An important documentary about the life of an early advocate for the rights and safety of Black men and women, Ida B.Wells

We're seeing lots of interesting and important material emerge and re-emerge thanks to the Black Lives movement, and one of the pieces of info most worth checking out is the brief William Greaves documentary Ida B. Wells: A Passion for Justice (1989). Though her name is by no means a household word, it should be, at least among journalists: She was probably the leading Black newspaper writer and columnist of her early 20th-century era (roughly 1880-1930) rising to the role of editor/publisher of the leading Black newspaper in Memphis; she took on many dangerous issues, in particular the horror of lynching, at great personal (and financial) risk; ultimately she moved to Chicago and continued her career as a lifelong advocate for the rights of Black people - becoming a hugely influential advocate and a national leader on civil rights. Greaves does a great job conveying the sense of her life and times with many stills of newspaper graphics and archival photographs, some of them painful to look at; Wells left behind not only her journalism and a diary or memoir with details about all of the activism and advocacy; Toni Morrison reads sections from Wells's writings, which gives this film a real voice of hope and courage.