Original subtitles

What is it?

How many times is he gonna ask me to do this?

How many times?

What is it?

This was around his neck a few minutes ago Whose neck?

What do you want me to do?

I've been through this so many times.

But enough is enough.

I'm coming home.

She left, and I don't know what my assignment is.

Here you go.

My name is Monica.

I am an angel sent by God as a messenger of hope and peace and truth.

I am not magic. I cannot predict the future.

I cannot alter the past.

Whenever I am on this earth, I've always come in human form to appear more like

you. But I was never less of an angel, except once.

For one day in spring, I discovered just how human I could be.

I don't have wings, you know, but that day, God forgive me, that day I

wished I did.

When you walk down the road,

heavy burden, heavy load,

I will rise and I will walk with you.

I'll walk with you till the sun don't even shine.

Walk with you every time I tell you I'll walk

with you.

Believe me, I'll walk with you.

All right, people, line up, everybody.

Not yet, Charlie, not yet.

Louise, now.

Swing low, sweet chariot, follow the drinking gourd, and other Negro

were actually coded messages to encourage slaves to escape and follow

constellations to the free states in the north.

Along the way, passengers on the so -called Underground Railroad, a secret

network of homes and businesses where fugitive slaves could stop and eat.

This band of angels... Slow down, Henry.

were anti -slavery activists who believed slavery was wrong and wanted to

runaways through their journey to freedom. One of these was a man named

Jackson.

Elijah Jackson, like many others, kept a candle burning on his window of his

house to tell any fugitive that this was a safe place to hide.

Can we get some help here, please?

Where's Mooney?

Does anybody see Mooney?

Looking good, LaVonna.

Thank you, Mayor.

I just have one concern here. I need you to educate me about this.

Is it still appropriate to call them Negro spirituals? Maybe we should call

African -American spirituals or spirituals that do. What do you think?

research indicates that at the time the phrase was Negro spiritual.

And I'm comfortable with that.

Well, good.

That's all I care about then.

So, I learned something today.

Historically accurate beats politically correct.

Okay. Excuse me, LaVon, you've got a real problem with the scenery up here. I

know, I know. Mooney was supposed to be here to finish building the support.

LaVon, I've got to excuse the band. There's a basketball game tonight, and

need some time off.

I understand.

Excuse me, please.

Oh, please tell me that you're the lady from the State Historical Board.

No, I'm sorry.

Are you the sheriff?

Yes, ma 'am. What can I do for you?

I want to report a murder.

I took them back to the road, and I discovered something about human beings

had never observed before.

Good people, kind and essentially decent individuals, can, in an instant,

transform themselves into one single terrible monster called a committee.

Looks like they tied a rope around his feet and another one around his neck and

laid him sideways and just ran over him.

You okay, Charlie?

I can't believe it.

He built the whole thing, you know.

The scenery, the platform.

And yesterday he was so excited, he wanted to show me something that he'd

in some old cemetery.

I said I didn't have time right now.

You didn't, Lavonda. You've been working yourself to death on this.

Tom, excuse me.

What does a reserve officer do? I mean, should I be taping the area or

something? Are you going to run yellow tape around the words, Charlie?

Hey, James, I...

I'm just trying to be helpful. All right.

What have we got here, folks?

There.

Oh, my God, it's Mooney.

My God.

Somebody definitely wanted that man dead.

Cy, come take a look at this.

Monica, this is Cyrus.

He's the city manager and owns the local diner in the ambulance company.

I never thought I'd actually see you driving one of these things, Cy. Well,

was my idea.

I thought we'd better get the lay of land, so to speak, before we got too

people involved in this.

You know what I mean?

No, sir, I don't. Looks like the mayor has called a little meeting of the city

council. You guys going to vote on this?

What are you talking about? Hate crimes are a federal offense.

Yeah, I know that, Jimmy. I'm going to call the FBI as soon as I get back.

Hold on here.

Do you know who did this, ma 'am?

No, I was just out walking.

I found the body over there. I'm the investigator here. Can I ask the

please? Tom, you and your deputy are employees of the city and county of

Ainsville. And I am instructing you to back off while we make some decisions

here. Ed, there's a dead man lying right there and we're going to start taking

votes. Charlie, you want to be a volunteer deputy right now or city

member with one of those votes?

Ainsville have never gotten any notice in 150 years.

Now all of a sudden something good happens to us.

LaVonda discovers this underground railroad connection and we finally get

map. And Rosa Parks arrives tomorrow.

I can't believe it. The mother of the modern civil rights movement is coming

somebody murders an African -American the day before she shows up. My point

exactly.

Now, if this poor fellow had been dispatched three weeks ago or two weeks

now, it would have been a horrible, lamentable murder, but a murder, period.

Now, let it happen the day before we're memorialized as the Southern Illinois

Cradle of Freedom, and it's a hate crime.

And if you think the media... Good Lord, they're coming from Chicago,

Springfield, St. Louis.

Once they get a hold of this, it's going to be nothing but irony and headlines.

National headlines.

Now, this is a good town.

We've never had a race problem here, ever.

But you get a bunch of those FBI boys crawling around in the middle of a civil

rights parade.

Mister, we are done for. It'll be Ainsville, hotbed of racism, and we will

live it down. And it's not fair.

Nobody in this town could have done such a thing, except you know who.

Everybody's thinking it.

It was those Foley boys.

You don't know that.

Well, probably.

He's right.

I saw them the other day in that old truck harassing Mooney while he was

up the platform.

I've already had the Foley's figured for this. So what's your point here? The

point is there's a lot riding on the next couple of days.

Ain't that right, Mayor?

We better believe there is.

The governor's coming. I'm going to hit him up for funding for that new bridge.

Now, Cyrus is counting on that diner business to make up for January when the

roof fell in.

And LaVonda.

This poor woman deserves to have her hard work rewarded and not overshadowed

this mess.

So what, we just drive off and leave poor Mooney lying in the dirt?

Well, no, no.

I could take the body back to the morgue town without anybody noticing.

You can continue your investigation. Just don't tell nobody.

No, no, no, no. It's not a cover -up.

We're just postponing this thing for a while.

I can think of four amendments to the Constitution that are being ignored

For heaven's sake, the man is already dead.

Why kill the town, too?

You remember that kid at your school that killed herself in the girl's

You kept that pretty low key, as I recall.

Now, what is wrong with taking it a little slow?

As a matter of fact, if it hadn't been for this Monica woman, he could have

laying there all week before anybody could have known.

He lived out in the woods. He doesn't have any family.

No one's going to miss him, I'm afraid.

Lavonda, you're not seriously considering this.

I don't like it, Tom.

But it's taken me three years to make this happen.

I found the Jackson diary.

I organized the pageant. I got Rosa Parks at the Guest of Honor.

I got Mooney to build the stage.

He put his heart and soul into this thing.

Mooney would have wanted it this way.

You didn't even know Mooney. Of course I did.

He did some work for me up at the house, and I don't appreciate your tone,

James. That tone is the righteous indignation of a black man watching the

sell us down the hill.

Hey, hey, I'll do the best I can.

What was Mr. Mooney's full name, please?

Huh?

Mr. Mooney, a human being was horribly and cruelly murdered today.

We can't imagine the agony of this man.

We cannot know his last thoughts.

But surely as his body was stretched across that field and he heard the key

the ignition, he knew that he would die and he knew that it was hate that would

kill him.

That he died today is not an inconvenient coincidence.

It's a message that no one is listening to.

Amen.

Should we take a vote?

Do I have anything to say in this? No.

And maybe that's a good thing.

And you can always say you were just following instructions.

Now, after Mrs. Parks and the governor leave on Saturday, we wait a suitable

amount of time, and then we officially discover the body. All those in favor,

raise your hands.

All right, we have one more piece of business.

The events of the next two days will go on as planned, with nothing to poison

the celebration.

That means we must all do everything necessary to ensure that no one here

decides to spoil it.

No one.

No. No, absolutely not.

In for a penny, Tom.

In for a pound.

Sorry. I'm so sorry.

They called it protective custody.

But I wasn't the one they were trying to protect.

They had to protect themselves from the truth.

And from me.

And yet the memory of Mr. Mooney's broken body crying for justice on a

road.

could not be banished so easily.

Jimmy, I got a copy of Rosa Parks' schedule here. You want to take a look

Fine.

Fine.

You're thinking I didn't fight hard enough, aren't you?

That I could have turned this thing around.

Because you think I couldn't have done it, right?

I mean, like we still need Eliza Jackson to put a candle in the window to save

us. Oh, come on. No, really.

You knew somewhere deep inside that it really wasn't going to matter what I

said. I'm a deputy, I'm black, and nobody's going to listen to me. For

out loud, everybody listened to Cyrus.

They weren't listening to a black man, they were listening to a rich man.

Well, maybe that's a good thing.

If a black man can have so much influence in a town, then things have

right? You know, you really would like to believe that, wouldn't you?

That the Foley's are just some kind of dinosaur left over from the 50s

thinks it was them and it probably was but it doesn't matter so much that you

think they did it You hope they did it. You're darn right. I hope they did it

because Because then you wouldn't have to look any farther for racism in this

town Or any closer I'll say

one thing for the police.

I know where they stand

I want to see her.

You know who she is, right?

Yes. I mean, this is the woman that inspired the bus boycotts in Alabama.

She's the one that wouldn't give up her seat on a bus to a white man.

I mean, Rosa Parks has been my hero ever since I was a little girl.

Now she leads something called Pathways to Freedom.

And they take children on buses all across the country.

And they trace the history of the civil rights movement.

And she is coming here with those children tomorrow.

And I'm going to have dinner with her and tell her what I've tried to do in my

own way to follow in her footsteps.

I have dreamed about that moment all my life, Monica.

Of meeting Rosa Parks like this?

I don't imagine that you would understand why it means so much to me

But you might understand what it means to this town.

Look out there.

The discovery of Elijah Jackson has brought this town together.

I didn't know this town was divided. Every town is divided.

Some just don't know it.

Do you know what was in the cemetery that Mr. Mooney wanted you to see?

I have no idea.

Anyway, I...

I'm truly sorry that you've been detained.

But I do believe it's for the best.

Lavonda, if I were black, would I be detained right now?

Honey, if you were black, they wouldn't have listened to you in the first place.

Whatever parade they were planning for Saturday could never equal the

of souls that paraded through the jail that day, seeking absolution.

transforming my tiny prison cell into a confessional.

I just want to clear, young lady, that this is being done for your own

protection. Well, I mean, that's not to say that this is a dangerous town.

We need to proceed with caution and moderation in all things.

I taught civics before I took over as principal here.

One day I did an experiment in class and I asked the students if you could

change the color of your skin.

All else being equal, would you do it?

The African -American student started to laugh.

George Carter looked me in the eye and he said, All else being equal, Mr. Ryan,

you wouldn't have asked that question.

Those Foley boys did it.

And their daddy was a white trash, foul -mouthed, racist pig, too.

They've been trouble for years.

Another day or two is not going to make much difference.

It made a difference to Mr. Mooney.

Am I a prisoner?

Monica,

you're not even here.

Can I ask you a question?

Sure.

Who are you?

What were you doing out on that road this morning?

What road?

Touché.

What can you tell me about Mr. Mooney?

Mooney was a nice old guy. I don't know. I guess he wasn't that old. It's just

that he came to town about 14, 15 years ago looking for some family he heard

used to live here.

So he was all alone?

Yeah.

I heard he lost his whole family in a tenement fire up in Chicago. I guess

that's why he came down here looking for more kinfolk.

Anyway, Mooney finally took to searching door to door and wandering through the

cemeteries. He kind of got a reputation around here for being a little crazy,

but he wasn't crazy.

He was just trying to figure out who he was.

And you?

Up until today, I thought I knew who I was.

Maybe it takes a day like today to find out.

Who are you, Monica?

That was a pretty impressive speech you made out there this morning.

The question is, did you say it because you really meant it, or did you say it

because it was the politically correct thing to do?

I meant it with all my heart.

I'm sure you did.

And what if you'd been black and Mooney had been white?

It doesn't matter. I would have done the same thing.

Really? You're sure?

Yeah.

Color makes no difference.

Well, this has been a complicated day, Monica.

Maybe it's time we all turned in.

Why am I here, Father?

What good am I behind these bars?

What good am I?

The longer I stay here, the more tired and hungry, afraid, human I feel.

Search me, O Lord, and know my anxious heart for Father.

I am so confused.

Every angel knows that God is not the author of confusion.

God brings order out of chaos and light out of darkness.

And that night, he brought out of me the truth I never wanted to see before.

Angels don't really need to sleep, you know.

But sometimes, I suppose.

We need to dream.

I knew at that moment that it was not a dream of the past, but a vision of the

future.

A road I was not sure I could travel.

I was nervous walking down the street the next morning.

I expected everyone to notice the miraculous change in me.

But no one seemed to notice me at all.

Thank you.

Morning, Loretta.

Good morning, Charlie.

You want some coffee? Please.

Excuse me.

I'm looking for a gentleman in town.

His name is Mooney.

I know Mooney.

You a friend of his?

Not exactly.

We have a mutual friend.

Well, it's funny you should mention it, because Mooney comes in here every

morning for the early bird breakfast.

But he didn't today, and he didn't yesterday.

Jerry says that Mooney guy stood up everybody yesterday.

And that scenery on the stage out there fell down, practically killed Tom

McKinsley. Well, then something's wrong.

Mooney's strange, but he's reliable.

That man's either sick and J .M. are dead.

Well, that was quick.

I don't care if you have to use dogs and helicopters.

I want that... What?

We got trouble.

There's a black woman over at the diner asking about Mooney. Forget it. We've

got bigger fish to fry. That Monica woman is missing.

How did she get out?

I don't know. Neither do I.

It was an interesting plan, though, violating someone's civil rights to make

sure Civil Rights Day goes well.

Rosa Parks gets here at noon. I've got a lot of interviews. Don't let me down,

boys. By the way, Sam Haskett tells me that Bud Foley walked into the hardware

store three days ago and bought a brand new rope.

Just in case anyone's interested.

She's coming!

Two minutes!

Excuse me, do you care?

I'm looking for someone in the town. His name is Mooney.

Ah, Mooney.

Yeah, I know who that is, but gosh,

I can't really tell you where to find him, though.

Excuse me.

Oh, uh, Rosa Parks is going to be here any minute.

That might be something you'd like to see.

That was her.

Did she ask you about Mooney? Yeah.

Well, what are we going to do?

Don't ask me, Charlie. I'm just following orders, remember?

Excuse me. Can you help me?

I'm looking for someone called Mooney. He lives in this town.

Girl, what you doing?

You're walking around here asking everybody alive where Mooney is.

Are you family or something?

No. Then take some advice from your brother, all right?

Drop it.

Just let it lie.

I don't understand.

Trust me, you don't want to.

Listen, they did it to us again.

Get it?

It was in that moment that I realized that neither a white Monica nor a black

Monica would penetrate the wall of fear that those six people had built around

themselves. And so the question remained, why then had God changed me at

I was still foolish enough to think that I had been transformed so that I might

understand how it feels to live inside black skin.

Of course, I recognized the subtle differences.

There's one.

In Black Skin, I was a step removed from the world, where before I met everyone

instantly as Monica, now I was Black first and Monica second, if they asked

name at all.

But you know what?

No one ever did.

May I have a glass of water, please?

Yeah, sure.

Something else had changed, too.

I felt thirsty.

It may not sound like much to you, but angels don't often get thirsty any more

than they get sleepy or even dream.

But I had done all those human things that day.

Thank you.

The whole busload of them just showed up today.

There's going to be more tomorrow.

Nobody's even found him yet.

So we move him a little closer to home.

Have you seen a woman around here, out of town, a really pretty, long, dark

hair, dark eyes, kind of petite?

No. Nobody like that comes in here.

Hmm.

I saw the Foley boys leave. Were they in here a couple of nights ago?

Wednesday? Yeah.

Yeah. They got loaded and started talking about killing all the blacks.

Why didn't you call me?

They do that every week, Tom.

I decided to walk back to the road, hoping that somehow Tess had returned.

In all our years together, I had never seen Tess as anything but my friend.

But today, I understood for the first time that even an angel must be stronger

and tougher and prouder if she's going to make a difference in black skin.

No one ever ignores Tess and no one ever forgets her.

What were you doing here with Mr. Mooney, Tess?

Oh, God.

What am I to do now?

Ted! Did you hear something?

It's gone.

What? That old boy's carcass is gone.

What happened?

Figured them nigger lovers down at City Hall just decided not to mention it.

We got ourselves a Watergate cover -up here.

So what do we do?

We go back and do it again, bud, and this time we do it right. Come on, get

the car.

In that moment, I realized everything.

I was human.

And I was going to die.

Oh, God.

Oh, Father, please.

Please. Please.

I'm so afraid.

Oh, dear God in heaven, I'm so afraid.

Please. Please.

Make me white again.

Please, no.

Please, don't. Relax, lady.

You seen a nigger woman come through here?

No.

Sorry if I scared you.

Wasn't her.

What?

How's it going?

Pretty quiet.

Listen, I had a strange feeling today about the Foley boys, like they might do

it again.

So I got Charlie out at the two -timer keeping an eye on them.

Charlie on a stakeout? Yeah. I figured it's so obvious nobody will ever guess.

Anyway, he says they're drinking up a storm and talking about ghosts in the

cemetery or something.

I'll bet.

I'm going to the diner. Come on.

Is that? Well, I'll be.

Monica! Monica, hold on. Wait, wait, wait.

Oh, help me, please.

You've got to stop them.

It could have been me.

It should have been me.

Oh, my God, what have I done? What's going on?

The Foley brothers.

They're going to kill someone.

No, they're not. Yes.

They're looking for someone to kill an innocent person instead of me. You've

to stop them. Monica, the Foley brothers are sitting in a bar, drunk as skunks.

They're not going anywhere without me knowing about it.

You don't understand what I've done.

I've got to explain.

Where's Mrs. Parks? Where's Mrs. Parks? I want to talk to Mrs. Parks. Mrs. Parks

is sleeping in the hotel.

No, I'm not.

Let her come over here.

What are you doing in here, Mrs. Parks?

I like to sit on the bus and think.

And who are you?

My name is Monica.

I'm an angel sent by God as a messenger of hope and peace

and truth.

I'm not magic.

I cannot predict the future and...

I cannot alter the past.

Whenever I'm on this earth, I come in human form to appear more like you.

But I'm never less than you.

And now I don't belong in heaven.

And I don't belong on earth.

Because I've betrayed.

And now I know in my heart that when those men were chasing me,

if I had been white, I

never would have begged God to become black.

God is good, Monica.

He forgives and heals.

He heals angels, too.

Especially an angel who's been human for a day.

Tess.

Oh, Tess.

Do you know what I've done?

Yes, baby.

I'm sorry.

I'm so ashamed.

I know. Me too.

I gave up on the world yesterday and let the father down.

And I'm not proud of that.

But our God is a great God.

And he forgave me.

And he's forgiven you.

Why do you think he let you be black?

To change this town?

Change these people?

Uh -uh, baby.

To change your heart.

Because you can't go on preaching against the darkness.

Until you've seen it in yourself first.

And there are not too many politically correct ways to do that. You just have

jump in and dig deep.

Until you face yourself.

And you've done that.

And I'm proud of you.

Now I say that you've got something real.

To say to those men out there.

I have something real to tell you, too.

I love you, Dad.

And I never really understood until now.

I love you, too, baby.

Now, come on.

Go on out there and do what you've got to do.

Don't be afraid.

I am an angel.

But for one day, I knew what it felt to be thirsty and tired.

A weak and frightened earthbound human.

And I discovered something.

Hiding fear in a dark corner of myself that I didn't even know was there.

You too must look deep into your own heart and seek

out that same dark corner.

And as hard as it will be, you must confess it to each other and to God.

For the color of racism is fear.

So please.

Don't worry about saying the right words.

As long as you say the true words.

I hate

it

when you call me Jimmy.

I'm not your boy.

I'm a man.

And I hate it when every time I walk into a night store or a fancy

everybody looks at me like I'm from another planet.

I can't, man. I'm sure you can't.

You think every white person in the town is prejudiced. You think every one of

us is about to rip you off.

Well, sure.

I mean, what have we been all talking about here?

White people, they got something in them that love to see us put down.

Every one of them?

Every one.

They try to hide it, but I know what they're thinking when they pass me on

street. Really? What was I thinking when I loaned you that $500 last year, when

we went fishing?

I haven't had you over to the house every Christmas Eve.

You even had me over.

I try to be a good man, a fair man.

I think racism is wrong, and I try to keep up with what I'm supposed to say.

Black, African -American, people of color.

I don't pull a black man over just because he's driving a Mercedes. I

to the Negro College Fund, but I still don't get why you've got one language

us and another one for each other.

And I resent that every time I go out of my way not to do something that might

seem racist.

Some black guy always knows it and manages to make me feel guilty.

I've got a lot of black friends in this town. But you know what?

God help me every time I shake the hand of a black man.

Something deep inside.

Something I can't explain.

Something involuntary makes me want to wipe my hand on my pants.

And I don't know why.

I'm sorry. I know it's terrible.

I am sorry.

And I pray to God that he will cut it out of me because I don't even know

it's coming from.

So, that's the truth.

I don't know where we go from here, but at least I know where we stand.

Yes, I think you do.

You're standing on God's side now.

Bingo.

It was Eliza.

Not Elijah.

This is Andrew.

He's the angel who was with Mr. Mooney that day.

The diary that LaVonda found was old. It was difficult to read.

And she made an honest mistake.

But the real hero of the Ainsville Underground Railroad was... was not a

man.

It was a free black woman.

And her name was Eliza.

Eliza Jackson.

After the Civil War, she married a man named Howard Mooney.

And they were Jackson Mooney's great -great -grandparents.

And this... This is what Mooney wanted LaBonda to see.

He not only found the truth, he found his family, too.

I think it's about time Mr. Jackson Mooney got a little respect.

Tom, where have you been? You've got to get in the costume.

What is she doing here? She's going to ruin everything.

No, she's not.

We got her.

After you, Jane.

Ladies and gentlemen.

Ladies and gentlemen, may I have your attention, please?

Hold it down, please.

Hold it down.

We have a very important, very sad announcement to make.

Sometimes I still shake my head and wonder at the things that human beings

capable of.

And then I remember the most human hour of my own life.

I will never be the same, and neither will the town of Ainsville.

And when I get home, I'm going to find Mr.

Mooney, and I'm going to tell him, thank you.