Image via VH1
On the night of March 3rd, 1992, in the Lake View Terrace area of Los Angeles, four LAPD police officers were caught on tape beating and tasing Rodney King, a black man who had refused to pull over for a traffic stop. The video incited outrage within the Black community and even though the four officers were charged and went to trial, on April 29th, 1992, they were all acquitted. Within hours of the verdict, riots broke out in South Central L.A. and spread throughout the city, igniting centuries-old flames of racial discrimination. Police failed to respond quickly, and as time went on, the chaos remained violent, uncontrolled, and televised. One of the most harrowing and memorable scenes is four black men pulling out a truck driver named Reginald Denny from his truck on the intersection of Florence and Nightingale and nearly beating him to death. The riots lasted five days but caused more than $1 billion in damages and took over 50 lives.
It is vital to remember that none of this happened in a vacuum. The rage we can now comfortable witness from our screens is certainly powerful, but without the proper background, we may forget that the lootings, fires, and beatings were desperate responses to a long line of systemic racism. We must understand history in order to not repeat it, right? So sit down and watch these six documentaries to truly understand the environment that incited those riots 25 years ago.
Let It Fall: LA 1982-1992
Director: John Ridley
Year of Release: 2017
Where to Watch: In theatres April 21, and then on ABC April 28th
A lot of energy has been spent documenting the L.A. riots—there are many more documentaries on the topic than are on this list—but it is John Ridley’s (American Crime, 12 Years a Slave) unique artistic sensibility that sets this one apart from the rest. Most of the talking heads here are people who were actually living in L.A. in the 90s and involved with the riots in some way. There’s the elderly Korean woman who lost a son, the sergeant who ordered his officers to retreat from the epicenter of the riots, and one of the unrepentant attackers of Reginald Denny. The result is a layered explanation of a tense racial climate that eschews any one interpretation; the overwhelming takeaway is just how complicated the reality was (...is?)
The Lost Tapes: L.A. Riots
Director: The Smithsonian Channel
Year of Release: 2017
How to Watch: television or online
This Smithsonian Channel project is more of a curated history lesson than a documentary. It is simply a reconstruction of events using local media footage, home videos and police videos, many of which have been exclusively obtained or haven’t aired since 1992. With no talking heads or narrator, the result is unadulterated, raw. One of the most shocking and revelatory aspects of this doc is the use of LAPD internal videos. In one video Daryl Gates, the LA police chief of the time, jokes about the “good lighting” of the Rodney King beating video; internal LAPD footage of the riots provides a more intimate look at the images you might be more familiar with. The most valuable part of this quasi found footage technique is that it offers a completely factual account of the events.
O.J.: Made in America
Director: Ezra Edelman
Year of Release: 2016
How to Watch: Hulu
If you ever wondered why the O.J. trial became such a big deal, part of the answer is the Rodney King riots. This Ezra Edelman directed Oscar-winning documentary eventually focuses on the O.J. trial, but in order to do so, it (rightfully) unpacks the fraught racial climate of Los Angeles through the Watts Riots of 1965 and the Rodney King riots of 1992. That’s why it’s such essential watching: the riots left an embittered community in their wake, and it was that resentment that paved the way for the ironic Black support of O.J. during and after his trial. The first two episodes of this doc in particular explore this climate, but the entire thing is an excellent case study in just how much destruction twisted race relations can cause.
Crips and Bloods: Made in America
Director: Stacy Peralta
Year of Release: 2008
How to Watch: Netflix
Full of interviews with real gang members reflecting on their lifestyle, this doc connects the dots between slavery, the economy of the 1960s and 70s, and racist LAPD policies in order to trace the outlines of the first gangs and the eventual creation of the Bloods and the Crips. The gangbanger’s stories are interlaced with news footage and expert interviews in an attempt to provide perspective on how the 1992 riots began and why they are so important. Be warned: the last act lays the drama on thick, but in any case, the documentary provides incredible insight into how gangs were formed and why that environment is so important to the city of Los Angeles.
Bastards of the Party
Director: Cle “Bone” Sloan
Year of Release: 2005
How to Watch: CleBoneSloan.com sells DVDs
At the outset, the subject of this doc is very similar to Crips and Bloods: Made in America, but they take entirely different perspectives and therefore yield different results. Whereas Crips and Bloods explains gangs as a consequence of racist history and difficult socio-economic situations, Bastards of the Party is directed by a Cle “Bone” Sloan, an inactive member of the Bloods, and follows his quest to understand why and how gang violence got so bad. It’s name comes from a line in City of Quartz, a book about the history of Los Angeles that Sloan came across while in jail, that calls the Crips and the Bloods the “bastard offspring of the political parties of the 60s.” Guided by this principle, this documentary zooms in closer to local history, telling stories of community leaders and the discriminatory policies they came up against daily, as well as making a solid argument accusing racist police of being integral to turning gangs violent.
Uprising: Hip Hop and the LA Riots
Director: Mark Ford
Year of Release: 2012
How to Watch: VH1
“The uprising in L.A., it’s just, you know, that’s the only way you can get white people to hear what black people got to say,” says Ice Cube in this Snoop Dogg narrated doc. While it isn’t as successful at tying together the different historical and social factors that led to the riots in comparison to the other documentaries on this list, its focus on how hip-hop both predicted the riots and mended the pieces of South Central Los Angeles after the chaos is unique. Although the documentary seemingly labels rappers as part of the problem rather than the solution, it ends by focusing on the power of Dr. Dre’s The Chronic, released in December 1992. Snoop Dogg himself credits that album with releasing some of the tension, explaining that “we were ready to move on and the music spoke to that.”