The Great Debaters, Golden Globe nominated drama made based on an article written about the Wiley College debate team by Tony Scherman for the 1997 Spring issue of American Legacy will be screened at 6 pm on Tuesday, September 9 at the American Center, Galle Road, Colombo-03.

Directed by a starring two-time Academy Award winner Denzel Washington, the film co-stars Forest Whitaker, Kimberly Elise, Denzel Whitaker, Nate Parker, Gina Ravera, and Jurnee Smollett.

It is also the first film to feature two African Americans who had previously won the Academy Award for Best Actor: Denzel Washington (for Training Day) and Forest Whitaker (for The Last King of Scotland).

Inspired by real events, the fascinating movie reveals one of the seeds of the Civil Rights Movement in its story of Melvin B. Tolson (Denzel Washington) and his champion 1935 debate club from the all-African-American Wiley College in Texas. Tolson, a Wiley professor, labor organizer, modernist poet, and much else, runs a rigorous debate program at the school, selecting four students as his team in '35, among them the future founder of the Congress of Racial Equality, James Farmer Jr. (Denzel Whitaker).

This 2007 film is produced by Oprah Winfrey and her production company, Harpo Productions.
The film, loosely based on a true story, revolves around the efforts of debate coach Melvin B. Tolson (Denzel Washington) at historically black Wiley College to place his team on equal footing with whites in the American South during the 1930s, when Jim Crow laws were common and lynch mobs were a pervasive fear for blacks. In the movie, the Wiley team eventually succeeds to the point where they are able to debate Harvard University.

The movie also explores the social milieu of Texas during the Great Depression including not only the day-to-day insults and slights African Americans endured, but also a lynching.