The Atlanta Film Festival is one of those gems that can be easily forgotten in the giddiness of the first signs of spring warmth. Yet it features some amazing creations as well as thrilling guests. The festival kicks off this year with a screening of Stanley Nelson’s Freedom Riders, a phenomenal piece of work about the 1961 Freedom Rides:
“Nearly 50 years after dozens of college students, Black and White, boarded two buses and risked their lives to challenge Jim Crow’s stranglehold and to push a nation to act, Freedom Riders is a film that documents a critical moment in American history and presents an amazing account of our nation’s conscience embodied in the actions of the young.”
The screening keeps up the festival’s tradition of introducing – or reacquainting – audiences with unsung heroes of American history. The film’s creator Stanley Nelson himself will be there, as well as many noted Civil Rights participants, including Ambassador Andrew Young.
