Roots (Season 1)

Roots (2016) is a four-part miniseries you can watch online on iFILM — an adaptation of Alex Haley's novel, aired on History Channel with four directors sharing the project: Phillip Noyce, Thomas Carter, Bruce Beresford, and Mario Van Peebles.

Kunta Kinte (Malachi Kirby) is a young Mandinka man from the Gambia who is captured by slave traders and sold into servitude in Virginia. The series follows his bloodline across six generations, from the plantation era through the Civil War and its aftermath. Forest Whitaker, Laurence Fishburne, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, and Regé-Jean Page each anchor a different chapter of the family's story across time.

Where the 1977 original broke ground by putting this history on television at all, the 2016 version handles the same material with less ceremony and more weight. It's slow in places and asks for patience — what it returns is a family history told as something lived. Stream Roots (2016) on iFILM.