Roots: The Gift
| Roots: The Gift | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Written by | D.M. Eyre Jr. (based on Roots by Alex Haley) |
| Directed by | Kevin Hooks |
| Starring |
LeVar Burton Louis Gossett Jr. |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language(s) | English |
| Production | |
| Producer(s) |
David L. Wolper Bernard Sofronski |
| Running time | 100 minutes |
| Release | |
| Original network | ABC |
| Original release | 11 December 1988 |
| Chronology | |
| Preceded by | Roots: The Next Generations |
Roots: The Gift is a 1988 television film. It is the third installment of the Roots series, which traces the maternal family history of African American author Alex Haley, starting with his fourth great-grandfather Kunta Kinte. The film premiered on ABC on 11 December 1988, with AT&T as the sole national sponsor for the broadcast. LeVar Burton and Louis Gossett Jr. reprise their respective roles of Kunta Kinte and Fiddler. The film takes place between the second and third episodes of the original Roots miniseries.
The film was crafted as a Christmas movie. As one of the characters explains, the gift mentioned in the title is freedom.
Roots: The Gift is notable for featuring four actors who portrayed major characters in Star Trek television shows: Burton (Geordi La Forge from Star Trek: The Next Generation), Avery Brooks (Benjamin Sisko from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine), Kate Mulgrew and Tim Russ (Kathryn Janeway and Tuvok from Star Trek: Voyager).
In December 1775, Cletus Moyer (Brooks) is a free black Northerner in colonial America, working with a pre-Underground Railroad network to help slaves escape captivity. In the days just prior to Christmas, a group of bounty hunters led by Hattie Carraway (Mulgrew) captures Moyer near the Parker plantation in Spotsylvania County, Virginia. Because of his capture, dozens of slaves who have already left their plantations in escape attempts are in danger of being captured as well. Moyer implores two slaves from the nearby Reynolds plantation to take his place: Kunta Kinte (Burton), a Mandinka in his mid-twenties who was captured in what is now the Gambia, and Fiddler (Gossett), an elderly man who was born into slavery. Kunta is eager to help (and to escape himself), but Fiddler is unwilling, fearful of the consequences if they are caught.
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