Spike Lee releases powerful new short film amid George Floyd protests

On Sunday, director Spike Lee released a short film likening George Floyd and Eric Garner's deaths to that of Radio Raheem, a character in his 1989 movie Do the Right Thing. All three died at the hands of police officers.

As protests against the death of Floyd continue across the nation and world, Lee released the titled, 3 Brothers, during a special report on CNN. The minute-and-a-half long film begins by asking the question, “Will history stop repeating itself?", then goes on to piece together footage of the arrests of Floyd and Garner – and their subsequent deaths — with scenes of Radio Raheem being choked by police and dying in Do the Right Thing.

Floyd, a black man in Minneapolis, died on May 25 after an officer held his knee to Floyd's neck for several minutes. The incident was caught on video by multiple bystanders and released across social media, leading to an intense response across the U.S. and beyond. Garner died under similar circumstances in 2014, after being arrested in Staten Island, New York. The officer involved was not charged.

“How can people not understand why people are acting the way they are?" Lee told CNN’s Don Lemon in an interview. "This is not new, we saw with the riots in the '60s, the assassination of Dr. King, every time something jumps off and we don’t get our justice, people are reacting they way they do to be heard…We are seeing this again and again and again… This is the thing: The killing of black bodies, that is what this country is built upon.”

Watch the short film above.

To help combat systemic racism, please consider donating to these organizations:

• Campaign Zero, which is dedicated to ending police brutality in America through research-based strategies.
• Color of Change, which works to move decision makers in corporations and government to be more responsive to racial disparities.
• Equal Justice Initiative, which provides legal services to people who have been wrongly convicted, denied a fair trial, or abused in state jails and prisons.

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