In the wake of the recent murders of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor, streaming powerhouse Netflix has made Ava DuVernay's powerful documentary 13th free to watch for everyone to watch, whether or not they have a subscription.

Originally released in 2016, 13th - named after the 13th Amendment of the US Constitution, which abolished slavery except as 'punishment for crime' - explores the history of racial inequality in the United States, specifically focusing on the fact that the country's prisons are disproportionately filled with African-Americans.

Netflix

Blending archival footage with interviews with politicians, activists and historians, as well as formerly incarcerated men and women, the documentary makes the argument that the high number of African-Americans behind bars today is actually a modern-day iteration of slavery.

Understandably, in the context of what's been happening in the USA recently - and the subsequent protests all around the globe - the documentary has seen a lot of renewed interest, which presumably led to the decision by Netflix to make it available for free.

Netflix

You can either watch it on Netflix or on YouTube, here. The documentary was universally praised when it was first released.

In their review, the New York Times wrote that it was 'powerful', 'infuriating' and 'electrifying', and that the film 'will get your blood boiling', while the Los Angeles Times wrote that 'everything in 13th illuminates what is convincingly presented as a sad and tragic story that we are still living today'.

It was nominated at the 89th Academy Awards for Best Documentary Feature, and won a BAFTA award for Best Documentary. It also won Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Special at the 69th Primetime Emmy Awards.

Other works Ava DuVernay has directed include the historical drama Selma and Disney's A Wrinkle In Time, which, according to her website, made her the highest grossing black woman director in American box office history.

So if you haven't yet seen 13th - and, given everything that's happening right at this moment, you really should - now is definitely the time.

Topics: Black Lives Matter, TV and Film, Netflix

Mischa Pearlmen

Mischa is a freelance journalist usually based in either New York or London. He has written for Kerrang!, Record Collector, NME, the New York Observer and FLOOD magazine, among others. Contact him at [email protected]