Welcome to Shelbyville
Welcome to Shelbyville is a glimpse of America at a crossroads. In one small town in the heart of America's Bible Belt in the South, a community grapples with rapidly changing demographics. Just a stone's throw away from Pulaski, Tennessee (the birthplace of the Ku Klux Klan), longtime African-American and White residents are challenged with how best to integrate with a growing Latino population and the more recent arrival of hundreds of Somali refugees of Muslim faith.
Set on the eve of the 2008 US Presidential election, the film captures the interaction between these residents as they navigate new waters against the backdrop of a tumultuous year. The economy is in crisis, factories are closing, and jobs are hard to find. The local Tyson chicken plant is hiring hundreds of new Somali refugees, and when a local reporter initiates a series of articles about these newcomers, a flurry of controversy and debate erupts within the town. Just as the Latino population grapples with its own immigrant identity, African-American residents look back at their segregated past and balance perceived threats to their livelihood and security against the values that they learned through their own long struggle for civil rights. While the newcomers, mostly of Muslim faith, attempt to make new lives for themselves and their children, leaders in this deeply religious community attempt to guide their congregations through this period of unprecedented change.
Through the vibrant and colorful characters of Shelbyville, the film explores immigrant integration and the interplay between race, religion and identity in this dynamic dialogue. The story is an intimate portrayal of a community’s struggle to understand what it means to be American.
Trailer
Credits
Director//Producer/Writer: Kim A. Snyder
Executive Producer: Ellen Schneider
Cinematographer: Greg Poschman
Editor: Jeremiah Zagar
Total Running Time: 70 min.
Website: www.becausefoundation.org/films
Press
Tunji Ajibade, When the US Mission Brought 'Everyday Americans' to Nigeria, The Will, Aug 14, 2010
About The Filmmaker
KIM A. SNYDER is an award-winning documentary filmmaker who most recently co-founded the BeCause Foundation to produce a series of documentaries and inspire social activism through the power of film. The first three short films of the BeCause series--Alone No Love; One Bridge to the Next; Crossing Midnight--have won numerous festival awards and have been the catalyst for campaigns that have significantly furthered the work of the social innovators they highlight. One Bridge to the Next was also selected to be part of the US State Department’s 2009 American Documentary Showcase, which was screened through US embassies worldwide.
Snyder directed and produced the award-winning documentary I Remember Me, which won several festival awards and was distributed theatrically in the US by Zeitgeist Films. She has produced over a dozen short documentaries and has written numerous articles for Variety. In 1994, Snyder associate-produced the Academy Award-winning short film Trevor, directed and produced by Peggy Rajski, which became the cornerstone of The Trevor Project, a national nonprofit organization dedicated to suicide prevention among gay youth. Snyder served on the admissions review committee for New York University’s Graduate Film Program, and has been a producer’s rep for several critically acclaimed foreign films including Crows (New Yorker Films), directed by Dorota Kedzierzawska. Snyder graduated with a masters degree in international affairs from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.