The Lena Baker Story
Director: Ralph Wilcox
“There’s right and there’s the way things are. This is the world we live in.”
“Then we need a better world.” – The Lena Baker Story
Shot on location in Colquitt, Georgia this Opening Night movie recounts the appalling true story of the first and only woman sentenced to die in the electric chair in Georgia.
Lena Baker was a smart, inquisitive young girl who wanted to see the world. Unfortunately, being born black, in the south, and in the early part of the 20th century, made these dreams just about impossible. Through many ups and downs she settled down and made a life for herself with her mother and three children as a housekeeper. Forced into a job taking care of Eliot Arthur, an old man considered to be the meanest man in town, she is eventually pushed by the man into a relationship with him thinking that she is protecting her family whom he threatens repeatedly. When she tries to escape he literally, physically kidnaps her and drags her back. When she relents and stays, the man’s son who hired her nearly beats her to death for disgracing his family and then has the sheriff drag her away for breaking the law of blacks and whites living together. Of course the man who forced her into it receives no punishment. When she is dragged back again and finally tries to leave for good, the elder Arthur pulls a gun on her. A life or death struggle ensues, and she kills him in self-defense. An all white male jury found her guilty of murder. She was sentenced to death. The entire trial, deliberation, and sentencing took no more than 4 to 6 hours. 60 years later she was posthumously pardoned.
The story, however, was not completely black and white, so to speak. Lena was portrayed honestly with the mistakes of her past, regretful choices, and flaws in her own character shown. It was heart wrenching, truthful, and powerful, and the performances were absolutely stellar. Tichinia Arnold as Lena Baker gave an incredibly convincing performance and the execution scene with the close up on her as she was strapped in and gave her last words was a masterpiece. Beverly Todd was wonderful as Lena’s mother, a woman who walked the fine line of being terrified of the power white people had over them and yet trying to stand up against it just enough to protect her family without bringing lethal wrath down on them all. Peter Coyote as Eliot Arthur was pure silver-tongued evil as the lecherous father and local actor Chris Burns was spot on as his violent, angry son. Michael Rooker did a subtly wonderful job as the sheriff who was the perfect example of white people at the time who knew things weren’t right and weren’t fair but whose hands were tied and could only do what little they dared to help. “Colored folks don’t have no police. Where do we go?”
The script itself is nothing extraordinary and the direction not exactly exciting. The quality of the film in some instances is grainy. And in one key scene, the scene where Lena sees her kids for the last time before the execution, it would mean a lot to me if they would take out the overpowering background music, which was a song with its own separate story whose lyrics kept distracting me from the power of the scene. That being said, the power of this film is in the story told and the performances that tell it. The director is apparently an actor’s director who focused on getting the best performances possible, and that he did. It’s a story everyone should see with performances anyone would enjoy.
Lucy Cruell