Apple TV's 'Emancipation' exposes a personal account of a Black man's battle for liberation from brutal enslavement. The film is inspired by 1863 images of a man identified as “Whipped Peter" taken at the height of the Civil War. One of the most popular depictions of American enslavement, Peter was the subject of what became known as “The Scourged Back.” In this photo, he is seen facing away from the camera with a bare, scarred back from decades of abuse at the hands of his enslavers. The image was first included in an edition of Harper’s Weekly and has since been used as one of the most prolific examples of mistreatment experienced by those victimized by the Trans-Atlantic slave trade.
EBONY correspondent Denzel Mooney spoke with the Will Smith, who stars as Peter, Charmaine Bingwa, who play's Peter's wife and director Antoine Fuqua about impact of the film and Peter's story.
"We spoke about such a reverence on set...we really wanted to reach the depth of emotion that was required for the experiences that the people we are honoring went through," said Bingwa of the labor that went into the crafting of the film.
