CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) – Not man know the story of Sala Udin, a self-described “agitator” during the Civil Rights Movement. Ty Cooper, filmmaker and director of the Indie Short Film Festival in Charlottesville, hopes his short film will help change that.

On Saturday August 9 Vinegar Hill Theater will host a screening of “The Price of Resistance: Sala Udin, An American Agitator,” a documentary short film that details the actions of Udin during the Civil Rights Movement and how he became a target of FBI surveillance in 1960s Mississippi.

“Sala was extremely brave. He was very courageous. He was a person who got bit by the bug when he was in DC to, you know, see the March on Washington,” Cooper explained in an interview on Cville Right Now Live.

The film, produced by Cooper and Emmy-award winning producer Annette Banks, features rare archival footage and interviews including a former FBI agent stationed in 1960s Mississippi. For Cooper, Udin’s courage and devotion to a cause that took him into the heart of the deep south away from his home in Pittsburgh gave enough reason to tell the story in the film.

“I know if that happened today, I’m like, no, I’m gonna fight from here. Somehow, someway I’ll support. But I’m not going down to Mississippi. So, if someone could do something that I wouldn’t do, I have great admiration for that,” said Cooper.

Once Udin traveled to Mississippi, the FBI took notice of his actions, which, Cooper said, put his life jeopardy.

“The wording states he needs to be neutralized,” explained Cooper, “When there’s a plan in action to eliminate what you consider as a threat, then that’s targeting and that’s when you’re putting a plan together and that’s what happened.”

Cooper also acknowledged the importance of remembering figures like Udin and others in the Civil Rights Movement and hopes that viewers will note the progress made because of them. “These people died and risked their lives for you to be able to vote, for your mother, for your grandfather to be able to vote,” he said. “I think this is something just to open people eyes and especially if you see what’s happening now with the rollback of certain policies, there’s a reflection. It’s almost like a mirror image of some stuff that was happening before.”

The screening at Vinegar Hill will also feature the short film Uprooted directed by Brandon Kellam about the displacement of an African American neighborhood in Newport News displaced to make way for the development of Christopher Newport University. A panel discussion will follow the screenings with a Q&A session with the filmmakers.

Tickets can be found here.