Thanks Orlando Sentinel! Rooting for Dare Not Walk Alone

Under the headline "A great Florida film to root for in the NAACP Image Awards Thursday" the Orlando Sentinel film critic Roger Moore had these kind words:

"Dare Not Walk Alone is up against the great Katrina documentary Trouble the Water in the best documentary category at the NAACP Image Awards, airing Tuesday night on BET. but Jeremy Dean's terrific film has a shot."

As previously noted in this blog, Trouble the Water is indeed a fine film and it is already "Oscar Nominated." That has put it on the radar for many people who might otherwise have overlooked it, and that's a good thing. The localized events of Hurricane Katrina, dealt with in Trouble the Water, drew attention to broader American issues and struggles. Likewise, by focusing on the racial conflict in St. Johns County, Dare Not Walk Alone seeks to draw attention to problems encountered across America. We are really looking forward to meeting the folks from Trouble the Water in Los Angeles this week.

Here is what I posted in reply to Roger's piece in the Orlando Sentinel. I'm not sure if all of it appears on the site:

Thanks for the kind comments Roger. To say that Jeremy and the rest of us on this project are thrilled that the film is up for this award would be a huge under-statement. The sense of history this year is almost intoxicating: the Image Awards ceremony is being held on the very same day that the NAACP was founded, 100 years ago (the same day that Lincoln was born, 100 years earlier).

The struggle to create a just and equal society has been long and hard, but it is not over yet. Yes, we have elected the first African American president, and we the people can take pride in that. But even as we take some time this month to honor the brave and heroic achievements of past campaigners for equality, we need to be thinking hard about how we can accomplish the difficult work that still needs to be done.

Dare Not Walk Alone has always been about both of these things, seeking to convey both the raw heroism of those who stood up to segregation and the reality of the present, where injustice still lingers, even as a heart-felt desire for reconciliation begins to emerge. It is our hope that the film will turn that desire into action and a renewed effort to achieve Dr. King's "beloved community." It is not too far out of reach.

Stephen Cobb
Executive Producer

"Trouble the Water" Gets Oscar Nod: Bravo Tia Lessin & Carl Deal

We were delighted to see that the Nominees for the 81st Academy Awards recognized the film “Trouble the Water” from Zeitgeist Films in the category of "Best documentary feature." The work of Tia Lessin and Carl Deal, this impressive documentary, which won a Grand Jury prize at Sundance 2008, presents "a unique, ground-level perspective on Hurricane Katrina that's been sorely missing from previous accounts of the disaster" (Roger Ebert).

Some people might feel like Hurricane Katrina is old news, but you would only think that if you had never experienced a hurricane or The South. Having experienced both, I think it is hard to overstate the importance of this cataclysmic event in America history, particularly Black American History. In many ways it was a turning point.

One reason I say this: our own documentary, Dare Not Walk Alone, might never have achieved theatrical release, were it not for Katrina. The reason? A lot of people who saw Dare Not Walk Alone before Katrina thought we were exaggerating the racial and social injustice we had documented in Florida.

While it is true that a documentary film maker can do that, choose the images he or she includes in the film to overstate the case, that is not what Jeremy did when he made Dare Not Walk Alone. There was as a lot more Jeremy could have included in the film about how bad things were and still are, but the problem, pre-Katrina, was that "the truth" was known only to a segment of the American people, a segment to which few people listened and about whom, judging by our government's reaction to Katrina, few people cared. In other words, pre-Katrina, people thought Dare Not Walk Alone lacked objectivity. That made funding (which has been, and remains, a huge challenge for the film) hard to find.

What happened during and after Katrina is that the measure of "objective" changed. Americans outside The South--and those who had managed to live in the South without fully experiencing The South--saw the harsh and undeniable reality on their TV. This was both important and unprecedented in so many ways, not least of which is the huge outpouring of support and aid that came from "regular" Americans, locally and nationally.

I don't think it is a stretch to say that you could glimpse the possibility of a black president in the aftermath of Katrina. It was clear from the positive responses to this natural disaster that a critical mass of Americans felt that the storm victims were their peers, their fellow Americans, worthy of equal treatment in all aspects of American life. Equally clear is the fact that many Americans now reject as unrepresentative and unworthy, a government that does not care equally or enough--as measured by real world action--about all Americans.

However, just as the election of an African-American president does not mean the Beloved Community has now been achieved, the passage of time does not mean that the wounds of Katrina are healed. There is much work still to be done and "Trouble the Waters" is a powerful reminder of that. So we say Thank You to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for recognizing this film and Bravo to its makers.
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