They're not just making pencils, they've gotten a lot more sophisticated about it. Clearly, there's a good percentage of people at Angola who have committed heinous crimes. There are also a good percentage of people there who have committed crimes of youth, drug-dealing, or even crimes of passion. It's counter to everything human. The warden talks about the issue of forgiveness.
Forgiveness is a fundamental part of spirituality.
To dismiss any possibility of redemption is to damn us as a nation. The film is a chance to start a dialogue. We're going to be doing a lot of grassroots screenings. But I'm setting up a statewide tour in Louisiana, and I want to get inmates, crime victims, good spiritual mediators, and show the film in communities. Perhaps in the year 2000 we can have an amnesty and release the inmates who are in there for nonviolent crimes at the very least.