Emanuel

I thought this doc took a horrible tragedy and told the amazing story of love that you never see in the headlines. I want to thank the victims families for opening their hearts to share an experience that was impossible to talk about and relive.

This is one of the best documentaries that I have seen in years. An unspeakable tragedy tranformed into a story about love, hope, and forgiveness.

Emanuel is a documentary that assembles eyewitness accounts and found footage to tell the tragic but also astonishing story of the Charleston Church Shooting.

What begins as a harrowing account of deliberate violence to stir up racial tension sets up an expectation of snowballing violence. Surprisingly the anger, hatred and rage that could have been expressed transforms into a powerful expression of forgiveness and peace.

The film has an understated tone where the facts speak powerfully for themselves. Emanuel tackles a difficult subject that the director navigates wisely and artfully. The result is an experience that is riveting to watch and profound in its meaning.

This is one of the most important documentaries I've ever seen. To be honest, there are moments that are difficult to watch as it demands that you engage with the story - the brokenness of humanity and what it means to look it in the face. It's not a film you watch and forget about. It powerfully tells of one of the most wicked hate crimes in recent American history - the murder of nine African Americans by a white supremacist during a Bible study. While it dives into the historical and systematic issues at play, the film doesn't dwell on the details of the evil of that night too much. As it begins driving home it's purpose, you hear story after story directly from the victims' families about the forgiveness that this evil was met with in the midst of their grief. It's a powerful display of a costly and difficult forgiveness and the ways that it can drive out fear and produce hope. It's stories like these that remind us that evil doesn't have to have the final say.

A must watch!!

I was deeply moved by the powerful real-life story of people choosing forgiveness over hate. In a world that seems more divided than ever before, it was so beautiful to see how the people of Charleston came together after a horrific shooting. After seeing this film you can walk away with a feeling of hope as it offers a path forward. You won't regret a single minute you spend watching this documentary.