Ava DuVernay’s ‘Origin’ Trailer Previews Isabel Wilkerson Adaptation

Trauma is inescapable in the first trailer for Origin, Ava DuVernay‘s forthcoming film chronicling Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson as she sits in generation-spanning grief to write the haunting book Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents. The film hits theaters Jan. 19.

“If you look closely, you can see something tragic is happening,” Wilkerson, portrayed by Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, states in the trailer. As she speaks from a podium, the image of hundreds of men signaling a Nazi salute. Caste, released in 2020 to critical acclaim, explores racism in the United States through the lens of a caste system, with poignant comparisons to caste systems of India and Nazi Germany.

There’s a chilling familiarity to the clip, which includes a call made to 911 to report a “real suspicious guy who looks like he’s up to no good,” which was actually just a young Black boy walking down the street and talking on his cell phone at night. One of the eight pillars of caste that Wilkerson describes in her book is “terror and cruelty as means of enforcement.” It’s not hard to imagine how that ended.

“I want to be in the story, really inside the story,” Wilkerson states in the clip. “And build a thesis that shows how all of this is linked.” And so she embarks on that journey. Along the way, she’s met with people who say: “I got to be honest with you, I don’t understand. I don’t see it.” Another tells her: “You’re trying to make sense of racism, but your thesis is flawed.”

But others understand the value of the work that needed to be done. “You go and write your stories,” another character, portrayed by Niecy Nash-Betts, tells her. “Folks need to know about this.” Wilkerson adds: “You don’t escape trauma by ignoring it. You escape trauma by confronting it.”

Origin stars Ellis-Taylor, Nash-Betts, Nick Offerman, Blair Underwood, Jon Bernthal, Vera Farmiga, and Audra McDonald.

Trauma is inescapable in the first trailer for Origin, Ava DuVernay‘s forthcoming film chronicling Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson as she sits in generation-spanning grief to write the haunting book Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents. The film hits theaters Jan. 19.

“If you look closely, you can see something tragic is happening,” Wilkerson, portrayed by Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, states in the trailer. As she speaks from a podium, the image of hundreds of men signaling a Nazi salute. Caste, released in 2020 to critical acclaim, explores racism in the United States through the lens of a caste system, with poignant comparisons to caste systems of India and Nazi Germany.

There’s a chilling familiarity to the clip, which includes a call made to 911 to report a “real suspicious guy who looks like he’s up to no good,” which was actually just a young Black boy walking down the street and talking on his cell phone at night. One of the eight pillars of caste that Wilkerson describes in her book is “terror and cruelty as means of enforcement.” It’s not hard to imagine how that ended.

“I want to be in the story, really inside the story,” Wilkerson states in the clip. “And build a thesis that shows how all of this is linked.” And so she embarks on that journey. Along the way, she’s met with people who say: “I got to be honest with you, I don’t understand. I don’t see it.” Another tells her: “You’re trying to make sense of racism, but your thesis is flawed.”

But others understand the value of the work that needed to be done. “You go and write your stories,” another character, portrayed by Niecy Nash-Betts, tells her. “Folks need to know about this.” Wilkerson adds: “You don’t escape trauma by ignoring it. You escape trauma by confronting it.”

Origin stars Ellis-Taylor, Nash-Betts, Nick Offerman, Blair Underwood, Jon Bernthal, Vera Farmiga, and Audra McDonald.