'Selma' tops the list of best films of the year

NEW YORK CITY (WABC) -- This year, half a dozen movies are opening on Christmas day, and among them is the best film of the year.

My list of favorite movies won't be out for another week, but I can reveal "Selma" will be number one.

The words and deeds of the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., resonate louder than ever thanks to this new movie that arrives in theaters a half century after he led the historic march from Selma to Montgomery.

Dr. King and his supporters were seeking to gain the right to vote, a right guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution yet denied to almost all black people in the deep south.

A scene featuring Oprah Winfrey dramatizes the discrimination faced by African Americans at this time.

Winfrey used her clout to help get "Selma" to the big screen, but the film belongs to director Ava Duvernay, and to her star David Oyolewo.

"I went on a quest to find the man behind the icon," Oyolewo said.

The actor was born in London to parents from Nigeria, but he has found a way to embody the preacher's son from Atlanta.

"A man who was flawed, a man who had insecurities, a man whose health was failing at times because of the pressures upon him, a man who had a wife and four kids whose lives were being threatened," Oyolewo said. "And yet he did it anyway."

This marks the second time Carmen Ejogo has played Coretta Scott King, and she captures the regal quality so often mentioned by those who were lucky enough to have met her and witnessed her crucial role in Dr. King's efforts.

Incredibly, this is the first major motion picture to focus on Dr. King, but it is the standard by which all future movies about him will be measured.

"Selma" is in just a few theaters now, but it will be shown in many more on January 9th.