MLK/FBI (2020) on Netflix

Plot summary

The documentary works from newly declassified government records and archival footage that spans 1955 to 1968, the years of Martin Luther King Jr.'s work as a civil rights activist. It follows the investigation and harassment that J. Edgar Hoover directs through the Federal Bureau of Investigation, as agents gather recordings and images concerning King's sexual encounters with women outside his marriage. That material is meant to undermine his standing within the civil rights movement, which is gaining momentum. The film sets the bureau's white ranks against the crowds of Black Americans who gather around King. Interviews with several people are presented largely as voiceover.