The film depicts the story of Oscar Grant III, a 22-year-old from Hayward, California, and his experiences on the last day of his life, before he was fatally shot by BART Police in … In May 2013, Fruitvale Station appeared in the Un Certain Regard, an award section recognizing unique and innovative films, at the 66th Cannes Film Festivaland won the award for … To make ends meet, Coogler took a job as a counselor alongside his father at the Juvenile Detention Center in San Francisco. This film highlights many injustices that black communities face in the modern era. “Fruitvale Station” is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian). Oftentimes, finding jobs with a stable income and employment benefits can be difficult and many turn to illegal activity due to its highly lucrative and fast-paced nature. Sophina and Wanda have their own burdens and distractions, and they deal with Oscar’s shortcomings as well as they can. Nearly every black man, whether or not he is president, tends to be flattened out by popular culture and the psychopathology of everyday American life, rendered as an innocent victim, a noble warrior or a menace to society. The audience of the movie falls in love with Oscar and his whole family for their close-knit and unconditionally loving connection. How could this have happened? “From ‘Brute’ to ‘Thug:’ The Demonization and Criminalization of Unarmed Black Male Victims in America.” Journal Of Human Behavior In The Social Environment, vol. “Fruitvale Station” is a story we’ve heard too many times. Oscar Grant was a young man who recently got out of jail and was trying to better his life for not only himself but his daughter. “Fruitvale Station,” based on the true story of a Bay Area black man shot by a white police officer on a subway platform, examines the subject with a steady, objective eye. His main intention — and his great achievement, as well as Mr. Jordan’s — is to make Oscar a fully human presence, to pay him the respect of acknowledging his complexities and contradictions. The lost dog he encounters at a gas station might as well have “Metaphor” stamped on its collar. The deaths of these and other African-American young men (Mr. Grant was 22) touch some of the rawest nerves in the body politic and raise thorny and apparently intractable issues of law and order, violence and race. https://platform.virdocs.com/r/s/0/doc/233335/sp/9912007/mi/32625521?cfi=%2F4%2F2%5Bpreface%5D%2F2%2F2. The notion of the black male as a “brute” or “thug” can be seen in history through the Jim Crow era when black males were seen as a threat to white society as well as specifically white females and were often wrongly accused of crimes. Your email address will not be published. He is, for one thing, irresponsible and not always honest, unable to admit to Sophina or Wanda that he has been fired from his supermarket job for chronic lateness. Visit Insider's homepage for more stories. Based on the true story of one of the most heart wrenching instances of police brutality in American history, Fruitvale Station humanizes Oscar Grant, a victim of senseless police violence and racial profiling. Responding to reports of a fight on a crowded Bay Area Rapid Transit train returning from San Francisco, BART Police officers detained Grant and several other passengers on the platform at the Fruitvale BART Station. At the beginning of the film, Sophina pleads Oscar to stop dealing marijuana. Fruitvale Station: A Real True Story. The new film Fruitvale Station tells the true story of a young, unarmed black man who was shot and killed by an Oakland, Calif., transit police officer early on New Year's Day 2009. (Martin, Bay, and White). 3–4, 2016, pp. Fruitvale Station, the just-released debut feature from 27-year-old director/writer Ryan Coogler, has already garnered critical buzz for the filmmaker and … ... Fruitvale Station is exactly that kind of film, and one that really succeeds due to it’s brevity and direct message. Studies of Black History at the University of San Diego, “From Tragedy to Triumph; The Middle Passage: Between Home and Death” — Sydney Gager, “Black History Month: Judas and The Black Messiah” – Lucas Xitco, Review of Django Unchained by Angad Yadav. Winner of both the Grand Jury Prize for dramatic feature and the Audience Award for U.S. dramatic film at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, director Ryan Cooglers FRUITVALE STATION follows the true story of Oscar Grant (Michael B. Jordan), a 22-year-old Bay Area resident who wakes up on the morning of December 31, 2008 and feels something in the air. The Seven Sees The Seven Sees takes you inside the true story of Oscar Grant, the 22-year old Bay Area man shot dead by cops on New Years Day 2009, as featured in the film "Fruitvale Station." ". Fruitvale Station garnered a good deal of buzz at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, after which the Weinstein Company acquired the film for a hefty sum.This preview doesn't exactly show what spurred the fevered purchase, but it does display a good deal of dramatic promise. He left behind his girlfriend Sophina and four-year-old daughter Tatiana. It stars Michael B. Jordan as Grant. Even as it unfolds with a terrible sense of inevitability, “Fruitvale Station” is rarely predictable. He dotes on his daughter, Tatiana, and seems sincere in his desire — if not entirely steady in his resolve — to stay with her mother, Sophina (Melonie Diaz). The streets of Hayward, Oakland and San Francisco and the cars of the BART trains are places of happy chaos and spontaneous solidarity, but also contested spaces where violence often seems close at hand. Those matters are hardly absent from “Fruitvale Station,” Ryan Coogler’s powerful and sensitive debut feature, which imaginatively reconstructs the last 24 or so hours of Oscar Grant’s life, flashing back from a horrifying snippet of actual cellphone video of the hectic moments before the shooting. While dealing drugs comes with high risk to all that choose to participate and black people do not participate in this at a higher rate than their counterparts, there is an alarmingly disproportionate amount of black males incarcerated for dealing substances such as marijuana than there are white males. Fruitvale Station 2013 | R | 1h 25m | Independent Movies This dramatic rendering of a real-life tragedy recounts the final hours of Oscar Grant, shot by San Francisco transit police on New Year's Day, 2009. I, as well as many others who have seen this film, have been very emotionally moved by the raw portrayal of this act of injustice. Oscar Grant III was a 22-year-old African-American man who was killed in the early morning hours of New Year's Day 2009 by BART Police Officer Johannes Mehserle in Oakland, California. The officer who killed Grant was charged with involuntary manslaughter and served a mere 11 months in jail, claiming he mistook his gun for his taser. We must never forget that Fruitvale Station is fiction, and that fiction sometimes can be just as powerful as the truth. How did we — meaning any one of us who might see faces like our own depicted on that screen — allow it? Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. This film closely examines just one story of the various societal struggles black family men encounter in their lives. A few moments lean a bit too hard on our dread-filled foreknowledge of Oscar’s tragic end. by Peter Foy. Based on a true story, Fruitvale Station won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival. The contrast between the audiences’ perception of Oscar and the way the BART police officers viewed him is very evident. … According to the author, “This term has become the platform to dismiss Black life as less valuable and perpetuates a negative and criminal connotation in forms of micro-insults and micro-invalidations. But Mr. Coogler, a 27-year-old Bay Area native who went to film school at the University of Southern California, examines his subject with a steady, objective eye and tells his story in the key of wise heartbreak rather than blind rage. Fruitvale Station Doesn T Trust Its Aunce To Know True Tragedy. of the events of 1 January 2009, then flashes back to explore the final day in the life of 22-year-old Oscar Grant (played with superb realism by Michael B Jordan, previously seen in The Wire and Friday Night Lights). The film “Fruitvale Station,” directed and written by Ryan Coogler is a story based on the death of Oscar Grant. But Mr. Coogler, with a ground-level, hand-held shooting style that sometimes evokes the spiritually alert naturalism of Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, has enough faith in his actors and in the intrinsic interest of the characters’ lives to keep overt sentimentality and messagemongering to a minimum. The Times critic A. O. Scott reviews "Fruitvale Station. Before Daunte Wright’s death, a gun-Taser mix-up was blamed for another police killing: Oscar Grant at Fruitvale Station A mural of 22-year-old Oscar Grant, who … The significance of this true story lies in the aftermath of his death which sparked a series of protests and riots against the injustice of police brutality. There is a dehumanizing violence in this habit, a willed, toxic blindness that “Fruitvale Station” at once exposes and resists. As played by Michael B. Jordan (Vince Howard to devotees of “Friday Night Lights,” though to fans of “The Wire,” he will always be Wallace), Oscar is a case study in confusion, unsure of where he’s going and a source of worry to those who love him. Oscar also displays his caring and empathetic nature throughout the film. Although Oscar acknowledges the fact that dealing illegal drugs is undoubtedly a risky form of income, he feels as though his hand is forced due to his recent termination from his job at a grocery store. Harvey Weinstein’s big Oscar hopeful this summer is “Fruitvale Station,” a true story about the fatal Oakland shooting of an unarmed young black man that arrived with almost miraculous timing. Since the film dives deep into the personality and psyche of Oscar Grant, the audience is well aware of how the officers are misinterpreting Oscar and profiling him due to his race. Michael B. Jordan stars as Oscar Grant and … This is the epic story of Oscar Grant, A 22-year old man shot in the back by transit police. Michael B. Jordan stars as Oscar Grant, a young man who was fatally shot by a BART transit officer in Oakland on New Year's Day 2009, in the new film, "Fruitvale Station… It is obvious that their manner of dealing with this altercation was highly racially motivated. After graduating, he began developing what would become his first feature film, Fruitvale Station, the true story of Oakland native Oscar Grant, an unarmed man who was shot in the back by a police officer. Profanity, violence and other facts of life. One important point … One being the criminalization and vilification of black men. Fruitvale station true story fact and the heart wrenching film fruitvale octavia spencer michael b jordan what hened at fruitvale fruitvale station is based on the. And this movie is based on a true story. In the early hours of Jan. 1, 2009, Oscar Grant III, unarmed and lying face down on a subway platform in Oakland, Calif., was shot in the back by a white Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer. Smiley, CalvinJohn, and David Fakunle. Oscar was unarmed and pinned on the ground by two officers, one of … Fruitvale Station True Story Fact And Fiction In About. And, in truth, Mr. Coogler has made that movie, even as he has also made one full of anger, grief and frustration. Rights for the film were ultimately acquired by The Weinstein Company for approximately US$2 million. After premiering at Sundance, the film was at the center of a distribution bidding war. https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/12/movies/fruitvale-station-is-based-on-the-story-of-oscar-grant-iii.html, Most Read: 13 Titles Leaving Netflix in May. He left behind his girlfriend Sophina and four-year-old daughter Tatiana. Fruitvale Station, directed by Ryan Coogler, is based on a true story of twenty two year old Oscar Grant, played by Michael B Jordan. Required fields are marked *. Among the negative vocabulary used to describe black males is the word “thug,” in an article titled “The demonization and criminalization of unarmed Black male victims in America” by Calvin John Smiley and David Fakunle, this word is well-defined. This film does not paint him as a saint nor does it paint him as a crook, it shows him as a human being with many flaws. PubMed Central, doi:10.1080/10911359.2015.1129256. Moreover, the recent killings of unarmed Black men have sparked discussion and discourse surrounding the term “thug” and how it is used in the context of reshaping perceptions of Black life broadly and Black males specifically.” (Smiley and Fakunle 2), These stereotypes of black males have been around for hundreds of years and have been perpetrated by white society as a means of oppression. Fruitvale station, is a story about the real life Oscar Grant, a black man who was shot and killed by a Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer in Oakland. The most heartbreaking part of the film is the end in which Oscar Grant is shot, unarmed, in front of his friends and family. Oscar Grant was one of far too many whose lives have been taken as a result of racial profiling and acts of brutality within our justice system. The details change. He is a devoted and loving father to his young daughter Tatiana as well as a caring son to his mother and the rest of his relatives. These are qualities that go against the stereotyped, vilified notion of the black male. In the text “Freedom on My Mind” racial profiling is defined as “Using race, rather than specific evidence, to determine how a person should be treated.”(Martin, Bay, and White) It is also noted in the text that “An inordinate number of African Americans are imprisoned for minor offenses because they are more likely than whites to be arrested.”, Oscar comes to a turning point in which he throws away his stash of drugs which symbolizes him letting go of a lifestyle that imprisoned him for many years. Mr. Jordan plays Oscar Grant, who was killed by a Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer. Grant’s life as a human ended in tragedy with real-life reverberations, but Coogler understands the power of fictional affect, and Grant as a character becomes a dynamic canvas for us to feel so much more. Police brutality is a violent reflection of these ideologies that have continued in our society despite the laws in place that afford inalienable rights to all citizens in our country. "Fruitvale Station" tells the story of a real man, Oscar Grant, who was shot in the back by a police officer in 2009. Ryan Coogler, the director of "Fruitvale Station," narrates a scene from his film. All of these scenes convey his goodhearted and nonviolent nature. There is a natural, easy sweetness to Oscar, but neither Mr. Coogler’s script nor Mr. Jordan’s performance sugarcoats his temperament. “In the United States, Black men are six times as likely to go to jail or prison as white men.” (Smiley and Fakunle 6) This is largely due to the tendency for law enforcement to racially profile black individuals. It is not that the movie is apolitical or disengaged from the painful, public implications of Mr. Grant’s fate. 26, no. Grant was a young man from Hayward, California who was fatally shot on New Year’s Eve after an altercation with a BART transit police officer in 2009. BART officer Anthony Pirone kneed Grant in the head and forced the unarmed Grant to lie face down on the platform. This racial ideology of black men is still prevalent in modern society when examining the justice system as a whole. At one point in the film, he is brought to tears when he discovers on the side of the road a wounded dog that was hit by a car. The climactic encounter with BART police officers erupts in a mood of vertiginous uncertainty, defusing facile or inflammatory judgments and bending the audience’s reflexive emotional horror and moral outrage toward a necessary and difficult ethical inquiry. Fruitvale Station, Jordan's first lead role, is directed by Ryan Coogler, a 28-year-old debutante straight out of film school, and shot in a clean cinéma vérité style for less than $1m. This perfectly conveys the ideology of the “brute” or “thug” black male that the officers thought they were dealing with. Grant was a young man from Hayward, California who was fatally shot on New Year’s Eve after an altercation with a BART transit police officer in 2009. This theme is demonstrated in a beautifully complex manner throughout the entirety of this film. In Fruitvale Station, there is some brief background about Oscar Grant that can be inferred through Ryan Coogler’s storytelling. Your email address will not be published. But it’s the same tragic scenario: a white policeman shoots a young unarmed African-American male. In “Fruitvale Station,” the shooting takes place on New Year’s Eve in 2008. These scenes are integral to the main message of the movie because they show Oscar’s humanity. You get the sense that he might have made this movie even if the world had not handed him a terrible true story, and made any day in the life of Oscar Grant into a sad, touching and subtle film. Fruitvale Station premiered on January 19, 2013 during the 2013 Sundance Film Festival where it was listed as Fruitvale before undergoing a title change. These “crimes” resulted in the extrajudicial murder of black men – lynching – carried out by whites in the community including law enforcement. “Fruitvale Station” describes Grant’s life and the events leading up to his death. 350–66. Even after two stints in prison (one visited in the film’s only chronological digression), he is still selling drugs, and his vows to stop have the feel of New Year’s resolutions, inspiring more hope than confidence. His own mother, Wanda (Octavia Spencer), is still able to boss him around, and he spends a lot of the day shopping for her birthday party. Oscar is burdened with the decision between providing for his family and engaging in illegal drug activity, he is also burdened with striving to be the best man and father he could be and simultaneously being viewed by outsiders as a dangerous criminal due to his skin color. The film “Fruitvale Station,” directed and written by Ryan Coogler is a story based on the death of Oscar Grant. Fruitvale Station: A Story of Police Brutality and Institutionalized Racism. This situation is very common among many low-income communities. You can feel the real-world implications of Grant’s death (oppression, anger, injustice) … But everything it has to say about class, masculinity and the tricky relations among different kinds of people in a proudly diverse and liberal metropolis is embedded in details of character and place. Shortcomings as well as they can takes place on New Year ’ s tragic end they navigate and language... 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