In Our Son's Name

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Phyllis Rodríguez and Aïcha el-Wafi

Budget

Raised to date: $190,779.00
Estimate to complete: $240,303.00
Total Estimated Budget: $431,082.00
The budget numbers above are accurate as of 11/19/2010

Status

Production

Media Type

Video

Project End Use

Key Personnel

Gayla Jamison
Producer, Director, Writer
Gayla Jamison, has more than twenty years’ experience in social issue documentaries filmed in 17 countries on five continents. Her work has appeared on PBS, The Hallmark Channel, Turner Broadcasting, ABC, NBC, The Learning Channel, WGBH-TV, Univision, and Galavision. Her most recent film, “Lives For Sale,” a documentary about sex trafficking, aired on PBS. She was Supervising Producer for “My Americas,” a 13-part series about spirituality and culture in Latin America funded in part by Latino Public Broadcasting and aired on public television. Independent documentaries include “Scraps of Life,” about Chilean women protesting the Pinochet dictatorship, “Approach of Dawn,” which documents Maya women during the Guatemalan civil war, and “Living in America: 100 Years of Ybor City,” a portrait of the Spanish-Cuban-Italian community in Tampa, Florida. Her documentaries have received numerous awards, including the Gabriel Award; Award of Merit, Latin American Studies Association; Gold Apple, National Educational Media Network Film Festival; Special Jury Award, USA Film Festival; and Golden and Silver Hugos, Chicago International Film Festival.

Arthur Yee
Director of Photography
Arthur Yee has filmed documentaries for PBS (“Aging Out,” Roger Wiseberg and Vanessa Roth, Producers), AMC (“Rated R: Republicans in Hollywood”), and A&E (“Intervention”), as well as National Geographic, Discovery, NBC, FOX, HGTV, MSNBC, VH1, and The History Channel.

Ellen Goldwasser
Editor
Ellen Goldwasser, has two Academy Award documentary nominations to her credit, for “Speaking in Strings,” screened at the Sundance Festival, and “Artists and Orphans”. Her most recent work is “Standing Silent,” produced by Scott Rosenfelt with funding from Sundance Documentary Fund grant. Other documentaries include “Mule Skinner Blues,” on Sundance Channel, and “Anatomy of Hate.”

Outreach/Engagement Plan(s)

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We are in touch with groups involved in restorative justice, reconciliation and peace efforts, religious tolerance, defense-initiated victim outreach, and outreach to prison inmates – organizations that will not only use the film themselves but also publicize the film through their extensive networks. The film’s website, www.inoursonsname.com, provides links to these groups as well as additional information about the film, including a blog. The film’s trailer is available on YouTube and a FaceBook page provides a link to the film’s website.

The film’s trailer already has been used as an educational tool in prison and university classroom settings, and there is an ongoing discussion of the film on the listserv, Peace and Collaborative Development Network. This listserv is a professional networking site for individuals and organizations worldwide involved in development, conflict resolution and related fields, with more than 17,000 members worldwide. This listserv will be a valuable tool for publicizing the finished film and making it available to professionals and academics who will use it in their work. Other groups are adding links on their websites to the film’s website, most notably the London-based non-profit, The Forgiveness Project (www.theforgivenessproject.com), which works at a local, national and international level to help build a future free of conflict and violence by healing the wounds of the past through collecting and sharing people's stories, and delivering outreach programs. Phyllis and Aïcha’s story is part of their program.

The film will be entered in appropriate festivals and offered to conferences related to issues raised in the film.

All of these strategies will ensure a large and diverse audience for the television airing and subsequent users of the film as an agent for social change through advocacy groups, prison outreach organizations, academic institutions and religious groups.

Funders

Name	Amount	Date
Sarah Peter	$10,000.00	11/10/2010
Catholic Communication Campaign	$100,000.00	06/15/2007

Short Synopsis

In Our Son’s Name is an intimate portrait of two people over the nine years since their son’s death in the terrorist attack on the World Trade Centr on September 11, 2011. Befriending the mother of terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui, speaking out against anti-Muslim actions and working with convicted felons, the grieving parents challenge conventional ideas about justice and healing.

Description/Treatment

This one-hour film follows Phyllis and Orlando Rodriguez, whose comfortable world shatters when their son dies in the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. Although overwhelmed by grief, they know the U.S. government could use the attack as a pretext to wage war in which more innocent people will die, so defying the hyper-patriotic mood of the country, they write an open letter to President Bush, “Not In Our Son’s Name.” The anti-war message circles the world on the internet and thrusts them reluctantly into the public eye. Around the world, people respond with supportive letters and email messages. The story is picked up by CNN and by newspapers in the U.S. and other countries.

A new life begins for Phyllis and Orlando. Challenging accepted ideas of justice that literally draw a line in the courtroom between defense and prosecution, they reach out to Aïcha el-Wafi, whose son, Zacarias Moussaoui, pleads guilty of conspiracy in the 9/11 attack. Orlando is among thirteen 9/11 family members who testify for the defense at Moussaoui’s trial, opposing a death sentence. This is the first time that victims witness for the defense in a capital crimes case. Testifying is the most fearful thing Orlando has ever done, until afterwards, when he feels liberated. Phyllis finds that her friendship with Aïcha teaches her that forgiveness is possible.

Brief family histories shed light on the couple’s sense of justice and reconciliation – in Phyllis’ Jewish heritage the Holocaust looms large; Orlando’s family fled the oppressive Batista dictatorship in Cuba.

As Phyllis and Orlando continue their transformative quest, they struggle to understand the roots of violence. This leads to a soul-searching encounter with prisoners convicted of homicide, where they act as surrogates for the men’s victims. The men reveal their terrible crimes, seizing a rare opportunity to cast aside prison swagger to show vulnerability and express remorse.

The climax of the film focuses on the controversy over the Park51 Islamic cultural center to be built near Ground Zero. Phyllis and Orlando again speak out against the fear and intolerance that consume the media and obscure reasonable discourse. They reach out to Talat Hamdani, a Muslim whose son, a New York City police cadet and EMT, was killed helping victims of the 9/11 attack. When Aïchi el-Wafi pays a surprise visit to White Plains, Phyllis and Orlando take her to meet Talat, supporting the two Muslim women in an emotional meeting that transcends the traditional boundary between victim’s and conspirator’s families.

Filmed in HDV, the hour-long documentary chronicles this extraordinary human drama through in-depth interviews with Phyllis, Orlando, their son’s widow, their daughter, Aïcha el-Wafi, Talat Hamdani, other 9/11 family members and others. The interviews will be inter-cut with verité footage, striking mixed media animation of family photographs and dynamic footage of 9/11, Moussaoui’s trial and the turbulent demonstrations against the Islamic center – woven together in a powerful story of personal courage that challenges conventional concepts of justice and healing in the aftermath of violence.

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