In today’s news cycle, the public tends to learn about youth violence through a steady stream of sound bites, with little else to offer a picture of the larger narrative connecting them.

 

To fill in the gaps, the July 31 screening of the documentary “Lost Friends” at the Tribune Tower offered a more personal story of love, sadness, anger and hope through the eyes of eight local students.

A collaboration between The Mash, True Star and the Chicago Bureau, the film tells us about of some of the youth who have fallen victim to gun violence—a classmate, a mentor, a father—and the people that knew them.

“You read the headlines about young people being shot in Chicago,” True Star executive director DeAnna McLeary told a crowd at the screening. “A lot of times there’s no face to the violence.”

The film was shot throughout various neighborhoods, schools and seasons, giving viewers a clearer sense of the disrupted homes and lives of so many youth. A young woman recalls the colors she and her prom date had chosen for their outfits before he was killed.

Another remembers last seeing her friend at a bonfire and discovering how many people were impacted by her death through Twitter. One woman describes seeing the years-old shooting death of her father featured on a television program that had never contacted the family for consent.

Listen to two students who attended the event, Maya Bryant and Christopher Brown, discuss how they got involved in the film and how they struggled to make sense of their own personal losses:

Maya Bryant, True Star participant and upcoming sophomore at Harold Washington College

Christopher Brown, True Star participant and upcoming junior at Columbia College

Annie Ryan, The Mash Business Manager, Tribune Company

The Mash is the Tribune’s newspaper and website written for teens, by teens. The Chicago Bureau is an investigative and explanatory news start-up focusing on policies that matter to today’s youth.

Susan Du
 wrote in The Chicago Bureau earlier this year that the idea for a film dates back to a Tribune Tower tour of True Star student journalists last year. When students were asked how many had lost someone to gun violence, hands went up around the room. “Those student journalists were folded in to the planning and development process for the documentary,” Du Wrote.

Watch the “Lost Friends” stories now.

Learn more

See more Why News Matters programs, like True Star’s This News Matters, Too program and The Mash’s Behind the Story.

Categories: Good to Know, News & Updates, Program Updates