Susan Whitall of The Detroit News writes that the new film "Selma" will remind us of a strong link Detroiters have to the violent events of March 1965 in Selma, Ala.
Viola Gregg Liuzzo, 39, a Detroit mother of five, was one of three people killed in Selma during voting rights demonstrations. Liuzzo was shot and killed March 25, 1965, by Ku Klux Klansmen on a desolate stretch of U.S. 80 as she drove Leroy Moton, a black demonstrator, back to Montgomery.
"Selma," directed by Ava DuVernay, 42, tells the story of those violent weeks when the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. helped lead a push for federal action protecting black voting rights in one of the most racist counties in Alabama.
Liuzzo's daughter, Mary Liuzzo Lilleboe, was disappointed at first when she heard that her mother's story isn't highlighted in the film. "You become hypersensitive to the details, you want everything to be perfect about your loved one, but it's never going to be that," said Lilleboe, 66, an Oregon resident.
She writes that Lilleboe's sister, Sally Liuzzo, lives in Tennessee and runs a Facebook page, "Viola Liuzzo Civil Rights Martyr," in tribute to their mother.
Whitall writes that Liuzzo is portrayed in the film by actress Tara Ochs. She is first seen seen sitting with her husband in a modest living room, recoiling in horror at the images on TV of Selma marchers being beaten and tear-gassed on "Bloody Sunday."
Lilleboe's sister, Sally Liuzzo, runs a Facebook page, "Viola Liuzzo Civil Rights Martyr," in tribute to their mother, Whitall writes.
