Ever since Apple TV+ held back the release of The Banker, its first Original film, to investigate sexual assault charges against Bernard Garrett Jr., co-producer on the movie, viewers have been waiting patiently for a new release date to be declared.
The Banker will now release in select theatres on 6th March 2020, and on Apple TV+ on 20th March for the benefit of its global subscribers.
The Banker was to have released on 6th December last year, but the release was postponed at the last minute when Cynthia and Sheila Garrett made accusations that their half-brother Bernard Garrett Jr. had molested them in the 1970s.
The Banker is the true story of Bernard Garrett Sr., father of Bernard Garrett Jr., who, along with Joe Morris, bought banks in Texas to lend money to blacks to fund their homes and to start businesses.
Anthony Mackie plays Bernard Garrett in The Banker, while Samuel L. Jackson plays Joe Morris. The story is set in the 1950s when Jim Crow laws established severe segregation in the Deep South, and did not allow banks to lend money to blacks, nor blacks to own banks.
Garrett and Morris hired a working-class white man (Nicholas Hoult) who posed as the head of their corporation, while they pretended to be a janitor and chauffeur. Under this guise, they bought banks, and in the process, became two of the first African-American bankers in the United States. The duo helped blacks to borrow sums of money to buy homes and start businesses.
Garrett Jr.’s name has now been removed from the project, and The Banker is poised to release in March, much to the delight of viewers who are keen to watch the movie, as it is a story that deserves telling.
Watch this space at Binged.com for more details on The Banker.