The Blinding of Isaac Woodard

The Blinding of Isaac Woodard (2021) is a documentary film directed by Jamila Ephron.

In 1946, Isaac Woodard, a Black army sergeant on his way home to South Carolina after serving in WWII, was pulled from a bus for arguing with the driver. The local chief of police savagely beat him, leaving him unconscious and permanently blind. The shocking incident made national headlines and, when the police chief was acquitted by an all-white jury, the blatant injustice would change the course of American history. Based on Richard Gergel’s book Unexampled Courage, the film details how the crime led to the racial awakening of President Harry Truman, who desegregated federal offices and the military two years later. The event also ultimately set the stage for the Supreme Court’s landmark 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, which finally outlawed segregation in public schools and jumpstarted the modern civil rights movement.

Cast

André Holland

Narrator (voice)

Leland Gantt

Isaac Woodward (voice)

Kenneth Mack

Self

Sherrilyn Ifill

Self

Rawn James

Self

Richard Gergel

Self

Belinda Gergel

Self

Robert Young Sr.

Self

Patricia Sullivan

Self

Laura Williams

Self

Gilbert King

Self

Kari Frederickson

Self