The tactics of slavery, the miserable economic engineer which still powers the country today, demanded that Black folks’ individual histories be severed from their time in Africa.

In fact, for most Black folks living in America, tracing one’s history beyond 150 years is next to impossible. During the pandemic, like many, I tried to search for my family history and found very few answers. The opportunity for justice, however, requires quite a bit of luck. The passionate descendents of those Africans still live in the area, and they’ve been itching not just to find the artifact, but to seek justice. But Brown’s focus extends far beyond the ship. ‘Book Club: The Next Chapter’ Review: You’re Going to Need a Lot of Wine to Enjoy This Sloppy Sequelīrown’s arrival in Africatown in 2018 for “Descendant,” coincides with a first-of-its-kind, nationwide partnership to search the waters surrounding Mobile for the wreck of the Clotilda. The two men burned and sank the ship, named the Clotilda, erasing all traces of the grave crime they committed. Within months they returned with 100 captive Black people. Despite the law, they believe they could sail to Africa, capture Africans, and bring them back as slaves without anyone finding out. See, in 1860, long after the Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves was signed in 1808, two wealthy white men from Mobile, Alabama made a bet. Because for the many Black folks living in Africatown, Alabama, where the last slave ship made landfall, remembering is what they do best. How best should we remember the dead? The critical African American history retold in Margaret Brown’s imperative film, “ Descendant,” an unblinking investigation combining local stories with “Erin Brockovich” flair, seeks to answer that question. Netflix releases the film in theaters and on its streaming platform on Friday, October 21. Editor’s note: This review was originally published at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival.

Descendant of the crane review