Brian Douglas
I got a strange feeling watching The Public at the Madison Public Library. I wondered who the movie’s intended audience is.
The Public, written and directed by Emilio Estevez (who broke out in the 1980s in The Breakfast Club), takes place at the central branch of the Cincinnati Public Library. Estevez himself plays the lead role, a librarian who engages on a daily basis with patrons who experience homelessness. On a night of record-shattering cold, people scramble for accommodation as shelters fill up, finally pleading with the librarian to keep the library open as an emergency shelter. In face of opposition from the library management, Estevez eventually leads a grassroots sit-in occupation at the library. A tense situation ensues, and negotiations with the police begin as the media spins it as a hostage situation.
The film challenges preconceived biases against people experiencing homelessness and showcases the diversity among them. It portrays them as victims of institutional failures: veterans neglected by the government, people with mental health issues with inadequate health care, law-abiding citizens whose only trouble with authorities comes from when they’re looking for a place to sleep at night. At the same time, it tackles the stereotypical image of the stoic individual enduring poverty or mental illness, affording them genuine humanity by showing that they, too, express a full range of emotions — sadness, anger, concern, humor and happiness. The characters retain some level of agency and dignity. For the audience, it renews a sense of hope for social mobility. For example, Estevez’s librarian reveals that he has experienced homelessness, and that books helped him get sober and land him a job at the library. Others write letters to relatives, help pick up books other patrons have left out, use public computers to go on online dating sites — just as less marginalized patrons of the library community do.
At its core, The Public reflects a growing reality in California and Washington, D.C. and elsewhere in the country; it’s a story about the half million people who sometimes turn to libraries in their daily search for accommodation. It’s an entertaining feel-good drama — almost a bit simplistic for a complex issue like this — packed into a 122-minute cinematic experience. But it’s just that — a cinematic experience.
I attended a media screening at the Central Library on March 20 on behalf of Isthmus. For a movie that explores the entangled relationship between homelessness and libraries, hosting a pre-release screening for journalists like myself and a small public audience felt oddly exclusive. There’s something strange about watching a film that describes a reality unfolding just outside the room, in the main halls of the library. As I sat front row in a room full of mostly white, educated viewers who had secured free tickets on Eventbrite, I couldn’t help but ask: Who is this movie for?
At times, it seems as though the answer is it’s for anyone except the marginalized people in whose narratives the film anchors itself.
“Libraries are one of the last institutions in our society where all the different socioeconomic classes can come together in the same place. There are very few places left where you’re going to find rich people and middle-class people and homeless people in the same room, potentially interacting,” Ryan Dowd, author of The Librarian’s Guide to Homelessness and consultant for the film, said after the screening. “When we lose those spaces — we used to have more — it’s really bad for our democracy. When middle-class and wealthy people never get to interact with poor people and homeless people, they make really lousy policy decisions on behalf of people that are marginalized.”
If politicians who are out of touch with people outside their elite circle make poor policy decisions, then what type of decisions do filmmakers like Estevez, an embodiment of Hollywood success, make when controlling the narrative of individuals experiencing homelessness?
While well-intentioned, The Public at its best encourages its viewers to empathize and to examine their own privilege. But real change demands more — perhaps a bit more interaction with those whose stories the movie narrates. Presumably, even socially conscious filmmakers must think about profits, but non-ticketed screenings in public venues could go a long way to reach more people whose real lives involve insecurity and marginalization.
After all, the film is called The Public.
The Public is currently showing at New Vision Theatres in Fitchburg and at AMC Classic Desert Star, outside Wisconsin Dells.
