Danny Glover was recently a juror and mentor at Turkey’s virtual International Migration Film Festival, for which he took a deep dive into films tackling the plight of migrants around the world from his home in San Francisco, just as protests over the death of George Floyd escalated in the U.S.

The actor-writer-producer and passionate political activist spoke to Variety about how he’s been associating the current global migrant crisis with the historical roots of violence against African Americans in the U.S. The screen icon, known for classics such as “Places in the Heart,” “The Color Purple” and the “Lethal Weapon” franchise, also discussed his parallel career as a producer of socially relevant films by global auteurs, such as Cannes Palme d’Or winner “Uncle Boonmee who can Recall his Past Lives,” and why “Lethal Weapon 5” should come back “within the political framework that we are in.