Slam: The Book

by Richard Stratton (Editor)

Directed by award-winning documentary filmmaker Marc Levin, Slam came in under the radar to become the surprise hit of Sundance. A gritty, inspiring portrait of urban poverty and the redemptive power of art, "Slam . . . seizes hold of your imagination", wrote Sundance juror Owen Gleiberman in Entertainment Weekly. "It's the kind of movie that makes you believe in movies". Set in a war-zone housing project known as Dodge City and in the infamous Washington, D.C., city jail, Slam tells the story of Ray Joshua, a talented young poet and rapper who is busted on petty drug charges and sucked into the black hole of the criminal justice system. In jail, Ray meets Lauren, a volunteer teaching a writing class for prisoners. She encourages Ray m use his gift to give voice to the anguish of a generation of young men who have been thrown away. The Book is more than just a screenplay. It also contains the poetry featured in the film, as well as behind-the-scenes filmmakers' and actors' diaries telling the story of the making of Slam in a two-week guerrilla shoot inside the walls of the D.C. jail and on the killing streets of the Anacostia housing projects in southeast Washington, D.C.

288 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1998

Reviews

[Cynicali · Rating 4 out of 5]

The movie was my introduction to slam poetry, an event that I consider (with no amount of hyperbole) to have changed my life.

This only adds. The diaries of those involved in the making of the film only serve to propel the story forward. Life becoming art imitating life.

Simply wonderful, by the spoon or the pint.