One of the most important movies about this life in Kansas City is soon to premiere.
Check out:
KANSAS CITY MURDER FACTORY
The movie's director Mike B. Rollen produced "a documentary film that explores the murder epidemic in the urban core of Kansas City, Missouri.
Kansas City Murder Factory is an unscripted experimental documentary told from the perspective of the victim. In the film both observational and traditional forms of filmmaking collide to expose Kansas City’s most taboo topic: Murder."
The trailer for the movie seems a lot more inspirational than the silly Star series by the same name from a while back.
The movie attempts to depict "the many hurdles and struggles of the victim’s families as they fight to get justice from a system, which manufactures injustice.
The film also presents the many challenges of organizations and individuals trying to decrease violent crime in Kansas City, includes compelling commentaries from Kansas City’s top spoken word artists."
It's definitely worth checking out at The Kansas International Film Festival where it premieres Oct. 4th, 2010 7:45 PM - Glenwood Theater 9575 Metcalf Avenue Overland Park, KS
Not bad.
ReplyDeleteKCMO has more than adequate resources right now to address the violence that's apreading throughout the city. A few suggestions:
ReplyDelete1. A serious daily interest and involvement in law enforcement by the mayor and council EVERY DAY.
2. More budget oversight of the KCPD by the city council.
3. An active collaboration by the council and the police board to build a serious community policing effort like KCKPD.
4. A commitment by Jackson County through the COMBAT program to expand and fully fund the Community Action Center
network.
Crime continues to worsen in KCMO because none of our institutions are risnig to meet the challenge: not the city government, or the police board, or the business community, or the faith community; none of them.
Individuals and neighborhood groups can do only so much by themselves.
Without a reasonable degree of safety in the city, all the other worthwhile efforts at job creation, economic development, repopulation south of the river, increased enrollment in KCMSD, or anything else is futile.
This should be the number one issue of the mayoral campaign.
Gonzo Washington is going to be pissed that he was included.
ReplyDeleteKCPD should be under the City not the state.
ReplyDeleteVote no on the public safety sales tax.
Since KCPD reports to the State let them go to the state for the money.
Mr. Kostar makes great points, however, the urban Hip/Hop Culture of death will continue to thrive.
ReplyDeleteThe BET/MTV/Hollywood glorification of rappers and thugs who violently rape, murder and steal to aquire wealth, will continue (As it has over decades.)to inspire inner city children to not snitch, skip school, hate 'the man' and underachive in all endeavors.
While society continues to make excuses for abhorant behaviour, the fatalities will continue to mount in the face of this movie, any 'peace march', t shirts, chants, slogans and, unfortunatley the best of intentions, including Mr. Kostar's.
Violent offenders understand only one thing. One thing. That one thing is VIOLENCE.
These thugs need to be taken off of the streets forever.
Legalize drugs, kill the incentive for violence, empty out non violent drug offenders from prisons and incarcerate or kill the violent offenders.
This urban cancer has metastasized and must be cut out, or the body will die.
Pollyanna needs to step aside. Bloody, bloody restraint is the only correction left.
One more time.
ReplyDeleteIncarcerate or kill all violent offenders now.
If more of these robbers could get their heads blown off during the holdup, maybe this would stop.
ReplyDeleteI don't care what their problems are. Put 'em in jail or, better yet, they get killed while doing a holdup.
ReplyDeleteBill Kostar is right.
ReplyDeleteFlash mob at The Glenwood premiere night!
ReplyDeleteSeriously tho, it looks like a good doc.
There's no question that there's all kinds of dysfunction and moe than enough irresponsibility to go around in some of our neighborhoods, with parents afraid of their own children, children having kids, drugs the only economic activity, and all the rest.
ReplyDeleteBut we as a society form government at its most basic level to provide some degree of public safety FOR ALL OF US. And when violence is allowed to run riot unchecked, all of us are put at risk. Nelson Hopkins Jr. was murdered near the Rockhurst campus late last year while walking home from the Plaza Library. He would have been salutatorian at his high school and was planning to attend Truman State this fall. Tony Singh was murdered in a robbery AFTER the money had been turned over to the robber. He left two young children to be raised by his brother.
In New York, when crime was running our of control years ago, the government applied the "broken window" strategy which postulates that broken windows, if left unanswered by authority, escalate to fires, theft, and further deterioration.
As I said in the earlier post, KCMO has more than ample resources to address this issue in creative and innovative ways. It's not what you have, it's how high a priority safety is and how those resources are deployed.
Even if the other local institutions still won't step forward, the municipal government and its officials HAVE THE RESPONSIBILITY TO DO SO.
as long as it stays in the urban core, nobody cares. The usual reponse is,"if you don't like it, move"
ReplyDeleteThese are good comments. I have additional suggestions.
ReplyDeleteGangs are criminal organizations. Every known gang member should be arrested & charged with domestic terrorism under the Patriot Act. Also, instead of driving around in fat machines, the police should be walking the streets.
Byron is also absolutely correct.
ReplyDelete12:17. I would have to disagree with you. I live in the far suburbs, but I care about what happens to the inner city. I thought a lot of people do.
Byron is right.
ReplyDeletekc council, mayor and board of police comm. don't support the officers, so i doubt if they are getting out of the cars anytime soon. Community policing is dead, and COMBAT, like aim for peace, is MIA.
ReplyDeleteDoesn't Councilwoman Gottstein support police, firefighters, etc?
ReplyDeleteFor anon 4:38pm
ReplyDeleteWe don't need elected officials to cowtow to specific groups. We need people who insist that the residents of the city are provided the basic services that their taxes pay for.
As for the question; How can you tell?