What do you do when you feel like you have no choices left?  For a practicing Catholic, the answer is prayer.  Of course, that is the answer to everything, but such is the human condition that in moments of real need, we tend to forget God.  That initial question is essentially what the African American community asked itself in the 1960s and 1970s.  First, they murdered Medgar Evers, the Mississippi field secretary for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), in front of his house in 1963; next they shot and killed Malcolm X in public as he spoke in front of his followers in 1965; finally (though not finally) they assassinated Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in a hotel in Memphis, Tennessee.  These are some of the reasons why the Black Panthers were started, a nationwide network of militant African Americans who were tired of being brutalized.  They had their moment in history, and then that moment seemingly passed.  Night Catches Us (2010) is about that post-revolution world in which everyone had to deal with the consequences.

The city in which those people have to deal with those consequences in Night Catches Us is Philadelphia.  It is 1976, and former Black Panther Marcus Washington (Anthony Mackie) is returning to his former neighborhood in order to attend his father’s funeral.  He arrives at his childhood home to find it empty, his father’s body lying in state in the living room.  He is not alone long when Bostic Washington (Tariq Trotter), Marcus’ brother, enters the room with his wife.  Their interaction is cordial until the subject turns to the house.  Due to Marcus’ long absence, the home had been left to Bostic.  Bostic takes offense at Marcus’ questioning of this, and the fact that the former already is planning to sell it.  Bostic is not the only one who holds resentment against Marcus.  The event that had forced Marcus to leave, primarily the shooting of Neal (not pictured), their former Black Panther leader, is blamed on Marcus.  The murder had actually been carried out by the police, and had taken place in the home Neal shared with his wife, Patricia “Pattie” Wilson (Kerry Washington).  The version of events that the neighborhood believes, particularly the remaining Black Panthers now headed by Dwayne “Do Right” Miller (Jamie Hector), is that Marcus had sold out Neal after the shooting of a police officer.  It does not take long for the news of Marcus’ return to get to Do Right, and the former warns the latter that “the snitch” will be dealt with soon.  The initial harassment comes in the form of the word “SNITCH” being spray painted on the side of the car formerly belonging to Marcus’ father.  Enraged, Marcus confronts Do Right in a bar where the latter hangs out.  The resulting fight is eventually stopped by the police, and it is Detective David Gordon (Wendell Pierce) who comes to release the offenders.  This prompts a visit from Detective Gordon, who warns Marcus away from not only Do Right, but Pattie as well.  Following angrily dismissing Detective Gordon, Marcus begins keeping tabs on Pattie.  The two had been close before he left, but it is her daughter, Iris Wilson (Jamara Griffin), who first notices Marcus’ lingering.  Iris tells her mother, who does not believe her until Pattie drives by Marcus’ old house and sees him in person.  He has been in the process of fixing up the place until Bostic orders his brother to leave.  Marcus’ solution is to sleep in the car under a bridge, but Pattie finds him there and invites him to stay with her.  Doing so is not to the liking of her current boyfriend and fellow attorney, Carey Ford (Ron Simons).  Pattie runs her house as an open place for the needy of the area to get a meal, as well as providing legal counsel for those in trouble with the law.  One of these semi regular denizens, in the house and in jail is Jimmy Dixon (Amari Cheatom).  Jimmy’s collects scrap metal around the neighborhood and sells it for what he deems is an increasingly unfair price.  He also mouths back to the police whenever he gets the chance, something for which he is often arrested.  Upon Marcus coming to live with Pattie, and Carey departing, one of the first things Marcus does is to tell Jimmy to either straighten up or move out.  Jimmy’s response is muted, but he secretly obtains a handgun from someone nearby.  At the same time, with an uptick in crimes against law enforcement, Detective Gordon seeks out Marcus and tries to blackmail the former Black Panther into cooperating with the police.  Detective Gordon wants Marcus to plant a gun behind the bar where Do Right is headquartered, using it as a pretense for arresting more Black Panthers.  The blackmail comes in the form of Detective Gordon threatening to tell everyone that it had been Pattie who had informed on Neal.  With that, Marcus takes the gun, but he goes to Do Right and warns the new leader instead of following police orders.  Unfortunately, Jimmy uses the weapon he had obtained to murder a cop sitting in his patrol car.  Jimmy tries to hide in Pattie’s house, but the police are able to track him to that location.  As soon as they obtain a warrant, the authorities kick down the door.  Jimmy is sent running out the back door, while Marcus is taken into custody.  Once Marcus is released, Pattie sits Iris down and tries to admit to giving up Neal, but Marcus takes the blame.  Further, Jimmy is quickly found and killed by the police instead of being arrested.  Things are not the same, and soon thereafter Marcus tells Pattie that he has a new job he must take.  He offers for her to come with, but she refuses.  Before departing, he tells her to call when she is ready and the film ends.

What I was not ready for in Night Catches Us was the Muslim Bostic quoting Genesis 42:21, “To one another, however, they said: “Truly we are being punished because of our brother. We saw the anguish of his heart when he pleaded with us, yet we would not listen. That is why this anguish has now come upon us.”  It does not take much to make sense of the use of this scripture.  First, the brothers’ father had been a Christian preacher, so it follows that they would each have a knowledge of the Bible no matter their current beliefs.  Secondly, the verse speaks to the suspicion cast on Marcus and how it effects Bostic.  The common saying is that we are not our brother’s keeper.  That saying has a Scriptural basis, too, having come from Genesis 4:9.  In the verse, Cain uses these words to lie to God, who had just slain his brother, Abel.  What Cain is also doing is trying to shift blame for Abel’s death, essentially saying that he is not responsible for the killing, that Abel had brought it on himself.  God, of course, knows the truth.  The way God wants it is the complete opposite.  We are our brother’s keeper.  Some might hear that and think this is far too great a responsibility.  After all, we can barely keep our own lives on the straight and narrow, let alone looking out for another.  However, it does not have to be every little thing.  Much of this can be boiled down to sin.  One thing I have learned about Faith in recent years is that there is no such thing as a private sin.  Every wrong doing effects everyone else in some often imperceptible way.  In the film, Pattie lives out this calling by taking care of her neighborhood.  It is a concept not unique to the Black Panthers, but one that the Church has followed for centuries.

What is unique about Night Catches Us is that it focuses on a period of Black Panther history not often discussed.  For this, if for no other reason, it gets my recommendation.  Seeing such films is important not only to understand the past, but for where we are today.