Anonymous – Speaking is Difficult Review

Title: Speaking is Difficult
Director: AJ Schnack
Year of Production: January 21, 2016
Length: 14:37
Keywords: Mass Shooting; Trauma; Gun Control; United States; Short Film
Link to watch the film: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCa2hckND-aq_hTu-Q-ZyfvA

This incredibly important short film directed by AJ Schnack depicts some extremely disturbing and unsettling audio recordings of 911 emergency phone calls received by operators while the callers are experiencing mass shootings that took place in various places in the United States, including schools, colleges, temples, theatres, etc. AJ Scnhack is a 52 year old independent filmmaker who has created multiple other films, including Kurt Cobain; About a Son. Schnack directed Speaking is Difficult for Field of Vision, “a film-based visual journalism platform he cofounded in 2015”. Field of Vision publishes many short films on important stories and messages regularly.

This film has no soundtrack. The only audio in the entire film is the 911 phone calls, and the police dispatch calls. The visuals in the film show short clips of areas where these mass shootings took place. Overlaid on top of these video clips, Schnack has put the places where these shootings occurred; which matched up with which shooting we are hearing about through the audio. They also included the date that the incident occurred, as well as how many people were killed and/or injured in the incidents. We also see some beautiful clips of people standing at the memorials put out for these mass shootings. In addition to the real 911 phone calls, we also hear sounds of sirens and gunshots in the background.

It is interesting to note that the film maker themselves did not have any visual, or audio involvement in the film, which I feel was a very positive and intentional move in order to allow the viewer to not be distracted by anything else other than the voices of the victims in these tragic events and the locations they took place. I think that the stance of the writers and filmmakers on this subject matter is very clear without them having to explicitly say that they think that there needs to be a change in gun laws in America. I found this message to be very clear to the viewer. This message could have been conveyed in a text, but could not possibly have the same affect on its audience.

This film triggers all of your senses to feel all kinds of things for these people who had to experience these awful events. You can really hear the terror in these victim’s voices as they are making these phone calls. There was one call where the 911 dispatcher is explaining to one of the victim’s how to care for a wound he received from a shooter. It is extremely unsettling to not know whether or not the people on the phone calls actually made it out of these situations alive or not. This film brought light to numerous shootings that I was nit even aware of, including one that took place in a hair salon.

I found it interesting that many of the clips depicted in the film showed sunny and bright days in many of the cities where these shootings have occurred, however I do not feel that the director was trying to bring light to a grim topic, I think that the Schnack used this imagery on purpose, to imply that life continues to go on without much of any discussion on these unspeakable acts. He also shows happy young students attending their schools and colleges, and people attending the restaurant and theatres that had been shot at previously. I think that the creators of this film wanted to bring awareness to the amount of mass shootings that go on in the United States, as well as the severity of them. Some of the effects that the director used were somewhat mundane shots of all of the locations where these shootings occurred at really sets the somber, quiet mood that this short film portrays.

At the very end, there is a clip of Gabrielle Giffords who is a former U.S. representative (and Gun-control advocate) from Arizona saying that “This is an important conversation, for our children, communities, democrats, and republicans. Speaking is Difficult”. “Too many children are dying. Too many children.” Because of this statement, I think that the title of this film holds a ton of power. Speaking is Difficult means a lot of things for a lot of different people. But, it is important that people learn to use their voices for good. Finally, In the last moments of the film the film maker writes in words on a black screen “Before 201, public mass shootings in the United States occurred on average every 200 days. Since 2011, these events occurred every 78 days.” This was an important way to close off this film with a real statistic of how prevalent this issue has truly become.