Shouting Fire: Stories from the Edge of Free Speech is a 2009

2009 in film

The year 2009 saw the release of many films. Seven made the top 50 list of highest-grossing films, and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced that as of this year, their Best Picture category would consist of ten nominees, rather than five .- Highest-grossing films :Please note...

 documentary film

Documentary film

Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...

 about freedom of speech

Freedom of speech

Freedom of speech is the freedom to speak freely without censorship. The term freedom of expression is sometimes used synonymously, but includes any act of seeking, receiving and imparting information or ideas, regardless of the medium used...

 and the First Amendment

First Amendment to the United States Constitution

The First Amendment to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights. The amendment prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of the press, interfering...

 in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, directed by Liz Garbus

Liz Garbus

Liz Garbus is an award-winning documentary film director and producer. Her most recent film, Bobby Fischer Against the World, opened the Premiere Documentary Section of the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, reserved for master American documentary filmmakers...

. The documentary prominently features First Amendment attorney, Martin Garbus

Martin Garbus

Martin Garbus is an American attorney. He has tried cases throughout the country involving constitutional, criminal, copyright, and intellectual property law. He has appeared before the United States Supreme Court as well as trial and appellate courts throughout the United States...

, who talks about the past and present state of free speech in the United States, and the case of Ward Churchill

Ward Churchill

Ward LeRoy Churchill is an author and political activist. He was a professor of ethnic studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder from 1990 to 2007. The primary focus of his work is on the historical treatment of political dissenters and Native Americans by the United States government...

. A tenured professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado, Churchill was fired after publishing a controversial article about the 9/11 attacks and being investigated for academic misconduct related to other issues. The film also explores the cases of Debbie Almontaser

Debbie Almontaser

Debbie Almontaser is a Muslim teacher of Yemeni descent who was the founding principal of the Khalil Gibran International Academy, a New York Arab-themed public school, named after the Christian Arab poet, Khalil Gibran.-Biography:Debbie Almontaser is the founding and former principal of the...

, Chase Harper, and protesters

2004 Republican National Convention protest activity

2004 Republican National Convention protest activity includes the broad range of marches, rallies, performances, demonstrations, exhibits, and acts of civil disobedience in New York City to protest the 2004 Republican National Convention and the nomination of President George W. Bush for the 2004 U.S...

 at the 2004 Republican National Convention

2004 Republican National Convention

The 2004 Republican National Convention, the presidential nominating convention of the Republican Party of the United States, took place from August 30 to September 2, 2004 at Madison Square Garden in New York City, New York...

 in New York City. Those interviewed include historians, legal scholars and attoreys, such as Floyd Abrams

Floyd Abrams

Floyd Abrams is an American attorney at Cahill Gordon & Reindel. He is an expert on constitutional law, and many arguments in the briefs he has written before the United States Supreme Court have been adopted as United States Constitutional interpretative law as it relates to the First Amendment...

, David Horowitz

David Horowitz

David Joel Horowitz is an American conservative writer and policy advocate. Horowitz was raised by parents who were both members of the American Communist Party. Between 1956 and 1975, Horowitz was an outspoken adherent of the New Left before rejecting Marxism completely...

, Eric Foner

Eric Foner

Eric Foner is an American historian. On the faculty of the Department of History at Columbia University since 1982, he writes extensively on political history, the history of freedom, the early history of the Republican Party, African American biography, Reconstruction, and historiography...

, Donna Lieberman, Daniel Pipes

Daniel Pipes

Daniel Pipes is an American historian, writer, and political commentator. He is the founder and director of the Middle East Forum and its Campus Watch project, and editor of its Middle East Quarterly journal...

, Richard Posner

Richard Posner

Richard Allen Posner is an American jurist, legal theorist, and economist who is currently a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago and a Senior Lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School...

, Kenneth Starr

Kenneth Starr

Kenneth Winston "Ken" Starr is an American lawyer and educational administrator who has also been a federal judge. He is best known for his investigation of figures during the Clinton administration....

 and Josh Wolf

Josh Wolf

Josh Wolf is a journalist and video blogger.Josh Wolf is also the name of:* Josh Wolf , comic appearing on season 4 of Last Comic Standing...

.

External links

• HBO Films' Shouting Fire: Stories from the Edge of Free Speech