The Long Shadow from Director Frances Causey Asks "How Free is Free?"

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Category: Entertainment News
Published on Thursday, 20 September 2018 20:17

Of all the divisions in America, none is as insidious and destructive as racism. The powerful documentary THE LONG SHADOW takes a shockingly candid look at America's original sin – slavery -- and traces the history of slavery.

From the country's founding, up through its insidious ties to racism today.  We witness from the moment of America's birth, how slavery was embedded in principal structural elements of society, and yet, even as slavery ended, these systems still operate today in various forms, carrying out their original purpose  - to diminish the social role of black people and keep them in a perpetual state of suffering.

Director Frances Causey and Producer Sally Holst, both privileged daughters of the South, were haunted by their families' slave-owning pasts. They grew up in a time when white superiority was rarely questioned, and challenging this norm was often met with deadly consequences.

Rejecting the oft-told romanticized version of early U.S. history, they embarked on a journey of hidden truths and the untold stories of how America - driven by the South's powerful political influence - steadily, deliberately and with great stealth,  established white privilege in our institutions, laws, culture and economy.

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From New Orleans to Virginia, Mississippi and Canada, they traveled the roads of oppression, suppression, and even hope to reveal the direct link from early slavery, Jim Crow and strong-arm Southern politics to the current racial strife and division we face today.

Interlaced with personal stories of Causey and Holst's privileged childhood, the filmmakers present a startling, unrecognized history that provides much-needed context when considering the major issues that impact black and white relations today.

By telling individual stories -- of free blacks in Canada; of a modern, racially motivated shooting -- the filmmakers personalize the lingering cost and the stakes of ignorance, intolerance and inaction, and how that casts a long shadow over our national identity and imperfect democracy.  In addition to history, the film examines current social norms that show how oppression lives on in new, devious forms including mass incarceration, health care outcomes and life expectancy, and per-capita income based on race.Heist: Who Stole the American Dream?

Writer/Director Frances Causey is an Emmy-award winning journalist and documentary filmmaker who began her career with CNN. Her 2012 documentary feature, "Heist: Who Stole the American Dream?" was a New York Times Critic's Pick and is currently seen in over 50 countries.

Causey was honored with the Women's International Film and Television Jury Award for her work on Heist.    Producer Sally Holst is a CNN contributor and a producer along with Causey on the "Heist: Who Stole the American Dream?" documentary.  Award-winning producer Jed Riffe and editor Maureen Gosling's films have been released theatrically and broadcast nationally and internationally around the world.

THE LONG SHADOW was nominated for Best Documentary Feature at the Soho International Film Festival in New York, and the Oxford Film Festival in Mississippi.

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THE LONG SHADOW opens in  New York Friday October 26 at the Cinema Village, and in Los Angeles on Friday November 23 at the Laemmle Music Hall 3

RT: 87 Minutes / Not Rated

Website:        http://thelongshadowfilm.com/

IMDB:             https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6264508/

Facebook:     https://www.facebook.com/longshadowdoc

Twitter:           @LongShadowDoc

Instagram:     @thelongshadowfilm

About Passion River Films:

Since 1998, Passion River Films has been devoted to acquiring, distributing and representing unique independent films and documentaries. Our award winning and festival favorite features have made their home on shelves of various notable film libraries and institutions. Our deep catalog represents films on nearly every topic including Multicultural Studies, Women's Studies, Medical Studies and Advances, Religious and Spiritual studies, Environmentalism, Aging, Drug Addiction, Gay/Lesbian/Transgender, etc. 

Passion River's films feature Academy Award and Emmy-winning titles as well as films that have been recognized at Independent Spirit Awards, Sundance Film Festival, SXSW, Tribeca Film Festival and many other prestigious events. For more info, visit www.passionriver.com.

  

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