Small Axe (2020): E Pluribus Unum

The unofficial motto of the United States is actually a pretty good description of the wonderful British film project collectively entitled Small Axe.  E Pluribus Unum (latin for “out of many, one”) has appeared on the Great Seal of the US since 1782 and is stamped on all American coins. It’s bad form to start a review with a digression, which this sort-of is since I will be discussing not an American production, but rather a British one set in London, with an English director and cast. Nevertheless, the concept “out of many, one” is absolutely germane to a consideration of Small Axe.

Small Axe  is a thematically related group of films - directed and co-written by UK auteur Steve McQueen [12 Years A Slave (2013), Widows (2018)]. Billed as a mini-series, it is actually an anthology consisting of five films, each of which tells a story about members of the Caribbean/West Indian community in London between the late 1960s and the early 1980s. As you might, imagine, writing and directing five individual feature films to be released together as a package was a herculean and time-consuming task; and in fact McQueen spent years pulling it together. McQueen himself is of West Indian extraction, and this was a passion project for him. He has called it “a celebration of all that that community has succeeded in achieving against the odds.”

Each of the movies can stand on its own. Each has its own look and an individual style appropriate to its subject matter. For example, three are shot on film stock (two in 35mm format, one in 16mm), the other two with digital cameras. Three are adaptations of true stories, while two are fictional; though the fictional pieces ring just as true as the others. While the movies themselves form an ensemble, Small Axe does not utilize an ensemble cast (although that might have been interesting); and no characters from one movie are carried over into any other.  Each picture, in its own way, is interesting and revealing about the world its subjects inhabit; and each is emotionally evocative, sometimes jarringly so. 

Understanding the title is a key to understanding the films, how they fit together, and McQueen’s reason for putting out an anthology in the first place. There was a song called Small Axe on Bob Marley and the Wailers’ reggae album, Burnin’ in 1973. It, in turn, refers to a Jamaican proverb that goes “If you are the big tree, we are the small axe.“  Seemingly small acts, from different folks at different times, can bring about change and topple – or at least transform – the powerful forces of oppression and institutional racism. In similar fashion, these five movies, each with its own story of little people getting up, standing up for their rights, meld together thematically to form an indelible whole that resonates more strongly than any one of the movies does individually. Seeing them in close proximity to one another is a powerful, eye opening experience about another time and place with quite a strong resonance in our own.

Taken as a whole, it’s brilliant.

Unknown to most Americans (fixated as we are with the indelible stain of slavery and racism in the USA), around a half million people emigrated to the UK from the West Indies – places like Jamaica, Barbados, Grenada and Trinidad – during the postwar period from the late 1940s to the early 1970s.  The majority of this community, largely black, settled in London. They were all British citizens with the right to resettle in the mother country and work there. Nevertheless, because of the color of their skin, along with their relative poverty and different culture, they were resented by the working classes and disdained by many in the upper classes. In consequence West Indians were subject to a high level of prejudice and abuse from the white power structure, which is to say the police, the courts, the educational system and social service agencies.

Each of the pictures in Small Axe  depicts a different aspect of this discrimination – which looks remarkably like its American cousin - by centering on the actions of particular individuals fighting against and/or attempting to rise above the obstructions laid in their path. The protagonists here are not MLK-style heroes, leading mass protest movements; rather, each might be considered a little axe, contributing his or her little cuts to the eventual downing of the big tree.

It’s a bit of a project to watch all of Small Axe – the five pictures taken together total a little under seven hours. On the other hand, it’s not unlike a lot of the other programming we’ve been watching during the covid era, right?  The lengths of the individual films vary considerably. The longest, Mangrove, is the only one that can truly be called a full-length movie – coming in at 128 minutes. It is also, perhaps, the most satisfying of the bunch.   The other four are of varying lengths,  averaging only about 70 minutes each – which is to say quite do-able. 

Herewith a brief summary of the five movies:  

The first Small Axe film is Mangrove, a true story about Frank Crichlow and the Caribbean restaurant in Notting Hill, London he opened in 1968.  Although that district is now fashionably upscale, back then it was a slum, occupied largely by West Indian immigrants drawn by the cheap rents. The first “respectable” eatery in the neighborhood, Crichlow's Mangrove restaurant became a community gathering spot. Along with that came police harassment; the place was raided and ransacked repeatedly without just cause (no contraband or other evidence of criminality ever found). Eventually, Crichlow and his supporters marched on the police station in protest – resulting in a police-initiated melee. Of course, it was Crichlow and eight other protestors – soon known as the Mangrove Nine – who were arrested, charged with incitement to riot. What followed was historic: a notorious 55-day trial, the depiction of which in the movie’s third act becomes its incredible centerpiece. The terrific cast is headed by a searingly intense Shawn Parkes as Crichlow, Latitia Wright as persuasive activist Althea Jones-Lecoint and Malachi Kirby as Darcus Howe, whose evocative speech at the trial, though a tad overdone, offers an emotional closing argument to the whole affair.  The film is fiercely dramatic, occasionally (and forgivably) dipping into melodrama during the riveting trial. It may even bring tears to your eyes – of outrage and of joy, both.

The next film in the ensemble is something entirely different. It is called Lovers Rock – named not, as you might think, for a place but for a genre of light pop reggae music that became popular in London’s Caribbean community beginning in the mid 1970s. the lovers rock style focused on romantic themes of love found and love lost – a contrast to the harder, angrier, political reggae blossoming in Jamaica. The film takes place at a West London house party in the early 1980s and is, in fact, primarily about the house party phenomenon. These events sprung up in response to anti-immigrant prejudice by which early generations of Caribbean immigrants were excluded from most local clubs and pubs. Nature abhorring a vacuum, local folks began hosting dance parties in their homes – clearing out the front rooms, bringing in a hot DJ, charging a modest admission and drawing scores of young people seeking a night of music, romancing, and a place to hang out, along with home-made West Indian grub, beer and such. Just who are these people and what was it like? McQueen brings us inside in such an intimate way, it’s like being there. How is this a small axe? Hint: if they don’t cater to us, we can do it ourselves. 

        (Key to an enjoyment of Lovers Rock – for reasons you’ll understand when you see the picture - is the light reggae song by Janet Kay (a second generation Caribbean Brit herself) entitled Silly Games, a huge crowd favorite that is featured in the movie.. [Listen on Spotify or watch on YouTube])

“Episode” 3 of Small Axe  is entitled Red, White and Blue. It’s the true story of Leroy Logan, a bright young West Indian guy who started his professional life as a research scientist. Logan avoided trouble growing up but was well aware of the racism and violence of the constables in his community, and when they assaulted his law-abiding father without cause, Logan was jolted into a life-changing decision. Believing that the best way to change the system was from the inside, he decided to join the Metropolitan Police himself in 1983. Red White and Blue demonstrates how dangerous and difficult that choice really was. He was viewed as an unworthy and unwelcome outsider by many of his (mostly white) uniformed colleagues, even as he was deemed a turncoat by many in his own community. John Boyega, in probably his best performance to date, is captivating as Logan. The movie takes us only through the first year or so of Logan’s career - through antipathy, isolation, hardship and danger - to a point of despair and indecision, as he wonders if his efforts are worth it, whether it will be possible to effect change after all. 

        [Coda: The film doesn’t actually tell us, perhaps because British audiences presumably already know; so if you haven’t seen Red, White and Blue, consider this a sort-of pre-epilogue: Logan chose to stick it out, and as it turned out he  did contribute mightily to changing police attitudes and policies respecting race. In fact, he was lauded for pushing for such change - awarded an MBE for his efforts. He retired with honor after thirty years of service in 2013.]

The fourth entry in the anthology is called Alex Wheatle, for the award-winning writer of novels for teens and young adults, upon whose early life the film is based. What Alex Wheatle gives us is his backstory. He was born to Jamaican parents but spent most of his childhood in a group home for children. Young Asad-Shareef Mohammed is pretty remarkable as eight-year-old Alex,  trying his best to cope with an overwhelming situation. By his mid-teens, now beautifully portrayed by newcomer Sheyi Cole, Alex was living in a South London (Brixton) public housing hostel, running the streets, small-time dealing, and getting into the reggae music culture as a DJ with Crucial Rocker sound system, through which he began writing songs, poetry, etc. He was caught up in the 1981 Brixton riots (following months of unrest and a brutal police crackdown in the largely Caribbean neighborhood) and served prison time for that. He used the lockup to read widely, reassess his life path and focus more seriously on writing. The film captures Wheatle’s life from youth through early adulthood, events which shaped the content of his subsequent fiction and became the foundation of his success.

The fifth and final film in the anthology is Education - loosely based on McQueen’s own educational experiences. It’s a coming of age story of a boy, 12-year-old Kingsley (Kenyah Sandy – a young actor to watch), who is quite bright but with a learning disability. Attending a mostly white school, his problem is misdiagnosed by the white school staff as laziness and stupidity, seen as typical of the barely human West Indian population. When Kingsley is sent to the principal’s office for being disruptive, he discovers he's being sent to a school for those with “special needs.” At least that’s the colloquial term used to whitewash the true bureaucratic terminology and policy, which refers to them as institutions for “educationally sub-normal’ children. Distracted by working two jobs, his parents (Charlene Whyte, Daniel Francis) are unaware of the unofficial segregation policy at play, preventing many black children from receiving the education they deserve; until a group of West Indian women take matters into their own hands.“ 

While the above summaries may give you the idea that this all downer stuff, I should say that it is more dramatic and evocative than depressing. And the series ends on a note of inspiration and hope. 

The question arises, is it essential to watch the five movies of Small Axe  in the listed order? No, it’s not, but writer-director McQueen prefers that you do. The films actually were shot in this order, and McQueen curated them to be viewed that way. He likens the arrangement of these movies to cuts on a record album, which back in the day were played in the order that the creators - the Beatles or Bob Marley or whoever - laid them out. In the age of digital music and personal playlists, respect for the artist’s vision has largely faded, so you can do what you want, but I’d still recommend viewing them in order to the extent possible. And why not?

As I’ve said along the way, the acting throughout all of Small Axe is excellent, and in some cases truly remarkable. Music is also a big part of all five pictures, sometimes in the forefront, other times as a soundtrack to the stories. It sets a mood and grounds us in the era, running from Toots and the Maytals, to the aforementioned Janet Kay, to The Clash’s London Calling.

These films deal quite frankly and movingly with racism.  As such they are not merely artifacts of a particular community in mid-twentieth century London – although McQueen and his team did a marvelous job of bringing at least this viewer into the scene at that time in that place and into the lives of some memorable characters - even though I personally am far removed from those circumstances. There are too many people and places in current day America, as 2020 surely reminded us, that face similar police … um …“insensitivity” and other race-based social and structural barriers. Connecting, as the Small Axe anthology allows us to do, with three-dimensional protagonists humanized by a talented and attuned director helps us to better understand and empathize. And empathy may be what we need most.

Grade:  A

Streaming exclusively on Amazon Prime Video (free with Prime membership)

Duration:

Mangrove         128 minutes

Lovers Rock         71 minutes

Red, White and Blue 81 minutes

Ales Wheatle         67 minutes

Education         64 minutes