Anise Starr's Blog: Movies, Books, & Other Musings.

The Laramie Project depicts the events surrounding the 1998 beating death of Matthew Shepard in Laramie, Wyoming. Matthew Shepard was a 21-year-old homosexual man who was beaten into a coma and left tied to a fence by 2 male teenagers that he had left a bar with. He eventually died as a result of the terrible beating he sustained. This film was done in a very interesting way - it has a stellar cast of actors turning in marvelous performances but it is done in the style of a documentary. It is the true story of a playwright and his theatre group who traveled to Laramie and interviewed the people surrounding the case as well as the residents of the town as to how the incident affected them and Laramie as a whole. The script of this film uses the actual transcripts of the real people who were interviewed. Matthew Shepard himself is never seen during the film but that does not make it any less powerful and intense.

The transcripts are brought to life brilliantly by a collection of actors including Peter Fonda, Steve Buscemi, Camryn Manheim, Laura LInney, Jeremy Davies, Janeanne Garafolo, Nestor Carbonell, Michael Emerson, Clea Duvall, and Frances Sternhagen. Some of the most jarring and disturbing scenes are when we hear the descriptions from the bicyclist who discovered Shepard's unconscious body tied to the fence and the first officer who arrived on the scene and tried to save Shepard. Things grew more intense as that very officer, Reggie Fluty, is later informed by the hospital that Shepard was infected with HIV and that she was at risk of having contracted the virus because she had handled Shepard's bloody face and body with no protective gloves and had some small cuts on her hands.

The realism of this film is strongly felt and no punches are softened, so to speak. While the majority of the residents of Laramie condemned the crime, we also hear from those who felt that Shepard, as a homosexual, deserved what happened to him. Indeed the issue of homosexuality itself is a major factor in how some people perceived the Shepard case and is covered from many sides in this film. Most of the straight residents stated that they had nothing against homosexuals, some even had a 'don't ask don't tell' attitude about it. We hear homosexual citizens of Laramie describe their experiences in such a small town and how the Shepard case affected them. We also hear from some straight residents who felt that unfair attention and sympathy was given to Shepard just because he was homosexual and that the homosexual community around the country was milking this case to gain sympathy and acceptance. Sherry Johnson lamented that one of her husband's patrol officer colleagues was killed on the same night that Shepard was beaten and the officer's death went largely unnoticed compared to the treatment that Shepard received. We also see startling scenes of ultra-conservative Rev.Fred Phelps and his followers protesting Shepard's funeral with signs with such slogans as "Matt in Hell" and "AIDS cures fags" .

The film also uses real footage from news stories during the unfolding of the Shepard case as well as footage from the mass vigils that were held around the US in protest of hate crimes. Although I well remember the case when it was happening in 1998, I had not been aware of many of the details and this film expertly covered the case. It is a very interesting, powerful film and of course at times shocking and disturbing, I would recommend it to anyone interested in learning about the case of Matthew Shepard, a crime in a small town that reverberated around the US.

Tags: jeremy davies, the laramie project
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