Prisoners who are rehabilitated with Shakespeare

The image of a sparrow resting on the yarn of a prison during the first bars of The Lives of Sing Sing immediately shows us the intentions of Greg Kwedar’s second film: poetry, like life, always finds a way, even in the most desperate situations. It is not very common to put on screen criminals dazzled by Shakespeare’s lyrics, but a The Lives of Sing Sing theater is the vehicle for the inmates of this New York state maximum security facility to regain the dignity they lost when they crossed the prison walls. In the theater sessions, they not only rehearse classical plays or absurd comedies, but also laugh, talk and, in the end, share the hardships and longings of a life in the garjola.

However, this prison melodrama has a special temperament that goes beyond the subject it talks about. First of all, because of its link with the reality it describes, since, although it adapts an article fromEsquire from 2005 about a program to rehabilitate prisoners through theatre, is performed – in part – by ex-convicts pretending to be themselves. And, secondly, for the emotion with which it portrays the bonds between this group of men, punctuated by Patrick Scola’s cinematography and Bryce Dessner’s music. Kwedar does not hide at any time that he aims to deeply move the audience and, despite the insistence on the subject, the truth is that there are moments when he succeeds.

Trailer for ‘The Lives of Sing Sing’