The Laramie Project

Rating:
Summary: Saw it in HS play form, Bet the movie is good too!
Review: I recently had the chance to see The Laramie Projrct performed as a High School Play on Long Island. Although I have never seen the movie version, I get the strong feeling that no matter what way The Laramie Project is showcased, the point will still come across in a powerful and moving way.
The teens who stared in the play really brought the emotions of Shock, Hate, Disbelife and Disgust to the surface. Rather it were the polic officer sobbing hystically as she recalled throwing caution to the wind to save Matthew, only to later discover she had been exposed to his HIV infected blood, the Minister preeching that Homosexuality was wrong, or the gay college profesor revealing that after the attack, she lived in fear of being assulted and killed herself.
Despite the fact the play was extremly long, and put on by a small Long Island school with a small budget and small stage, I still feel as thow it did a marvelous job in bringing to light the fact that hate, closed mindedness and unimaginable horror can thrive in even the smallest towns such as Laramie, where everyone thought "My town dosn't harbor such fellings" If it can happen in Laramie, it can happen in my little town, who's high school is home to only 200 kids grades 9-12.
I recomnd seeing The Laramie Project in any way shape of form, Movie, DVD, Broadway of High School Play. It will open your eyes, and your mind, and will leave you thinking in a whole new way, a way that kind of shocks you and smacks you right in the face. I got that feeling from a High School Play.
PS--I plan on writing an articel about the Laramie project for my High School News Paper. Maybe Ill post it here when it comes out!

Rating:
Summary: The play is better....
Review: I think my title gives it all away: the play version of The Laramie Project is MUCH MUCH better then the movie. Its longer, its more indepth, and it conveys the feelings of the Laramie residents better. Because of the formatt, I think that The Laramie Project is just a better play (I've seen it twice and own a copy) then it makes a film.

That said, if you are someone who hates to read, this film will get the job done. It will make you cry (in particular, when the girl in the headscarf is talking about owning this crime) but some of the moments come off a little stilted and melodramatic to me (like the whole first 10 minutes basically). I love that the film is actually shot in Laramie, so you see the counthouse where the boys who murdered him were tried and you see the fence he was tied to. That makes a better set then anything Hollywood could build. And the cast is excellent, many great vetran actors and talented younger people. The story is so powerful that it earns a 4 stars from me, dispite being a too short and melodramatic.

As a DVD, I would have wanted more featurettes on the shoot, Laramie and the people from the play. There were two short ones, but I felt as though it wasn't enough. There is no commentary which is disapointing.

In conclusion, if you want to get The Laramie Project, read the play. If you are too lazy to read the play, the movie will get it done.

Rating:
Summary: Chilling, Startling, But Most Importantly REAL
Review: I wasn't quite sure what to expect from this film, but what i found was it to be a great account of the horrific murder of Matthew Shepard. It was chilling, startling, but most importantly real. At some points in the film, you forgot you were watching a re-enactment of the interviews that were carried out; you forgot you were watching a film. I thoroughly enjoyed the movie, and would recommend anyone to see it.

PS. It is a tear jerker!!

Rating:
Summary: Terrifyingly Real
Review: I?m not a ?cryer;? before I watched this movie I couldn?t possibly tell you the last time I cried. ?The Laramie Project? terrified me to the point of tears and kept me crying with the stark contrast of several beautiful gestures. The reality of the movie is shocking in its effect. The filmmakers, obviously, made every effort to truthfully portray both peoples? words and the manner in which they were spoken. To sit and listen to one person describe Matthew Shepard?s tragic death as deserved and in the next breath describe Laramie as a ?live and let live? sort of place is shocking. The casual, ingrained, encouraged heterosexism that ?The Laramie Project? depicts is in sharp contrast to the heartwarming acceptance and love that some of the townspeople portrayed through their actions and their interviews. For someone who grew up aware of the GLBTA community?s struggles and grew up in an extraordinarily liberal University town, Laramie was a slap in the face. The world is not Ann Arbor, MI and there are people out there who really truly believe that all homosexuals are perverts and that to live as a homosexual is to incite violence. Even in the shadow of a community were there was so much hate there were a few really moving moments of ? something markedly stronger than acceptance. Please watch this movie; it is truth, both heartwarming and terrifying. As a white, middle class, protestant, Aryan American I could only appreciate the fear that so many minorities live with after watching this movie. This movie is a masterpiece that words simply can?t convey. Watch this movie regardless of your relationship to the LGBTA community, or lack there of, it hits home.

PLEASE WATCH THIS MOVIE

Rating:
Summary: A review from the Actor's perspective
Review: Last year I had the supreme fortune and privelage to act in the play that this film is gleaned from, and as research and character help we watched the HBO movie while producing the play. I share a deep emotional bond with this material, and I must say that this play and film have affected me more than perhaps any other event in my life.

One of the biggest things to remember about this play/film is that it is REAL. All the events portrayed here and all the words here are completely real. The play and the flim are both written directly from the interviews that the Tectonic Theater Project players conducted in Laramie. The entire play is quotes from the people of Laramie. I believe that knowing that gives the words an almost entirely new meaning.

Also, yes this play deals with hairy subject matters like Matthew's HIV-positive status and with the Homosexual issues in general, but what I believe this play is about at its heart is family, and how a family and a town deal with a loss like this. The message that I got out of this play can be summed up in one line, that the doctor says during his media pronouncement of Matthew's death. He says, quoting Mrs. Shepard,
"Go home and hug your kids, and don't let a day go by without telling them that you love them."

Rating:
Summary: How Could Someone?
Review: Matthew Shepard is a 22 year old college student, who is gay, and is brutally beat and tortured because of it. Based on a true story in Laramie Wyoming, this movie moved me and made tears swell up in my eyes. Every scene, i kept asking myself, How Could Someone Do Something Like This?

Rating:
Summary: Nice, powerful movie
Review: Matthew Shepard was severely beaten and left for dead, and he dies a couple of days later. After that, a theater group comes to Laramie, Wyoming and talks to the local people and tries to give us a feel of what happened and what people's emotions and feelings were.

Shepard's case got national attention because it was a hate crime against gays. The message this movie gives us is that we need to get hate out of us - and ignorance.

All the people in this movie are actors; it is a retelling of the actual interviews that happened. I liked this movie and I recommend showing it to other people to create awareness and tolerance of the gay community. No human being should live in fear of being discriminated against, beaten up or killed just because of his or her sexual preference.


Rating:
Summary: a shattering, unforgettable experience
Review: Matthew Shepard's murder affected me very strongly and still does. I could have seen the stage version of this piece, as I was in New York when it was playing, but was too afraid (for the same reason, I haven't seen Boys Don't Cry). And this apparently truncated HBO version is a very tough film to watch.
It's excellent despite limitations imposed, we may assume, by the complex finances of TV. The cast is uniformly fine - I especially loved Margo Martindale, Terry Kinney (who would have given a shattering reading of Mr. Dennis Shepard's complete courtroom speech), Dylan Baker, Laura Linney, Amy Madigan and Frances Sternhagen, but everyone just GAVE so much! (I know other reviewers have carped about some of the performances, and I think it's worth pointing out that these actors donated their services to this project.)
The people of Wyoming are not treated patronizingly - the film contains, in fact, a thinly veiled indictment of the 1998 media which did sometimes treat these people as hicks. And the script, of course, is based on transcripts from interviews with these people, and like interviews with anyone, there are idiosyncracies and lapses in grammar. Of course there are rednecks - as there are in Los Angeles or even Manhattan. But the citizens of Laramie overwhelmingly recoil from this senseless tragedy, and the most horrifying character - aside from the killers, and maybe even more than them - is "Reverend" Fred Phelps, as he was at the time - and he's an outsider.
One person is conspicuously absent from this film, and that is Matthew Shepard. The Laramie Project is about the reaction of citizens to the brutality of his murder and the response of that city to the influx of international media attention.
During the past five years, Dennis and Judy Shepard have done incredible work to help stamp out hate crimes everywhere, and we all owe them immeasurable respect and compassion. But I bet they'd give it up in a fraction of a second to have their son back for even one hour.
As a member of the so-called gay community, I have always felt uneasy with this tendency - and the movie contributes to it - to treat Matthew Shepard primarily as a symbol and a martyr. He was a human being, and he deserved to go on being one.
Matthew Shepard was not even 22 years old when he died.

Rating:
Summary: A great piece of political drama
Review: My hat goes off to Mr. Kaufman and his associates for developing this truly inspired document. It's hard to believe but I've heard people ask "what makes this individual case more important than others." Nothing and everything. It's a tragedy whenever a life is taken, but when the only motivation is hate it impacts everyone. Great performances are plentiful here - and a number of our finest players make the most of beautifully written roles - Kathleen Chalfant, Steve Buscemi, Frances Sternhagen, Laura Linney, Christina Ricci and (my favorite) Bill Irwin. Don't miss this one.

Rating:
Summary: Prior Knowledge Necessary?
Review: Perhaps you have to have some prior knowledge of the subject matter of this film in order to properly appreciate it. ... I don't think so, but maybe I'm wrong. As a person, a human being, hearing the words of actual human beings who are trying to sort through their feelings after a tragedy, I would have been moved had I known nothing of the death of Matthew Shepard (as it is, I knew very little before viewing this movie).

What initially attracted me to this film was the fact that it was an HBO production, and I've seen several quality HBO productions in the past. I'd heard a little about the Matthew Shepard case, and I wanted to know more. So I saw the film.

First, this film isn't really a documentary-it's a dramatazation of interviews and conversations that members of a New York theatre troupe conducted with citizens of Laramie, Wyoming These interviews served as the basis for the play "The Laramie Project." It's a little distracting at first, because the film is shot in documentary-style and yet the people who are supposed to be citizens of the town are recognizable actors and actresses (such as Steve Buscemi and Christina Ricci). And I wondered how much of the dialogue was real and how much was fictional. But once I got over those concerns, I became engrossed in the story (after all, movies are fiction anyway). And what a story. For those who don't know, Matthew Shepard was a 21 year old college student who was brutally beaten and left for dead in Laramie, Wyoming in 1998. The young men who attacked him were Russell Henderson and Aaron McKinney. Shepard was in a coma for a week before he died on October 12, 1998. Shepard was [homosexual], and his killers claimed that he'd made passes at them, and so they decided to drive him to the edge of town, tie him up, and beat him. To teach him a lesson.

Whether Shepard learned his lesson or not is unknown, since he died soon after the attack. But the citizens of Laramie sure seem to be learning something, and they want to talk about it. The townspeople who were interviewed are a mix of [homosexual] residents, college professors, college students, and outraged citizens. The young man who found Matthew Shepard, the Police Officer who was the first on the scene, a friend of Shepard's named Romaine, and a local Catholic Priest are standouts. The emotions run the gamut from young people trying to reconcile what they've always been taught (that homosexuality is wrong) with the message that it's just another lifestyle choice, to others who believe that no one deserves to be beaten that way-but hey, Shepard shouldn't have been hitting on those young men...A local pastor prays that Shepard had time in the last moments of his life to repent and turn to Christ, a local Priest calls citizens together for a candlelight vigil, and all the while the members of the theatre troupe record the reactions of the townspeople as they themselves are touched and changed by what they see.

Here we have people talking, people yelling, people laughing, people crying. Everyone has been affected in one way or another by the tragedy, and what they say as they struggle to put their feelings into words (and the emotions that are so compellingly portrayed by the actors and actresses here) make for a startling portrayal of human emotion. The story is told not just through words but through music, through facial expressions, through moments of silence that no words can fill. Part character study, part "documentary," part "message film," "The Laramie Project" succeeds as excellent storytelling. In a word: Haunting. Apparently, it's not for everyone. But I don't see why not.