The Isabel – Performance Hall
390 King St W, Kingston, Ontario, K7L 2X4
Nance Ackerman, Ariella Pahlke, Teresa MacInnes
2019 | 78 min
Bianca, Treena, Laura, and Caitlin are a stark reflection of the troubling worldwide tendency to criminalize and imprison the most vulnerable in society—those most affected by poverty, addiction, childhood trauma, and mental illness.
Together with long-time prisoners’ rights advocate Kim Pate and others, these women collaborate with the filmmakers to answer a deceptively simple question: What would you have needed to avoid incarceration? Through art, photography, filmmaking and poetry, the women inside envision a more ideal world on the outside.
Their creative agency emerges as a force that empowers them to chart the course of their own lives, and they become increasingly engaged in making Conviction—not another ‘broken prison’ film, but rather a ‘broken society’ film.
Conviction takes us on a raw and cinematic journey, while making the impassioned argument that we would do better to create communities that heal and support our most vulnerable, rather than punish them further.
Hosted by the Kingston Canadian Film Festival. For more information, click here.