The Force

Peter Nicks (The Waiting Room) returns to the Wex with The Force, his engrossing portrait of two tumultuous years in the life of the Oakland Police Department that earned him a Best Director (US Documentary) award at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. A Frederick Wiseman-esque portrait of an American institution with a ripped-from-the-headlines sense of relevance and drama, the documentary finds Nicks embedded with the department as the Black Lives Matters movement blossoms and the force is under continual federal oversight for pervasive corruption and criminality. Filmed in a very present tense, you-are-there style, we’re given unprecedented access as Nicks gradually and responsively opens up the film’s scale and radical alternative solutions are proposed. In a year of great conversation-starting documentaries, this is one of the most discussable! (80  mins., DCP)