But Hollywood did not get the message. Beloved stands apart from Roots, as well as recent cinematic treatments of slavery like Glory and Amistad, by looking at slavery from the inside out. The movie tells of a black mother who tries to kill her children to keep them free. The film's power lies in the emotions of the characters, not in its plot. It starts with the arrival of the first Africans in Jamestown in 1619 and continues to the eve of emancipation in 1861.
Actors give voice to slave narratives and the diaries of plantation owners.
Over the program's six hours, the personal dilemmas show how people struggled with the terrible legacy of slavery. On his deathbed, George Washington told his more than 100 slaves that they would be free once his wife, Martha, died. Fearful that the slaves would murder her to liberate themselves, Martha emancipated them a year after her husband's death. In the end, early Americans learned to live with the practice even if they abhorred it. They couldn't imagine the country without it.