WHAT I WANT MY WORDS TO DO TO YOU International Documentary Competition

“It’s not that reality is outside-we’re just as real as the outside.” This affirmation by an inmate at a women’s maximum-security prison goes to the heart of this rewarding film. The filmmakers’ unvarnished aesthetics, combined with the force of the inmates’ own words, make for riveting viewing.

New York playwright Eve Ensler (The Vagina Monologues) started a writing group at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility in an attempt to help the incarcerated women. Memories of pain and pathos, humor and hubris, pour forth and are shaped into stories filled with raw emotion. Although quick to call each other (and Ensler) out when necessary, the meetings are remarkably non-judgmental. Ultimately, Ensler collects the stories and they are performed in front of the entire prison population by an all-star cast.

This film does a great service by providing insight into a disparate group of women whose commonality is that-at some point in life-they all took a turn down a bad road. Heartbreaking at times, the honesty and humanity of these women shine through, even as they acknowledge remorse for the pain they have caused. Socrates would approve.