"To this day, says Geeta Gandbhir, I'm devastated. The film-maker is talking about the killing of Ajike AJ Owens, a black woman shot dead by her white neighbour in Florida two years ago. Gandbhir first came to the case in a personal capacity, as 35-year-old Owens was a family friend. But things quickly changed. She and her team worked hard to drum up media attention and pressure law enforcement and government institutions to take action and hold this neighbour, 60-year-old Susan Lorincz, accountable."
"All this grew and has now resulted in The Perfect Neighbor, a film by Gandbhir, who may well have invented a new subgenre of true crime documentary. By telling the story almost entirely using official and harrowing police body camera footage, the 55-year-old director has moved beyond traditional narrative to present an unfiltered and unflinching account of a tightknit community facing a horror in its midst."
"It was made possible by Owens' mother, Pamela Dias, who consented to footage being made public. I showed Pam the film when it was completed, says Gandbhir, and I said, Is this what you want?' She said, Yes the world needs to know what happened to my baby.' The central themes of the film, which premiered at this year's Sundance festival and is about to stream on Netflix, include the devastating impact of Florida's stand your ground laws, the weaponisation of race and fear."
Geeta Gandbhir remains devastated by the killing of Ajike AJ Owens, a 35-year-old Black woman shot dead by her white neighbor, 60-year-old Susan Lorincz, in Florida. Gandbhir began involvement as a family friend and then organized media attention, protests, and pressure on law enforcement to hold the neighbor accountable. The resulting film, The Perfect Neighbor, uses official police body-camera footage to present an unfiltered account of a tight-knit community confronting the killing. Owens' mother, Pamela Dias, consented to public release of the footage. Central themes include Florida's stand-your-ground laws, weaponization of race and fear, and law enforcement failures.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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