''Small Axe'' is a British anthology film series, created and directed by

Steve McQueen Terrence Stephen McQueen (March 24, 1930November 7, 1980) was an American actor. His antihero persona, emphasized during the height of the counterculture of the 1960s, made him a top box-office draw for his films of the late 1950s, 1960s, and 1 ...

. The anthology consists of five films that tell distinct stories about the lives of

West Indian A West Indian is a native or inhabitant of the West Indies (the Antilles and the Lucayan Archipelago). For more than 100 years the words ''West Indian'' specifically described natives of the West Indies, but by 1661 Europeans had begun to use it ...

immigrants in London from the 1960s to the 1980s. Two episodes of the series were selected into the

2020 Cannes Film Festival The 73rd annual Cannes Film Festival was scheduled to take place from 12 to 23 May 2020. On 13 January 2020, Spike Lee was named as the president of the Jury. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic in France, festival management announced on 14 A ...

. The series premiered on 15 November 2020 on

BBC One BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's Flagship (broadcasting), flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News ...

in the United Kingdom and on 20 November 2020 on

Amazon Prime Video Amazon Prime Video, also known simply as Prime Video, is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming and rental service of Amazon offered as a standalone service or as part of Amazon's Prime subscription. The service p ...

in the United States. The title references a proverb – "Small axe fall big tree" or "If you are the big tree, we are the small axe" – that was popularised by

Bob Marley Robert Nesta Marley (6 February 1945 – 11 May 1981; baptised in 1980 as Berhane Selassie) was a Jamaican singer, musician, and songwriter. Considered one of the pioneers of reggae, his musical career was marked by fusing elements o ...

in his 1973 song " Small Axe".

Films

Production

Development

It has been reported that

began working on the idea for ''Small Axe'' in 2010, and that some form of the series was in development since 2012. While the series was initially conceived as a conventional television series with a serialized story, McQueen realized during development that he had sufficient material to make several distinct films. In January 2014, it was announced that he would write and direct an untitled television series for either

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream ...

about the experience of black people in Britain. In August 2015, it was announced that the series would air on BBC One. In June 2019,

was announced to be distributing the series in the United States, with

Amazon Studios Amazon Studios is an American television and film producer and distributor that is a subsidiary of Amazon. It specializes in developing television series and distributing and producing films. It was started in late 2010. Content is distributed t ...

co-producing. The screenwriters include the British-Caribbean novelist Courttia Newland (author of ''The Gospel According to Cane'', 2013) and Alastair Siddons.

Casting

In June 2019, it was announced that Letitia Wright,

John Boyega John Adedayo Bamidele Adegboyega (born 17 March 1992), known professionally as John Boyega, is a British actor and producer. He first rose to prominence in his native Britain for his role as Moses in the sci-fi comedy film '' Attack the Block ...

, Malachi Kirby,

Shaun Parkes Shaun Parkes (born 9 February 1973) is an English actor. Biography At 16, Parkes enrolled at Seltec College to study drama. Two years later, he was accepted into RADA. Having acted in both theatre and television support roles, Parkes made his ...

, Rochenda Sandall,

Alex Jennings Alex Jennings (born 10 May 1957) is an English actor of the stage and screen, who worked extensively with the Royal Shakespeare Company and National Theatre. For his work on the London stage, Jennings received three Olivier Awards, winning fo ...

, and Jack Lowden had joined the cast of the series. In January 2020, Micheal Ward joined the cast of the series.

Release

''Lovers Rock'' had its world premiere as the opener of the 58th

New York Film Festival The New York Film Festival (NYFF) is a film festival held every fall in New York City, presented by Film at Lincoln Center (FLC). Founded in 1963 by Richard Roud and Amos Vogel with the support of Lincoln Center president William Schuman, it ...

on 17 September 2020. ''Mangrove'' had its world premiere at the festival on 25 September, and ''Red, White, and Blue'' on 3 October. ''Mangrove'' also opened the 64th

BFI London Film Festival The BFI London Film Festival is an annual film festival founded in 1957 and held in the United Kingdom, running for two weeks in October with co-operation from the British Film Institute. It screens more than 300 films, documentaries and shor ...

on 7 October 2020; ''Lovers Rock'' screened at the same festival on 18 October. The series premiered in the UK on

on 15 November 2020 and in the United States on

on 20 November 2020, with one episode released per week on both platforms.

Reception

Critical response

Critical press reviews of each individual film were positive. All five films received approval ratings of at least 95% on the

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wan ...

, while

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

assigned four of the five a score indicating "universal acclaim". ''

Lovers Rock Lovers' rock is a style of reggae music noted for its romantic sound and content. While love songs had been an important part of reggae since the late 1960s, the style was given a greater focus and a name in London in the mid-1970s.Larkin, Coli ...

'', in particular, was named the best film of 2020 by the British film magazine ''

Sight & Sound ''Sight and Sound'' (also spelled ''Sight & Sound'') is a British monthly film magazine published by the British Film Institute (BFI). It conducts the well-known, once-a-decade ''Sight and Sound'' Poll of the Greatest Films of All Time, ongoing ...

'' in its poll of 104 critics worldwide; ''

Mangrove A mangrove is a shrub or tree that grows in coastal saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. Mangroves are taxonomically diverse, as a result of convergent evolution in several ...

'' came in at 13th.

Accolades

References

External links

"These are the untold stories that make up our nation": Steve McQueen on Small Axe

David Olusoga David Adetayo Olusoga (born January 1970) is a British historian, writer, broadcaster, presenter and film-maker. He is Professor of Public History at the University of Manchester. He has presented historical documentaries on the BBC and contribu ...

's interview with Steve McQueen about ''Small Axe'', in ''

'', 13 November 2020. * * at

* {{Amazon Video original series 2020 British television series debuts 2020 British television series endings 2020s British anthology television series Afro-Caribbean culture in London BBC television dramas Black British cinema Black British history English-language television shows Cultural depictions of Metropolitan Police officers