to win their freedom. It tells the true story of Africans who in 1839 revolt against the masters of a Spanish slave ship but are imprisoned by the U.S. Navy. Aside from violence and naturalistic nudity, director Steven Spielberg has treated this morality tale with his usual flair. The movie has a powerful reference to the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ, although there is also a reference to ancestor worship.

GLORY

Quality:
****
Content:
-2 Extreme caution for older teenagers and adults.
With a really good 1860's look, GLORY is a biblical moral lesson about overcoming racism through reconciliation, not rebellion or revenge, set in the context of history that we all need to see. GLORY is a great film for mature, discerning Christians.

THE JACKIE ROBINSON STORY

THE JACKIE ROBINSON STORY is from 1950 and stars the Robinson as himself in his struggle to become the first African American Major League Baseball player 

REMEMBER THE TITANS

Quality:
****
Content:
+3 Some minor questionable elements. (Media-wisdom is suggested to discuss.)
Based on a true story, REMEMBER THE TITANS depicts the forced integration of an all black high school with an all white school and its impact on football in 1971 Alexandria, Virginia. Faced with the need to unify their team, two coaches, one of them played by Denzel Washington, must help the team to learn that the real victory lies in changed hearts. Humorous as well as dramatic, TITANS is a moral, uplifting, well-acted tale.

AMAZING GRACE

Quality:
****
Content:
+4 Biblical, usually Christian, worldview, with no questionable elements whatsoever.
AMAZING GRACE is the story of William Wilberforce who, after a young life of debauchery, came to Christ at the age of 25 and believed he was called by God to stop the slave trade and reform morals in England in the 18th Century. The acting, directing and production values in AMAZING GRACE are superb. It also has deep, soul-stirring Christian references to the sinfulness of people, the salvation of Jesus Christ, and the divinity of Jesus Christ, with frequent renditions of the great hymn “Amazing Grace.”

HIDDEN FIGURES

Quality:
****
Content:
-1 Caution advised for older children, including teenagers, and sensitive adults.
HIDDEN FIGURES is an engaging, encouraging, uplifting salute to three African-American women who contribute greatly to the 1960s NASA program during the Space Race with Communist Russia. Led by three fantastic actresses, HIDDEN FIGURES is an uplifting movie that exemplifies a positive way to stand with Christian strength and grace in the face of opposition, but caution is advised for older children due to many light obscenities and one strong profanity.