Wisconsin v. Mitchell | The Grey Area | Hammers High

In 1988, Mississippi Burning, a film based on murder of three civil rights activists in Neshoba County in Mississippi was released. This movie was a strong statement against racially motivated hate crimes in US and other places in the world. It showed them how society renegades humanity and degrades into a mass to stinking flesh.

However, in a string of events  which were rather ironical, movie led to a hate crime in Wisconsin and then led to a landmark decision in American Civil Rights history. A group of Afro-Americans, allegedly drunk, were discussing the film. There was a sense of angst in air. Todd Mitchell instigated them and as a result they beat up a young white kid in his pre-teens - Gregory Reddick. Reddick’s only fault was his skin color. Mississippi Burning triggered something it stood against, a tragedy. Reddick was brutally beaten and left in the middle of the road. Attackers presumed him to be dead. After sometime, Reddick was found unconscious by Police. He remained in coma for four days and slowly recovered.   

In an interesting trail of events, this case became a precedent to First Amendment after the case went to Supreme Court. Circuit Court sentenced Mitchell for four years as his crime was racially motivated. It was appealed. Supreme Court ruled that a state may consider whether a crime was committed or initially considered due to an intended victim's status in a protected class. More details on the court case could be found on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisconsin_v._Mitchell and other link present on the page.

Why Aakrosh Doesn't Burn Like Mississippi Burning | Cine Talk

As a standalone movie Aakrosh is a decent effort that should have come around 2000. In 2010, the Bollywood cinema has gone a few more miles ahead. However, it can't be denied that Aakrosh come out as nice movie which sticks to the topic most of the times but fails to retain the sting throughout. A rip off Mississipi Burning, Aakrosh is almost a quarter good, which, I must add, is impressive. Let’s have a look what were the problems with Aakrosh:


Not-so-convincing Story Line: MB's biggest asset was the element of reality in the fiction. Based on a true incident, MB had a strong backing of reality. Aakrosh took a realistic background and laced it with fiction which was so alien to the backdrop. Given the incidents which laid the foundation, the way Officers handle situation when some politics is involved is too spicy to digest.

Interpretation Of Characters: Bollywood has to understand the between heroism and super heroism of characters. The enthusiasm shown by Akshaye's character was understandable but the anger in eyes of Ajay had flames of prejudice. Ajay should have underplayed the role. His character's anger should have settled down over the time.

Romantic Angle: The love story of Ajay Devgn and Bipasha was absolutely not required. Why does she help help Ajay? She hates her husband, she still love Ajay and she has empathy for the weak. But while MB subtly put ethics over anything else, Aakrosh prefer to keep it hazy. In MB, though there is a little romance between respective characters, absence of back story and very subtle portrayal makes it more convincing.

Racism Vs Casteism: Both practices are very similar in nature. However unlike upper castes, whites never considered blacks as a part of society. They were considered unwanted and their removal had no impact on the social structure. Upper castes have defined rules for lower castes and they turn violent only when the rules are breached. This is the core difference between caste and race based discrimination, however, both are equally condemnable.

Based on conversation between Sujoy Ghosh and Arun Purushothaman