Where does forgiveness come from? From whom, why, and how? Is there room for redemption in this world, and how can one receive this redemption?

The documentary Shakespeare Behind Bars (2005) shows how 20 prisoners at the Luther Luckett Correctional Complex, a medium-security prison in Kentucky, grapple with these questions as they juggle the themes of forgiveness and redemption in Shakespeare’s play, The Tempest. The prisoners choose their own roles, many of them opting for characters that have uncanny similarities with their own lives. And through the work of preparing and performing The Tempest, the prisoners not only develop a sensitivity to language and theater, but also struggle through the psychological and emotional tensions in their own lives.

By a stripped-down, bare-bones description, Shakespeare Behind Bars is an educational program run by Curt Tofteland, a theater director who works with 20 or so inmates at this prison every year to put on a Shakespeare play. Yet this program does so much more than simply introduce inmates to Shakespeare or to acting. While forcing the participants to examine the ideas of forgiveness and redemption on a bigger scale beyond their own personal lives, engagin with The Tempest also makes the participants — many of whom have committed very heinous crimes — deal with these themes on a harrowingly personal level.

The documentary gives us a poignant look at the humanity of these inmates. We see them develop a love of language, of the craft of theater. We see them grapple with their own self-hatred, their own efforts to determine what forgiveness is and who deserves it. We see their regret over their past actions and their desire to somehow make amends.

Yet Shakespeare Behind Bars is not a simple indictment of the current prison system, or an appeal for less-stringent prison sentences, or even an argument to reconsider the sentences of these specific prisoners. The most disturbing aspect of the film are the uneasy paradoxes of our prison system that’re laid bare. We see the humanity, the creativity, the beauty of these men, who voice their desires to be free, to try to at least make amends and contribute to society in some way. Yet these men are murderers and rapists, whose re-integration into society is likely to be highly tempestuous, perhaps even ruinous. Even during the course of the documentary’s filming, two of the men break the rules of the prison system. These men are put into a solitary confinement — one even transferred to a maximum security prison — for stepping outside the bounds, no longer able to participate even in the play, let alone life outside the prison walls.

In fact, the film is, in many ways, less about these inmates than about the attitudes of the viewer. Who do YOU think is worthy of forgiveness? Who are YOU willing to forgive, and why?

The most difficult moment in the film for me is when one inmate speaks heartwrenchingly and articulately about how he’s now defined by the worst thing he’s ever done in his life. He just desires to do SOMETHING in this world, so that when one looks at the totalily of his life, he’ll be able to just “make the scales balance” somehow. The moment’s a real tearjerker, a sudden glimpse into the man’s humanity and his inner turmoil — and really, his love of the human consciousness beyond himself.

Yet one is left wondering what exactly a man could do to redeem himself after sexually molesting 7 girls. What exactly could this SOMETHING be that would allow the man to balance the scales now? Many of us can’t conceive of a life in which you give up any hope of being remembered for something good, but instead lead a life under the pressure of simply trying to even out the scales.

It’s possible that this film touched me more than others, simply due to the fact that I’m a grad student in the English department. I first read The Tempest for a grad-level class examinining post-colonial literature, which, in retrospect, sucked all the human pain an pleasure out of the play. This documentary made me realize how valuable, and how human, literature really is.

Thanks to Ironweed (covered here) for introducing me to this film.

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