New Documentary Explores Wisdom Found Among Janitors
At the last (OS1) Coach Class, we had the oppurtunity of previewing the new documentary flim by Patrick Shen, The Philosohper Kings. The film is all about Janitors employed at American Universities. A topic close to our hearts here at ManageMen. We would like to share more information about the film with the cleaning industry. Please check out the press realease below:
Transcendental Media is proud to announce the World Premiere of THE PHILOSOPHER KINGS at the 2009 AFI/Discovery Channel Silverdocs Film Festival. In search of wisdom found in unlikely places, THE PHILOSOPHER KINGS takes us on a journey through the halls of the most prestigious colleges and universities in America to learn from the staff members who see it all and have been through it all: the custodians.
“They are everywhere – in every business, on every campus – yet they’re totally unseen. How many encounters do we have with people everyday yet not really see them? Too many to count probably. There’s a disconnect there somewhere and I wanted to call attention to that somehow with this film”, says director Patrick Shen.
THE PHILOSOPHER KINGS interweaves the musings of eight unique custodians as they discuss their triumphs and tragedies and the life lessons learned as a result of these experiences. "The Philosopher Kings highlights some extraordinary individuals who have experienced a lot of hardship in their lives”, explains co-producer Greg Bennick. “Hardship and suffering is at the heart of our experience on this earth. The film is just as much about embracing this fact as it is about the story of these unseen custodians.”
Filming for THE PHILOSOPHER KINGS didn’t just take place in the rooms and halls of universities – it takes viewers into the homes of these custodians, follows them in their pursuit of better lives, accompanies them to the decaying homes of their childhood and even the final resting places of family members in an attempt to put old ghosts to rest.
Among the extraordinary individuals featured in the film is Josue Laujenesse who is the portrait of a quiet and selfless hero. Custodian at Princeton University by day and taxi cab driver by night, Josue works nearly twenty hours a day in order to send enough money home to family in his native Haiti, the poorest nation in the western hemisphere.
“We found ourselves in a remote village in the middle of the jungles of Haiti, where Josue was raised and where his family currently resides”, explains director Patrick Shen. “We feared for our lives every second we were in Haiti, a country known for frequent kidnappings of Americans and whose capital is considered one of the most dangerous places on the planet, but it was possibly one of the most incredibly exciting and rewarding experiences we’ve ever had.”
In the remote village of Lasource in Haiti, the filmmakers found themselves among a small, impoverished community of Haitians surviving in large part due to Josue’s efforts to improve living conditions there. Josue has been working for the past three years to bring running water to the families there by financing the construction of a simple plumbing system, consisting of a pump and approximately twenty-five miles of PVC pipe that carries water from a nearby mountain into Lasource. The filmmakers are currently seeking non-profit organizations to partner with to help Josue expand his project to bring water to the rest of the village.
THE PHILOSOPHER KINGS is one of eleven films in the festival’s line-up to compete for Silverdoc’s prestigious Sterling U.S. Feature Award, which was awarded to Oscar- nominated documentary The Garden in 2008. Silverdocs has been hailed as the “pre- eminent U.S. documentary festival” (Screen International) and will be premiering THE PHILOSOPHER KINGS on June 18 at 7:15pm in the AFI Silver Theatre in Silver Spring, Maryland. An encore screening is scheduled for June 21 at 1:15pm.
For more information on The Philosopher Kings: http://www.philosopherkingsmovie.com