Imagine what your life would be like if you were imprisoned.
Not the fictionalized prison you’re shown on TV, but a real prison, a prison of the everyday. A prison of the minutia. A space where you lose your freedom of movement, your freedom of choice, your privacy and to a large extent your identity.
“five prison stories” relays five stories about life in prison. It does so in an understated, matter of fact, yet private and sometimes almost humourous way. Schwenk gives us insight into a way of living and a space that most people have no exposure to, or experience with.
The stories are told in the third person by a prison guard and are set against images and footage of the inside of a prison. The stories are titled:
- “visiting you on table 33”
- “They did have pottery and a kiln”
- “It’s not homosexuality. Its jail sex”
- “There was excessive use, not for the purposes they were intended.”
- “At least you are giving people contact.”
The film makes the inaccessible accessible in a simple and engaging way.
This work is part of the larger project called, “Sometimes awful things have their own kind of beauty” that tells stories about prisons and people committed in asylums in a beautifully simple, yet powerful way.