"OJ: Made in America"
I only watched this because the critics were raving about it. I really had no interest in seeing anything more about OJ ever in my entire life.
A multi-part documentary about OJ that is actually about much more than OJ. It is very good. It is also about race and racial issues in Los Angeles, and America. I just finished the second episode. It is On Demand on ESPN.
The interviews are fascinating, as they got to all of the people close to the situation, for better and for worse. It is also one of the few documentaries I've seen that really represents the views of black people really well. I lived through all of this in Los Angeles at the time, I recognize all the personalities, the local newscasters, good and bad, and the guy who made this got it exactly right. I have previously posted that I went to the same bank as OJ, even though we lived in very different neighborhoods in terms of income. The first time I saw him, I was stuck behind him in traffic, and he was driving a Ferrari Testarossa, the first I had ever seen.
The race and class differences are highlighted. At sometimes the filmmaker gets it so right that it hurts to watch it. Everything is put in historical context, in terms of the social and racial issues of that era.
Part of the reaction is simply personal. I took my ex-girlfriend, black, out to dinner for her birthday on April 29, 1992, the night the verdicts came down from the Rodney King trial of the policemen in Simi Valley. We had dinner in Redondo, then I went back to my home in the Miracle Mile section of LA. I saw all these fires as I was driving on the freeways ..... the riots started miles away, but came up to my neighborhood two days later, on a beautiful sunny day ....
All the black political figures in LA are also shown and interviewed. I've met Rev. Cecil Murray at First AME, the black political center of the city. All the LA cops are interviewed, too, and they are quite split on the politics, and the Rodney King beating.
Thematically, it is almost a Tragic Negro story, in that the incredibly talented OJ believed he could transcend race completely, and completely out of step with what the other black athletes of his time were doing. OJ thought himself above race, at least as he represents himself in this story. Some of his skewed thinking is revealed in interviews he did on various sports programs.
The filmmaker shows Mohammed Ali as a contrast, and the other black athletic political activists. This documentary should be a major educational piece for current young people who don't know the context.
Check it out, it is very good, and proves to me, once again, that reality is more complex than fiction can ever hope to be.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Thanks for your POV! 
