Judas and the Black Messiah trailer showcases Daniel Kaluuya as Black Panther activist Fred Hampton

The rise and fall of Black Panther activist Fred Hampton will be told on the big screen in the first trailer for Judas an the Black Messiah.

Daniel Kaluuya stars as Hampton, who rose to prominence as chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther party, in the new Warner Bros. film.

The film will be released in theaters in 2021, though no specific release date was given yet, with the trailer (via Warner Bros. Pictures YouTube) offering a first look.

The trailer begins with a door opening and Hampton stating his name, and that he’s the ‘deputy chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party.’

Hampton is shown at a rally, leading his followers to scream, ‘I am a revolutionary’ repeatedly’ while William O’Neal (Lakeith Stanfield) nervously sees Roy Mitchell (Jesse Plemons), one of the only white faces in the crowd, smiling.

O’Neal is clearly nervous with Mitchell clearly watching him, while another scene shows O’Neal running out of a bar and leaping over a parked car.

‘You’re looking at 18 months for the stolen car,’ Mitchell says, while we see O’Neal getting pulled over in the stolen car, as Mitchell flashes his FBI badge.

Mitchell adds he could get another five years in jail for ‘impersonating a federal officer,’ as we see O’Neal has been beaten quite badly.

‘Or, you can go home,’ Mitchell adds, which leads O’Neal to shake Mitchell’s hand, the start of his undercover work for the FBI, where he was tasked with infiltrating the Black Panther Party and providing them intelligence.

Hampton is also seen at an outdoor rally revealing that the Black Panthers, ‘are forming a Rainbow Coalition of oppressed brothers and sisters of EVERY color.’

Mitchell is heard through voice over claiming that the Black Panther party’s aim is to, ‘sow hatred and inspire terror,’ over shots that show them doing no such thing.

There are shots of Hampton at one of his many events where he provided free breakfasts for local children, telling the kids to repeat, ‘I will learn all I can.’

O’Neal is seen telling his FBI superiors that, ‘these ain’t no terrorists,’ while Hampton delivers another fiery speech.

‘You can murder a liberator but you can’t murder a liberation,’ Hampton says as the crowd filled with black and white people applaud.

‘You can murder a revolutionary but you can’t murder a revolution,’ he adds, while other shots show the beginnings of a gunfight at the Black Panther headquarters.

‘You can murder a freedom fighter but you can’t murder freedom,’ Hampton says in his fiery speech, while O’Neal glances nervously at Mitchell.

The trailer winds down with a rapid-fire sequence of shots including more of the shootout with O’Neal on the roof while in another shot he’s being passed an envelope while at dinner in a fancy restaurant.

‘I’m gonna die for the people ’cause I lead for the people, I lead for the people ’cause I love the people’ Hampton says as the trailer comes to a close.

Hampton was killed in December 1969 at just 21 years of age during an early-morning raid on his apartment by the FBI.

Judas and the Black Messiah is directed by Shaka King (Newlyweeds) from a script he co-wrote with Will  Berson based on a story by Keith and Kenneth Lucas.

The film was originally slated for release on August 21, 2020, though it was pushed into 2021 by Warner Bros. due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The film, which was produced by Black Panther producer Ryan Coogler, also stars Martin Sheen as FBI director J. Edgar Hoover,