The relationship between life and art is a complicated one. Does life imitate art or art imitate life? Well, they certainly influence each other. In the world of film, filmmakers are often inspired to create out of a sense of injustice or inequality in the hope that they can move their audience enough to change the way things are, to right the wrongs they see in the world. And I imagine it’s very difficult to know if they’ve succeeded. It’s rare that a specific film can claim credit for making some kind of tangible, measurable difference in the world.
This is one such film. It saved a life.
The Paradise Lost trilogy of documentaries spans 17 years, investigating the murders of three boys and the unjust incarceration of three more boys for those murders. But that brief description is not accurate because these films not only documented this tragic story, they became a part of it.
Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory begins by recounting the events of the first two films. But it’s not long before the films themselves become a player in this third documentary. It’s fascinating how much publicity these films generated for the so-called West Memphis Three (Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin, and Jessie Misskelley, Jr.), publicity that led directly to the establishment of a donation-based defense fund that ultimately righted the wrong that occurred in 1994 when these boys were convicted.
But these “boys” are men now, having spent half their lives in prison. The contrast between who they were when they went in and who they are now is striking. That’s not to say that prison ruined them. They still seem to be of much the same temperament, gentle and quiet. But they seem so naive in the early footage of the first trial. As adults they’ve become much, much wiser. Most notably, they do not think of themselves as victims. They’re able to see life from a wiser perspective than most of us.
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