THE REBELLIOUS LIFE OF MRS. ROSA PARKS – Review by Susan Wloszczyna
The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks is a long overdue documentary that digs deep into the life of the civil rights activist from Montgomery, Alabama and is based on a best-selling biography. The film starts off with a clip of the quiz show To Tell the Truth in which the celebrity panel overlooks the real Rosa Parks.
Of course, Parks would become known for the fateful day — December 1, 1955 –when she entered a city bus and was told by the white driver that she and other black passengers had to give up their seats for white patrons. She wasn’t the first person to resist bus segregation in the city. But she would start a bus boycott that lasted more than a year while finding other ways of transportation. We get see and hear Parks in front of a red curtain on screen while Lisa Gay Hamilton provides dialogue when the iconic historical figure off screen.
In 1932, Parks married a barber, Raymond Parks, from her hometown. He was a member of the NAACP at that time and collected donations to support the defense of the Scottsboro Boys, a group of Black men falsely accused of raping two White women. Rosa took numerous jobs, ranging from a domestic worker to hospital aide.
Raymond encouraged his wife to complete her studies in 1933 at a time when fewer than 7 percent of African Americans had high-school diploma. From 1965 to 1988, she served as secretary and receptionist for John Conyers, an African American U.S. Representative.
She would go on to connect with such admired male civil rights figures as Edgar Nixon, Martin Luther King Jr. as well as Malcolm X. However, she and other women were left out of speaking at the March on Washington. But she did meet South African leader Nelson Mandela after she moved to Detroit, Michigan in 1990 when he toured the United States after his release from prison.
One harrowing encounter occurred in 1994 when Parks, who was 81 at the time, was robbed and assaulted in her Detroit home. Her African-American assailant Joseph Skipper, claimed he chased away an intruder and demanded payment. The man was sentenced to 8 to 15 years in prison.
Parks lived to be 92 and died from natural causes in 2005. Many mourned this brave woman’s passing. During the memorial service, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said if not for Parks, she wouldn’t hold such a high-level office. Parks made history again when she the first American who had not been a U.S. government official to be honored Parks was also the first woman and the second Black person to lie in honor at the Capitol.
This civil rights activist also was involved with free and fair elections for people of color and promoting them to vote. No coup plots in her time. But it seems that the state of the voting process in the U.S. these days isn’t as secure as it should be.
