Documentary Takes On Homelessness in America — Here’s How
By Movieguide® Contributor
Homelessness is at an all-time high in America, and a new movie hopes to shed light on the issue.
Security.org reported, “The homelessness rate in 2023 is also the largest number the agency has seen throughout its 18-year history of taking surveys on homelessness. On top of that, homeless people in 2023 represented 0.19 percent of the national population that year – the highest rate since 2012.”
That means approximately “653,104 Americans were homeless.”
This is a crisis Jennifer Stolo, CEO and producer at Robert Craig Films, couldn’t ignore.
“Really our goal is to bring about more empathy and more compassion around the causes that we bring forward with the power of film,” Stolo told Movieguide® of her documentary AMERICANS WITH NO ADDRESS. “So, many of us have had some personal connections, so we really felt powerful when we read the screenplay for the actual film and then actually created a documentary for it as well.”
The AMERICANS WITH NO ADDRESS documentary highlights the real-world issues that the feature film, NO ADDRESS, dramatizes.
Stolo and her team wanted the project to feel authentic.
“It is a fictional movie,” she said. “It is based on true events, however we wanted to make sure it didn’t into a cheesy Hollywood type feel and look. So, it was really important for us to research, really understand, and see firsthand the American crisis across the country.”
To do that, the team “spent three weeks on a bus touring 20 major cities across 18 states to capture the essence of what is causing the homeless crisis in America and produced their findings in the AMERICANS WITH NO ADDRESS documentary.
“The team interviewed policy leaders, mission directors, clinical specialists, CEOs of national nonprofits, executive directors of local and regional nonprofits, influencers, those who had experienced homelessness, and those who were still struggling. Trauma, mental health, substance abuse, lack of affordable housing, and economics are all factors for the drastic increase in homelessness in our country,” the website explains. “Several scenes from the feature film NO ADDRESS appear in the documentary, providing a narrative perspective of these various issues.”
Movieguide® previously reported on Robert Craig Films’ initiatives to fight homelessness:
Robert Craig Films is launching a new initiative to help combat homelessness in the United States.
“In a continuation of the mission to bring awareness and solutions to homelessness in America, Robert Craig Films is announcing the release of an Interactive Study Guide, which will be widely available on March 5, 2024 titled, ‘No Address,’” a press release reported.
“This is an important part of ‘The Big 5’ solutions for homelessness born from the Robert Craig Films – produced, award-winning AMERICANS WITH NO ADDRESS documentary and NO ADDRESS movie.”
The group’s mission is to “develop, create, and produce films that inspire the audience to engage with greater empathy, compassion, and generosity in the communities they live in.”