Emancipation is a 2022 American historical action thriller film[3][4][5] directed by Antoine Fuqua, written by William N. Collage, and co-produced by Will Smith, who stars as a runaway slave headed for Baton Rouge, Louisiana in the 1860s, after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation to end slavery in secessionist Confederate states,[6] surviving the swamps while being chased by slave catchers and their dogs.

Ben Foster stars as a ruthless slave hunter and Charmaine Bingwa as an enslaved wife and mother.

[7] That story was made famous by the photograph of a man's bare back heavily scourged from an overseer's whippings, which was published worldwide as magazine illustrations in 1863, and gave the abolitionist movement proof of the cruelty of slavery.

When Peter is close to Baton Rouge, Fassel catches up to him and is about to shoot him, when he is suddenly shot in the neck by a black member of the 1st Louisiana Native Guard.

After a victorious battle against Confederate soldiers, he returns to various cotton plantations to free the slaves, while also reuniting with Dodienne and their children.

On June 15, 2020, it was reported that Antoine Fuqua would direct Will Smith in Emancipation, based on a spec script written by William N.

[9]Warner Bros, MGM, Lionsgate, and Universal Pictures bid on the film before Apple ultimately won distribution rights for over $130 million.

[8][11][12] In August 2021, Ben Foster, Charmaine Bingwa, Gilbert Owuor, and Mustafa Shakir joined the cast.

[15] It was later set to begin on June 21, 2021, in Georgia,[16] but on April 12, it was announced that the film would be shot elsewhere due to the recently-enacted Election Integrity Act of 2021.

Smith and Fuqua said in a joint statement: "We cannot in good conscience provide economic support to a government that enacts regressive voting laws that are designed to restrict voter access.

[23] A screening of Emancipation was held at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation's 51st Annual Legislative Conference in Washington, D.C., on October 1, 2022, with Smith and Fuqua in attendance to give a subsequent Q&A discussion.

The website's consensus reads: "Emancipation works as an action movie – albeit one that's uncomfortably at odds with its awkward handling of the real-life events that inspired its stirring story.