What I'm Watching
an excellent documentary
FILM SYNOPSIS
"The Boys of Baraka" reveals the human face of a tragic statistic - 61 percent of Baltimore's African-American boys fail to graduate from high school; 50 percent of them go on to jail. Behind those grim figures lie the grimmer realities of streets ruled by drug dealers, families fractured by addiction and prison and a public school system seemingly surrendered to chaos. As eloquently portrayed in Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady's award-winning documentary, which has its national broadcast premiere on public television's P.O.V., a generation of inner-city children faces dilemmas that would undo most adults. In this case, they are told early on that they face three stark "dress" options by their 18th birthdays - prison orange, a suit in a box, or a high school cap and gown.
The four young boys featured in "The Boys of Baraka," despite individual talents and considerable personal charms, cannot escape the common fate expressed by those dress options. But fate, as documented in this film, comes to them with a remarkable and fickle twist - an experimental boarding school in rural Kenya.
FILM SYNOPSIS
"The Boys of Baraka" reveals the human face of a tragic statistic - 61 percent of Baltimore's African-American boys fail to graduate from high school; 50 percent of them go on to jail. Behind those grim figures lie the grimmer realities of streets ruled by drug dealers, families fractured by addiction and prison and a public school system seemingly surrendered to chaos. As eloquently portrayed in Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady's award-winning documentary, which has its national broadcast premiere on public television's P.O.V., a generation of inner-city children faces dilemmas that would undo most adults. In this case, they are told early on that they face three stark "dress" options by their 18th birthdays - prison orange, a suit in a box, or a high school cap and gown.
The four young boys featured in "The Boys of Baraka," despite individual talents and considerable personal charms, cannot escape the common fate expressed by those dress options. But fate, as documented in this film, comes to them with a remarkable and fickle twist - an experimental boarding school in rural Kenya.