I watched this last night and I've now had a chance to step back and consider this documentary more carefully. Overall I feel that it really could've been produced far better in several ways but having said that it certainly keeps you watching from start to finish and would recommend it to anyone to watch.
I viewed this knowing nothing about this case beforehand & I was left with the feeling that this was really a documentary that was unfortunately one sided and produced primarily to present to the viewers the great wrong-doing that was done to the 5 kids who were wrongly convicted.
Much of the documentary is giving voice to the victims of this case and as another review already mentions no one from the other side such as officers or layers or in fact anyone at all that could of given an alternative perspective, was part of this documentary. So therefor we are left with a very one sided view and it really didn't allow us to understand the motivations and reasons to why this happened to these 5 people other than the more obvious reasons that the documentary presents.
What I felt would of really brought this documentary alive was to give some perspective onto the pressures and life of the convicting police officers during this time and to delve more into the experience of the kids growing up in prison knowing you have been wrongly convicted. We didn't find out much about their experience in prison at all.
But again having said this I would still recommend this documentary and for me it once again highlights and makes you consider how society and we as individuals then, now and all through history in fact, love to witness a horrible crime and find at all costs the individual or individuals on which the guilt rests; which is why even as a viewer we have such strong reactions to this.
"As you see him, you will see yourself ... As you think of him you will think of yourself for in him you will find yourself or lose yourself." ACIM (T-8.III.4:2-5)
I viewed this knowing nothing about this case beforehand & I was left with the feeling that this was really a documentary that was unfortunately one sided and produced primarily to present to the viewers the great wrong-doing that was done to the 5 kids who were wrongly convicted.
Much of the documentary is giving voice to the victims of this case and as another review already mentions no one from the other side such as officers or layers or in fact anyone at all that could of given an alternative perspective, was part of this documentary. So therefor we are left with a very one sided view and it really didn't allow us to understand the motivations and reasons to why this happened to these 5 people other than the more obvious reasons that the documentary presents.
What I felt would of really brought this documentary alive was to give some perspective onto the pressures and life of the convicting police officers during this time and to delve more into the experience of the kids growing up in prison knowing you have been wrongly convicted. We didn't find out much about their experience in prison at all.
But again having said this I would still recommend this documentary and for me it once again highlights and makes you consider how society and we as individuals then, now and all through history in fact, love to witness a horrible crime and find at all costs the individual or individuals on which the guilt rests; which is why even as a viewer we have such strong reactions to this.
"As you see him, you will see yourself ... As you think of him you will think of yourself for in him you will find yourself or lose yourself." ACIM (T-8.III.4:2-5)