Though set in the 1980s like Lovers Rock, another movie in Steve McQueen’s Small Axe series, the tone of Red, White and Blue feels much more familiar to Mangrove, a film set in the ’60s. In its short runtime, the gripping drama chronicles the early career of real-life former superintendent Leroy Logan (John Boyega). A young forensic scientist growing increasingly weary of his days locked away in a lab, Leroy decides to fulfill a childhood dream of being a police officer.
Though he’s well-aware of racism and injustices, having even experienced some first hand, Leroy is determined to shift the Black community’s perception of the police while calling out racist treatment and politics within the force. If that sounds like a naive endeavor for a 20-something Black Londoner in the 1980s, it’s because it is.
Instead of breaking through and shattering the mold, Leroy finds himself pigeonholed and ostracized from his fellow police officers who remind him at every turn that he’s not really one of them. More painful than the enraging treatment he faces at work is what Leroy deals with at home.
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