Selma, we come to understand, was hardly picked at random. Not only were the statistics especially grim — a 50% African American population who made up only 2% of voters — but the state courthouse was an especially camera-ready target, and the local county Sheriff Jim Clark was racist enough to be a tempting adversary. In fact, one of the themes of "Selma" is how tactical so much was, how geared to getting on the network news and influencing public opinion nationwide. 

 SELMA is the story of a movement. The film chronicles the tumultuous three-month period in 1965, when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. led a dangerous campaign to secure equal voting rights in the face of violent opposition. The epic march from Selma to Montgomery culminated in President Johnson (Tom Wilkinson) signing the Voting Rights Act of 1965, one of the most significant victories for the civil rights movement. Director Ava DuVernays SELMA tells the real story of how the revered leader and visionary Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (David Oyelowo) and his brothers and sisters in the movement prompted change that forever altered history.(C) Paramount 
 
 Rating: PG-13 (for disturbing thematic material including violence, a suggestive moment, and brief strong language) 
 
 Genre: Drama 
 
 Directed By: Ava DuVernay 
 
 Written By: Paul Webb 
 
 On Disc/Streaming: May 5, 2015 
 
 Runtime: 127 minutes 
 
 Studio: Paramount Pictures 

 Since films based on fact are controversial, perhaps we should stop making them. “Selma,” an ambitious, deeply moving drama about the 1960s civil rights movement, has triggered a noisy quarrel, just as pseudo-true-story Oscar contenders “Zero Dark Thirty’ and “Argo” did a couple of years ago. 
 
 “Selma,” which has already received four Golden Globe nominations, opens with the Rev. Martin Luther King (David Oyelowo, right) and his wife, Coretta Scott King (Carmen Ejogo), dressing formally to receive his Nobel Peace Prize. It shifts quickly to scenes of an ongoing war against black Americans. 
 
 We observe a horrific attack on a Birmingham church, then a racist registrar rejecting an application by a woman (Oprah Winfrey) whose right to vote he has repeatedly denied. Director Ava DuVernay makes every spoken scene and visual frame sharply composed. This is a film that will flesh out every facet. 
 
 “Selma” is a stunning surface-level exploration of King’s groundbreaking 1965 voting-rights march from Selma, Ala., across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, to the State Capitol in Montgomery. Oyelowo’s piercing eyes empower a lead performance of pure gravitas. What Daniel Day-Lewis did for Lincoln, Oyelowo does for King, mimicking his behavior and speech uncannily. He is both completely believable and someone we’ve never encountered before. 
 
 Oyelowo presents King at his highs: a respected minister, a controversial activist pulling political strings, a popular hero galvanizing Southern blacks into battalions seeking reform. And we see him at his lows, leading hundreds of Selma followers into riot-geared police squads that attack them as if they were pushing treason. Even when it shows King as a scapegoat, adulterer and martyr, “Selma” presents him with care that would have made its subject proud. A powerful scene in which he comforts a man who has just lost a grandson to police brutality is touching to the point of tears. 
 
 “Selma’s” missteps come only during a few brief, too-deep excursions into the Oval Office. Fans of Lyndon B. Johnson are angry that “Selma” shows the president, absorbed by the unwinnable Vietnam War, less focused than King on creating federal mandates to ban every factor denying the black population’s right to vote. Johnson is shown ordering the ongoing smear campaign by FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover, who secretly wiretapped King’s every move. 
 
 “Selma” plays fast and loose with those facts, which are, at most, 5 percent of its story. The authorization for King’s notorious surveillance came from Attorney General Robert Kennedy in 1963. Johnson considered the Voting Rights Act of 1965, created in cordial cooperation with King, his greatest legislative achievement. The film does not present itself as a documentary. It is drama inspired by history, with all of a drama’s need for shorthand. Johnson never literally told King, “You’ve got one problem, I’ve got 101,” but the film’s use of it feels outrageous only if you haven’t seen the incendiary performances by Tom Wilkinson and Oyelowo. 
 
 What is unquestionably true is that “Selma’s” makers have created a work of art that speaks their conscience. While it embellishes, it also presents insightful honesty. If it’s not perfect, it’s far better than countless spurious films in which Hollywood has rewritten history. If we examine “Selma” as film using artistic license on its own terms, not as propaganda or journalism, it is outstandingly good. Brilliantly acted, beautifully shot, emotionally touching and filled with stunning action set pieces, its achievements are not to be scoffed at. It sees the world in colors richer than black and white. 
 
 Colin.Covert@startribune.com • 612-673-7186
– If critics are to be believed, Selma might be the best movie you see this season. The historical drama following Martin Luther King Jr. as he fights for racial equality in Selma, Alabama, circa 1965 has an impressive 99% rating from critics on Rotten Tomatoes. Here's what they're saying: Selma "deserves major attention this awards season," particularly due to David Oyelowo's masterful depiction of King as "a man of flesh, blood, and foibles," Peter Howell writes at the Toronto Star. "We see history as it unfolds, not as it has been encased in amber, in a movie that needs to be seen in these anxious days of renewed racial and cultural unrest." Kenneth Turan at the Los Angeles Times calls Selma "a necessary film, even an essential one." Ava DuVernay directs the picture "with passion and conviction" and Oyelowo is "mesmerizing" as he "expertly" captures King's body language and cadences. "The heart of Selma is the three separate 50-mile marches," Turan writes, but the film is "inconsistent and not always as strong as its strongest moments." "Even when it shows King as a scapegoat, adulterer, and martyr, Selma presents him with care that would have made its subject proud," writes Colin Covert at the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Oyelowo is "both completely believable and someone we've never encountered before." There are a few missteps, but the film is "a work of art ... brilliantly acted, beautifully shot, emotionally touching." Moira Macdonald agrees Oyelowo "captures King's musical cadence, his quiet magnetism." But more than that, "History becomes breathtaking drama in Selma; there's an urgent realism in the storytelling, as if we're seeing this just in time," she writes at the Seattle Times. Plus, "it stays with you long after the theater lights have been raised."