Review of 'Judas and The Black Messiah'

 

Rather good film about Fred Hampton, Chairman of the Illiniois (Chicago) Black Panthers, murdered at 21 with the help of a police infiltrator. The story is mainly that of the infiltrator, how he was recruited (he was a petty criminal and blackmailed by the FBI) and rose through the ranks of the Panthers to become Hampton's bodyguard and 'captain of security'. 

Avoiding spoilers, it's a good depiction of the period and the struggle, and in particular is very good on how the Panthers were not Black nationalists or separatists but socialists (even if some of the Maoism is occasionaly a bit cringe-y). The FBI were most worried about them because they were making common cause with Latino groups like the Young Lords and even white racist immigrants from the south like the Young Patriots. The film is really good about this, not hiding from the fact that these people identified as racists and 'confederates', but showing the way that the Panthers actually saw struggle in terms of class not race.

Watched via laptop, informal distribution and VLC-renderer...which hasn't been working for a while but now it is!