‘Soul Patrol’ Trailer: A Historic Group of Black Vietnam War Veterans Reunite to Reckon with the Past

“Soul Patrol,” the winner of the Directing Award for U.S. Documentary at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, is finally headed to theaters starting November 6, just in time for Veterans Day.

J.M. Harper‘s (“As We Speak”) documentary unveils a hidden chapter of American military history by introducing audiences to the Vietnam War’s first Black special ops team, an elite unit operating deep behind enemy lines, and capturing a reunion between the surviving members at a hotel on the 50th anniversary of the war. IndieWire shares an exclusive trailer for the film below.

Harper’s “Soul Patrol” uses a variety of archival material, from raw Super 8 footage to photographs and audio recordings from the group’s personal archives, in order to reconstruct their journey with a rare sense of immediacy. In modern times, the reunion becomes a surreal liminal space, where memory, brotherhood, and unresolved trauma collide. Reflecting the group’s experiences, “Soul Patrol” interrogates the contradictions of fighting for freedom abroad while facing inequality at home.

One of the film’s participants, executive producer Ed Emanuel, serves as a narrative catalyst. He wrote the 2003 memoir “Soul Patrol: The Riveting True Story of the First African American LRRP Team in Vietnam,” which inspired Harper to take on the challenge of making the documentary.

“‘Soul Patrol’ admirably never tries to sum up the full experience of what Vietnam was, rather just trying to sum up what it was for these men. In the film’s closing stretch, it turns its attention to the men’s difficult experiences returning home from the war, with a candor and a vulnerability that’s hard not to tear up from,” says the IndieWire review of the film. “As one member of Soul Patrol reflects eloquently towards the end of the film, ‘We need to tell the stories to look at where we were at, where we come from, and where we headed. You need to know your beginning before you can figure out your ending.’”

Kino Lorber will release “Soul Patrol” in select theaters starting Friday, November 6, with special screenings being scheduled for Veterans Day on Wednesday, November 11.