Education
Drama
A Black boy’s journey through an ineffectual public school system reveals the racial inequities built into everyday British life. Young Kingsley Smith (Kenyah Sandy) is a spirited aspiring astronaut with a love of drawing whose life is turned upside down when he is thrust into a new school for the “educationally subnormal”—a harrowing experience that gradually awakens his mother (Sharlene Whyte) to the institutional mistreatment of the children of West Indian immigrants. Shot on Super 16 mm to evoke BBC television dramas from the 1970s, the final Small Axe film concludes the pentalogy with a hopeful vision of the power of Black-led collective action.
2020-12-13
en
Cast
Director
Steve McQueen
Kenyah Sandy as Kingsley
Naomi Ackie as Hazel
Jade Anouka as Mrs. Morrison
Sharlene Whyte as Mother
Temirlan Blaev as Pupil
Nigel Boyle as Mr. Hamley
Tabitha Byron as Sheila
Ralph Davis as Senior Teacher
Kate Dickie as Miss Gill
Daniel Francis as Esmond Smith
Aiyana Goodfellow as Nina
Jo Martin as Mrs. Bartholomew
Kayla Meikle as Mrs. Howard
Adrian Rawlins as Headmaster