On Mother's Day 2000, an estimated 820,000 people gathered in Washington, D.C. for the Million Mom March. The group was mostly women of every age, profession and color, including Courtney Love, who lost her rock star husband Kurt Cobain in a gun-related suicide, and Milwaukee's Cynthia Martinez whose 11-year-old daughter had been killed six weeks earlier at her Grandma's house.
Local filmmakers and "media activists" Janet Fitch and Brad Pruitt documented the women and their families as they traveled from Milwaukee to the March. They later produced the compelling documentary, "Promise of America," the second segment in a three-part trilogy called "Guns, Grief and Grace in America" from New Moon Productions.
The hour-long "Promise of America," which follows the critically-acclaimed first segment, "Dear Rita," " is an extremely provocative and emotional look at gun violence in America, the March in Washington to stop it and snippets from other historical events influenced by female activists, including civil rights, suffrage, anti-war and anti-nuclear movements.
On Thurs., Dec. 19, the hour-long "Promise of America" will air with Michael Moore's powerful film that also explores gun violence, "Bowling for Columbine," at the Rosebud Cinema, 6823 W. North Ave.
A reception will begin at 5:15 p.m., with "Promise" airing at 6 p.m. and "Bowling" showing at 7:45. Berkeley Fudge will also perform. The cost for both films, food reception. musical performance and between-film discussion with Pruitt and Fitch is $8.
Recently, OMC talked to Janet Fitch about her latest documentary and gun violence in Milwaukee.
OMC: What inspired you to create this documentary?
JF: As media activists, we realized that our own personal and specific engagement with one individual mother's response (Cynthia Martinez) to the effects of gun violence was the sort of introduction to the subject of gun violence that would broaden our audience from a fairly narrow interest group to a much wider range of interested viewers. The very intimate, in-depth story would be key in revealing human suffering, not exploiting it, and could assist viewers in thinking more critically about the current polarized debate on gun violence. We decided to continue to document our own experience to follow the important story that was unfolding before us, and that we were so fortunate to be engaged in.
We felt strongly that going from the personal story of the loss of Rita (Martinez), to masses of mothers with the same lament, will show why mothers united in this movement, as they have historically, when their children's lives were/are at stake. When we arrived back in Milwaukee, we asked Cynthia Martinez, who bravely agreed, to open her life to us for the remainder of the year. Rita's Grandmother, Carmen Martinez, and the rest of Rita's family, her teachers and her friends, also opened their lives and hearts to us.
This path proved so rich and we eventually were compelled to split our nearly 80 hours of footage into two separate documentaries and one community education piece. Committed financial supporters have encouraged and sustained us by granting the initial funding, but we are still raising completion funds.
OMC: How has Milwaukee responded to your work so far?
JF: People in Milwaukee and Wisconsin have been actively engaged with and talking about "Guns, Grief and Grace in America" since the first segment, "Dear Rita," aired statewide (PBS, 2001). The piece received national attention as a Finalist in the 2001 New York International Film and Video Festivals' Awards and was selected to be screened at Moondance International Film Festival in Boulder, Colorado.
Requests continue to arrive from a myriad of organizations with a range of fields and interests that include women's groups, health care, education, law enforcement, the faith community and multi-faceted community based organizations.
Plus, The Milwaukee Police Department is currently using "Dear Rita" in their "Gun Awareness Program" with Milwaukee Public Schools, the State Department of Corrections has placed it in their "Victim Impact" educational curriculum, Healthy Sheboygan 2010 has requested materials for their "Suicide Prevention" program, and the Milwaukee Federated Library System has requested the series.
OMC: Are you and Brad from Milwaukee?
JF: Yes. We are both Milwaukee born and bred.
OMC: How were you each involved in the documentaries and what are some your past professional experiences?
JF: I am the show's executive producer. I founded New Moon Productions in response to the local and national interest in my first co-produced documentary and master's thesis, "Through one city's eyes: Race relations in America's heartland."
Brad is an executive producer and Emmy Award winning director. He's concurrently producing his debut feature film, "Wide Open." Brad spent several years of working and teaching in various organizations, eventually developing a youth media program designed to access natural talent in kids for Milwaukee's Inner City Arts Council.
OMC: How is your documentary similar to "Bowling for Columbine?"
JF: The subject matter of gun violence is similar. Interestingly, Michael seemed to pick up on themes that we wanted to cover but felt we really could not, given the limited time to address such dense material. This makes the works quite complementary. We think "Bowling for Columbine" is absolutely brilliant. The fact that it is doing so well in the box office is another affirmation that people want to see substantive change on the issue.
OMC: In your opinion, who is responsible for reducing gun-related violence in our city?
JF: We all are responsible to find our voice and the will to make it happen.
{INSERT_RELATED}OMC: Does Milwaukee have more or less crime than other cities that are similar in size. Why is this?
JF: Although we don't feel as if this is within the realm of our expertise to attempt an answer, I'll give it a shot. There are no simple solutions. Milwaukee has a lot of issues to deal with. Race and class for starters. But gun violence is a national disaster that needs to be dealt with on local, state and national levels. Everyone in the U.S. is affected by this dilemma. Here, it feels like central city violence is the absolute worst of it, and we all carry the collective sadness surrounding that. But the statistics have another story to tell. Of the 30,000 gun deaths every year in the U.S., the majority of those are suicides.
"Successful suicides" occur with guns and, in Wisconsin, research reveals that suicide accounted for two-thirds of state gun deaths last year, with the highest concentration of those in rural and suburban areas. Further, fatal incidences of domestic violence outnumber homicides in the state death toll. We need to get to the heart of this issue and do everything we can to encourage people to think critically about the complexities involved here.
OMC: Where in Milwaukee did you shoot the series?
We followed a bus full of Milwaukeeans to D.C. for the March, then did in-depth interviews with Rita Martinez' family and friends for the remainder of the year, recording their daily lives in Milwaukee. Also, several of our "experts" are local, so we'd be at the Federal Prosecutor's office, the hospital, community events, etc.
OMC: Tell us about the bus ride from Milwaukee to Washington D.C. for the Million Mom March .
Because there was no way to know who or how many people would show up at the first national March for sensible gun laws or what the actual story would be, we formulated a plan that required three separate production crews: one to fly ahead to document people arriving and organizing; one to cover Mother's Day as usual at home; and one to be on the bus registered from Milwaukee. Cynthia Martinez was on that bus from Milwaukee, just six weeks after her 11-year-old daughter was killed. The bus arrived in D.C late on Saturday night. Participants were exhausted from the trip that began at 4:30 a.m. and would have them back on the bus immediately after the next day's March. Nevertheless, Cynthia, her sister and cousin volunteered to do an in-depth, taped interview that night. This is why we're here: to stop this from happening to other children. The emotional session at the historic William Penn House in D.C., with these brave women changed everything for us. We entered the next day, when nearly 820,000 demonstrators gathered on the Washington Mall, many of them wearing and carrying photos of their children and loved ones lost to gun violence, with a more intimate understanding of the grief so many of these families were experiencing.
In the span of 24 hours, gun violence had become personal to us.
For more information, visit www.newmoononline.com
Molly Snyder started writing and publishing her work at the age 10, when her community newspaper printed her poem, "The Unicorn.” Since then, she's expanded beyond the subject of mythical creatures and written in many different mediums but, nearest and dearest to her heart, thousands of articles for OnMilwaukee.
Molly is a regular contributor to FOX6 News and numerous radio stations as well as the co-host of "Dandelions: A Podcast For Women.” She's received five Milwaukee Press Club Awards, served as the Pfister Narrator and is the Wisconsin State Fair’s Celebrity Cream Puff Eating Champion of 2019.
