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liffender. The next two. The Price of ;' Life (probation), and The Revolving ')oor (jails and the lower courts) ivere similarly received. I The shadow of Attica was upon the Icreen for everyone to see. Some of |he images were too revealing to be pelieved. A solitary confinement cell |he size of a closet housing 8 naked placks whose worst infraction was that jhey were "slow" in responding to i*'ake-up call, filth, disease, sadistic pehavior on the part of guards, and fther niceties too numerous to list ,iere. The films did their job — they leally shocked many people and liroused them — this was film sponsorihip at its very best. And yet, we still moved toward Attica with an inevitability that would have made the .ireeks blush. Why? : Because the role film can play in liclping us recognize and confront our 'ocial problems is as yet unrealized. t"hc large corporations are beginning |o discover that one important docujientary film can do more for their lompany and its product than all the [industrials" in the world . . . and that I'V commercials are not always the I'cst or most effective way to exercize !corporate citizenship". Despite this.
almost no one yet is giving the kind of support to this type of film that would extend their impact on the public and their ability to really change the world.
Attica "happened" because too many did too little. We really didn't want to face up to the grim fact that after 200 years we still haven't the foggiest notion of how to deal with those who commit offenses against society. Lulled to torpor and apathy by the empty words and barren voices of our President, Vice President and Attorney Cieneral, we took the easy road — and paid a price we could scarcely afford. The films Vision made on our prisons were among other excellent films on this subject and they failed to encourage us to seek other ways.
Our experience inside these prisons (Attica included) provided first hand, unarguable evidence that a bad system is deteriorating into a wholly repressive one when human dignity and worth are as forgotten as they were at Buchenwald, Dachau, and Auschwitz, loday, with the help of those business leaders who really care, the filmmaker will continue to press for support (production anil distribution) for films that can change a small portion of tomor
row. Attica can best be remembered in the words of an imnamed convict who died in a prison after being beaten by a guard and kept in a black chamber the size of a broom closet for 10 days . . .
". . . my life inside these walls has taught me only that men are not noble . . . they arc not compassionate and they do not seek to understand ... I came to this place hoping only to serve my time and ne\er again return. But hope is one thing and this place is another — and now I think that it doesn't make any difference whether I live or die — believe me when I tell you I know what Hell looks like — pray for me . . ." He was black, 21, and serving three to five years for breaking into a store and Mealing $.^3.00. He had been offered no training, no rehabilitation services, had been assaulted homosexually 13 times, had been denied visitors on 35 occasions and been in solitary for being too slow to move at a guard's command.
There are more films to make . . .
November/ December, 1971
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