"NOW! AGAIN! is a reenactment of a classic radical film, "Now" by Santiago Alvarez, staged this summer in Ferguson, Missouri by the cops themselves. Playing themselves, the cops reenact their own vicious history as if they were checking their performance in a mirror shattered by gunfire. NOW! AGAIN! blows up at the intersection of an avant-garde film act and an urgent manifesto for militant action, demanding an end to police violence NOW!"
Last class there was a brief moment where we brought up the concept of 'modern day lynching' and I noticed a bit of hesitation to refer to what in going on in our present day political stratum as a lynching. I didn't really know how to vocalize how that made me feel then, and perhaps I still have trouble putting words to why that "idea" seems so prevalent to me. Maybe the feeling to too raw now. But I was pointed towards this short film, by one of my favorite documenters and I feel that it speaks to what is going on now. People try to pull what's going on now away from the context of the Civil Rights Movements, when people try to demonize protesters and admonish people in there journey of grief, and these are things that drive me crazy simply because no one has the right to say how anyone should mourn. But back to the contact of the piece; Wilkerson draws an excellent parallel between then and now.
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