‘Alex Wheatle’ Is The Weakest Strike In Steve McQueen’s ‘Small Axe’ [Review]

Amon Warmann Guest ContributorIn any year, Steve McQueen’s “Small Axe” would be a historic achievement.

Peter Debruge Chief Film Critic“Education.” That’s as good a title as any for the final episode of Steve McQueen’s “Small Axe” project — a series of five features, some little more than an hour, designed to educate and inform audiences about the experience of London’s West Indian immigrant population, about the expectations of assimilation raised by a white-majority country and the obstacles such a society puts in the way of that goal.To get the picture, audiences needn’t see every entry of

I was born with a speech impediment. For years, I received speech therapy in special education.

Steve McQueen and Ryan Murphy are set to receive the Gotham Independent Film Awards' director's and industry tributes, respectively. The two will be recognized alongside actor's tribute honoree Chadwick Boseman and actress tribute honoree Viola Davis, both of whom are starring in George C.

The “first” awards show of what will be a very long Oscar season, the Gotham Awards, already announced their 2020 nominees last month. While “First Cow” and “I May Destroy You” topped the list of nominees, two tributes were also revealed for both Chadwick Boseman and Viola Davis.

Dave McNary Film ReporterThe Independent Filmmaker Project has selected ​Steve Mc​ ​Queen​ and Ryan Murphy as recipients of tributes at the Gotham Awards ceremony, which will be held Jan. 11.McQueen, who won the Academy Award for best picture for “12 Years a Slave,” will receive the Director’s Tribute.

The careers of Ryan Murphy and Steve McQueen will be celebrated at next month’s Gotham Awards.

Also Read: Chadwick Boseman, Viola Davis to Receive Tributes at 2021 Gotham AwardsMcQueen’s “Small Axe” anthology is a collection of five films each set between the late ’60s and mid-1980s and tell a different story within London’s West Indian community and how they’ve been shaped by generations of rampant racism and discrimination, as well as by their own force of will. The films are rolling out now on Amazon Prime Video.

With anticipated films delayed, theaters closed, and festivals canceled or refurbished to virtual affairs, there has been little in big, prestigious movie events for audiences to rally around in 2020. Steven McQueen‘s five-film anthology series “Small Axe” may be as close to a buzz-worthy event as we’ll get in the current movie climate.

Steve McQueen’s Small Axe portmanteau of five roughly hourlong films centered on racial issues in second-half 20th century UK wraps up with Education, which, at the end of the day, is what the series is all about: education in terms of the efforts of different segments of the population to begin understand each other, to cast off ill-informed presumptions and long-entrenched prejudices, creating more opportunities and learning that the “other” should ideally create more possibilities than

I was born with a speech impediment. For years, I received speech therapy in special education.

straight to your inboxFormer Liverpool and Manchester City midfielder Steve McManaman has hailed John Stones after the defender produced another impressive display during Saturday's victory against Fulham.Raheem Sterling 's early goal and a penalty from Kevin de Bruyne sealed a 2-0 win for the hosts, who were dominant throughout the match against Scott Parker's side.

Jazz Tangcay Artisans EditorDirector Steve McQueen’s new five-part anthology series, “Small Axe,” takes starts in the late ’60s and ends in the mid-’80s, following the West Indian community in London through the decades.

Early in Steve McQueen's Alex Wheatle, the young protagonist whose name gives the film its title prompts derision from a barber shop full of Londoners of West Indian descent by revealing that he doesn't consider himself African. "I might be Black, but I'm from Surrey," says the young Brit abandoned by his Jamaican parents, who has grown up in the loveless Social Services foster-care system.

This late fall has been a treat because we’ve received a new Steve McQueen (“12 Years A Slave,” “Widows“) week every week for the last three weeks; when does that happen? And they are all part of McQueen’s new five-film anthology series, “Small Axe,” based on the Jamaican proverb, “If you are the big tree, we are the small axe.” Three films have debuted at the New York Film Festival earlier this fall, and those three have now aired on Amazon Prime Video.

Watch Video: 'Small Axe' Trailer: John Boyega, Letitia Wright Tackle London Racism in Anthology SeriesWhen Alex arrives in Brixton, he’s a fish out of water in the neighborhood; neighbor Dennis (Jonathan Jules, “Fighting With My Family”) takes it upon himself to fix Alex’s wardrobe, hair and inability to speak the Jamaican dialect. “I’m not African,” Alex tells the barber who has referred to him as such.

With the arrival of Alex Wheatle, the fourth of five installments that make up Small Axe, Steve McQueen’s adamant and penetrating series of roughly hourlong dramas centering on the Black immigrant community experience in post-World War II Britain, the emerging core concern is the hypocrisy involved in the nation laying out the welcome mat to newcomers in the first place while denying opportunity once they’ve arrived.