Poignant last day in the life of an ordinary man

25 April 2014 - 10:16 By TYMON SMITH
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PREYED UPON: Michael B Jordan as Oscar Grant III in 'Fruitvale Station'
PREYED UPON: Michael B Jordan as Oscar Grant III in 'Fruitvale Station'

Reuben "the Hurricane" Carter died on Sunday.

Carter was a promising boxer immortalised by Bob Dylan in the singer's 1976 hit about his unjust incarceration - "for a murder he didn't commit".

Carter was played by Denzel Washington in Norman Jewison's 1999 film The Hurricane. The bitter memoir Carter wrote while in prison for more than two decades was a bestseller in the US.

Stories of racial injustice at the hands of the US justice system have provided fertile ground for popular culture over the years - most recently in documentary chronicler Ken Burns' The Central Park Five, about the wrongful conviction of a group of black teenagers for the murder of a jogger in Central Park in the 1980s.

Winner of both the grand jury and audience awards at last year's Sundance Film Festival, Fruitvale Station presents the dramatisation of an incident in which 22-year-old Oscar Grant III was shot in the back by a transit authority security officer in the early hours of January 1 2009, three years before the killing of Trayvon Martin grabbed headlines around the world.

The feature is the directing debut of Ryan Coogler, who is from the San Francisco area where Grant lived.

Fruitvale Station presents its story by focusing predominantly on the last day in Grant's life and contrasting its ordinariness with the tragic events that ended it, filmed on bystanders' cellphones and later watched on YouTube by millions of angry people.

Grant, played brilliantly by Michael B Jordan, lived a life typical of his social class - young, black, previously incarcerated, with a young wife and small child, all while still in his early 20s.

We watch as he wakes up on New Year's Eve, feeling there's something in the air. In the spirit of the day he attempts to deliver on his promises to his wife, child and mother (who is celebrating her birthday) as best he can.

In the course of this flatly, purposely non-melodramatic observation of an ordinary man going about his ordinary business we realise that Grant, like most of us, is more complicated and flawed than he might at first seem. But thanks to Jordan's sublime performance, we are disposed to have empathy for him in spite of his shortcomings.

Coogler's camera floats temperamentally around in the style of a documentary and emphasises the claustrophobia of Grant's circumstances, but also allows space to let the hopefulness and carefree moments provided by family, friends and Grant's youth to shine through. All of which make what happened to him even more outrageous, unnecessary and disillusioning - he was just a man, trying his best to get by, who found himself in the wrong place at a poignantly inappropriate time.

In a country where police drag people behind cars, fire at them while their hands are raised and strip and kick them in the streets, Fruitvale Station provides a powerful and resonant reminder to South Africans of the limits of social systems that are supposed to protect us all, irrespective of the colour of our skins or how much money we make.

Fruitvale Station opens at cinemas today

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