DETROPIA

A new film from the makers of Jesus Camp

"The most moving documentary I have seen in years. Both an ardent love letter to past vitality and a grateful salute to those who remain in place - the survivors, utterly without illusion, who refuse to leave. The filmmakers are so attuned to color and to shade that I was amazed by the handsomeness of what I was seeing. I'm not being perverse, this is a beautiful film." - David Denby, THE NEW YORKER "Of all the Sundance films tackling the gap between the richest 1% and the rest of the nation, the documentary Detropia stands out for how it encapsulates the causes and potential solutions." - John Horn, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES DETROPIA successfully symbolizes Detroit and nation's anguish. Tom Long, THE DETROIT NEWS "This haunting piece of documentary cinema tells the story of one city in economic decay; but really, as the real people in the film repeatedly state, this isn't just a Detroit problem; it's an American problem." -Tambay, INDIEWIRE Imagine if Frederick Wiseman and David Lynch had a bastard child, and you'll get a sense of the movie's off-kilter aesthetic, a potent and pointed mix of firsthand observation and surreal flights of fancy. Keith Uhlich, TIME OUT NEW YORK

Production Notes
2012 SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL FILM GUIDE SYNOPSIS Detroits story has encapsulated the iconic narrative of America over the last century the Great Migration of African Americans escaping Jim Crow; the rise of manufacturing and the middle class; the love affair with automobiles; the flowering of the American dream; and now . . . the collapse of the economy and the fading American mythos. With its vivid, painterly palette and haunting score, DETROPIA sculpts a dreamlike collage of a grand city teetering on the brink of dissolution. As houses are demolished by the thousands, automobile-company wages plummet, institutions crumble, and tourists gawk at the charming decay, the films vibrant, gutsy characters glow and erupt like flames from the ashes. These soulful pragmatists and stalwart philosophers strive to make ends meet and make sense of it all, refusing to abandon hope or resistance. Their grit and pluck embody the spirit of the Motor City as it struggles to survive postindustrial America and begins to envision a radically different future. LOG LINE The woes of Detroit are emblematic of the collapse of the U.S. manufacturing base. Is the Midwestern icon actually a canary in the American coalmine? DETROPIA is a cinematic tapestry of a city and its people who refuse to leave the building, even as the flames are rising. RECENT NEWS AND UPDATES: Facing a $12 billion dollar deficit (partly due to a dwindled tax base) Detroit narrowly averted bankruptcy in April 2012 by entering into a consent agreement, or a power sharing deal with the state. In May 2012 Detroit announced it would shut off half its streetlights due to budget woes. In June 2012 169 fire fighters were laid off. One month later the Department of Homeland Security gave a $22 million dollar grant to rehire 100 of them. 15 bus lines have been cut in Detroit since 2011. In May, DDOT (Detroit Department of Transportation) eliminated nighttime bus service and cut service hours on 34 weekday routes and 29 weekend routes despite the fact that 1/3 of Detroiters do not own a car (Huffington Post). In June the city imposed a 10% wage cut for all public workers, including police and fire. The police force recently increased their regular shift from 8 to 12 hours a day. The Detroit Opera continues to function after it narrowly avoided closure in 2011. The company was able to raise $6 million dollars from supporters as well as persuade the banks to forgive a portion of its debt. After stalling for several months, Mayor Bings Detroit Works Project has re-launched and is currently holding community conversations to get feedback from residents on the best uses of excess land. There is no longer talk of an official relocation of residents. American Axle and the UAW did not reach an agreement and the company announced it would close the last remaining plant in Detroit. A local pickle company is now renting some parts of the factory.

POPULATION AND DOWNSIZING: In 1930, Detroit was the fastest growing city in the world. (The Guardian) Detroit's population shrank by more than 25% in the last decade. The city's population has fallen from over 1.85 million in 1950 to 713,777 in 2010; a drop of almost 240,000 residents in ten years 100,000 more than Katrina-ravaged New Orleans. (The New York Times) In the last 10 years Detroit experienced a 59 percent increase in the number of college-educated residents under the age of 35 moving to its downtown. (The New York Times) Detroit has about 40,000 abandoned homes and 100,000 vacant residential lots. (The New York Times) The average price for a home in Detroit is $7,100, down from $73,000 three years earlier. (The Wall Street Journal) With more than 20 percent of the lots in the 139-square-mile city vacant, the mayor is in the midst of a program to demolish 10,000 empty residential buildings (The New York Times) In June 2011 Five Detroit based companies, led by Quicken Loans CEO Dan Gilbert launched Live Downtown, a program that offers financial incentives to employees who buy homes and rent apartments in the boundaries of Detroit. Gilbert moved the headquarters of Quicken Loans to Detroit in late 2010 along with 1700 employees. Officially, Detroit's unemployment rate is just under 30 percent. But the city's mayor and local leaders put the actual jobless is closer to 50 percent. (The Detroit News) In May 2011, the FBIs list of the 25 most dangerous cities has Detroit as #2 after Flint, Michigan. (CNN) The median Detroit home price in 2011 was about $54,000 more than $100,000 less than the rest of the country.

MANUFACTURING: In the last ten years, Michigan has lost 50% of its manufacturing jobs. (CNBC) Six and a half million blacks left the South from 1910 to 1970 and became known as the Great Migration. In 1965, manufacturing accounted for 53 percent of the economy in the United States. By 1988 it only accounted for 39 percent, and in 2004, it accounted for just 9 percent. For the first time since the Industrial Revolution, fewer than 10 percent of American workers are now employed in manufacturing. (The Economist) 50,000 US factories have closed in the last ten years (The Washington Times). In late 2011 and early 2012 The Big 3 began hiring again as car sales began to rise. Over 40,000 jobs have been added to the economy including parts manufacturers. Still, the country has lost over 600,000 manufacturing jobs overall since January 2009 (Washington Post). China has a 113 million strong manufacturing workforce with an average wage of 81 cents-per-hour, just three percent of their U.S. counterparts pay. (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics) Mexicos 10.7 million industrial workers average just $2.92 per hour. (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.)

The number one American export to China is scrap metal. (US International Trade Commission)

THE AUTO INDUSTRY: In1979 G.M. employed 600,000 Americans. Today it employs around 79,000. Since 2007, G.M. has bought out nearly half of its workers in the US, a total of more than 50,000 people. GM currently hires about 8,000 people in Detroit. (The New York Times). In the late 1970s, G.M. controlled nearly half of the United States vehicle market. Since then, the influx of robust foreign competitors like Toyota, Honda, and Nissan has cut G.M.s sales to about a quarter of the American market. (The New York Times) UAW membership has dropped 42 percent since 2004. About 9% of Americans are currently members of any union. (Reuters) China became the world's largest car market in 2009. (The Guardian) In Sept. 2011, Chinas Ministry of Industry and Information Technology refused to let the Chevy Volt qualify for subsidies ($19,300 per car) unless GM agreed to transfer the engineering secrets of one of the Volts three main technologies to a joint venture in China with a Chinese automaker. The flap resulted in an agreement between GM and Chinese automaker SAIC to co-produce a new electric vehicle together, in China (The Wall Street Journal /The New York Times). The recent turnaround in the auto industry brought about by the government bailout has brought Michigans jobless rate from 14% to 9.5%. Little of that has trickled to Detroiters, where the jobless rate is estimated to be at least 40%. The Chrysler 200 featured in the Eminem Imported from Detroit Chrysler ad is made in the suburbs of Detroit and the Chrysler 300 and the Town and Country are made across the river in Ontario, Canada.

JOB LOSS AND OUTSOURCING: Over the last 10 years, U.S. multinational corporations slashed 2.9 million American jobs, while creating 2.4 million jobs overseas. (The Wall Street Journal) The United States is the only major nation that refuses to offer tax and other incentives to manufacturers who set up shop on American soil. (The Wall Street Journal) 100% net job growth in the US today comes from entrepreneurial start ups (The Wall Street Journal)

EDUCATION: Nearly half the adult population of Detroit is functionally illiterate. (The Windsor Star) 11 percent of Detroits adults have college degrees. (The New York Times) The state took over the Detroit public schools in 2009 Detroit closed 70 public schools in 2010. A current plan calls for the closure of 70 more by 2014, leaving only 72 public schools in Detroit. (CNN)

ARTS FUNDING: Over the last decade, the portion of corporate philanthropy dedicated to the arts has dropped by more than half. 31 states, still staggered by the recession, cut their arts budgets for the 2012 fiscal year (The New York Times

In Detroit, with the Big 3 scaling back charitable donations, Toyota, Nissan and Hyundai of South Korea are becoming more a part of the city's social fabric by supporting local charities, sponsoring teams like the Red Wings. (The New York Times)

ABOUT THE SUBJECTS TOMMY STEPHENS: Retired School Teacher, owner of the Raven Lounge. Mr. Stephens, mid 60s, has seen in Detroit for over 40 years. He is the owner of several homes in Detroit (which he renovates and rents) and the owner of the Raven Lounge on Detroits East side. Open just 2 nights a week, the club is in the shadow of the Detroit Hamtramck assembly plant. GEORGE MCGREGOR: President of Local 22. George (in his early 60s), was born in Tennessee. He arrived in Detroit in 1967 during the riots as part of the Army unit dispatched to restore calm to the city. When his service was done in 1968 he returned to Detroit and began working in the plants and worked his way up the ranks of the UAW. CRYSTAL STARR: Blogger. Age 28, Crystal is the barista at Caf 1515, where she holds a new monthly salon called Culturenomics. She is also an aspiring poet. She and her family are from Southwest Detroit. DAVID DICHERA: General Director, Michigan Opera Theater. Founded the Michigan Opera Theater in 1971. With the help of local supporters and Luciano Pavarotti, took a long ago shuttered triple X movie palace and restored it to create the Detroit Opera House, finished in April 1996. STEVE AND DOROTA COY: Artists. Both in their late 20s Steve and Dorota Coy are a married couple and visual and performance artists who have lived in Detroit for a few years. Together they make up The Hygenic Dress League, an art project meant to send up capitalism and corporate America. ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS HEIDI EWING Director/Producer Heidi Ewing was born and raised in the Detroit area around a family manufacturing business. DETROPIA is her fourth feature length documentary film and is close to her heart. She and her directing partner Rachel Grady are best known for directing Jesus Camp, a searing look at the Christian right through the eyes of children. The film was nominated for the 2007 Academy Award for Documentary Feature. The duo made their feature doc debut with The Boys of Baraka in 2005., a touching movie that follows inner city boys to a boarding school in rural Kenya. The film was nominated for an Emmy and aired on POV. The directing team recently collaborated with other high profile nonfiction filmmakers for the 2009 omnibus documentary film Freakonomics: The Movie, based on the best-selling book. Their controversial 12th & Delaware, a searing portrait of the battle between a crisis pregnancy center and an abortion clinic, debuted at Sundance in 2010, won a Peabody Award and aired on HBO. RACHEL GRADY Director/Producer A private investigator turned filmmaker, Rachel Grady has produced and directed a wide variety of documentaries for HBO, PBS, The Discovery Channel, MTV and A&E. She and her directing partner Heidi Ewing co-directed The Boys of Baraka, the critically acclaimed documentary feature that won a 2006 NAACP Image Award and was nominated for an Emmy. Her feature documentary, Jesus Camp, also co-directed with Ewing, chronicles the Evangelical movement through the eyes of children. The film was nominated for an Academy Award. In 2007 Grady and Ewing also collaborated with several high profile nonfiction filmmakers for the omnibus documentary film Freakonomics: The Movie, based on the bestselling book. Gradys last documentary, 12th & Delaware, co-directed with Ewing and winner of a Peabody Award, is a searing portrait of a street corner in Fort Pierce, Florida, where a pro-life crisis pregnancy center and an abortion clinic are locked in battle. ENAT SIDI Editor Enat Sidi received the editing award for DETROPIA at the Sundance Film Festival, 2012. She has collaborated with Loki Films for over 10 years, and has edited all of the company's feature films to date (Jesus Camp, The Boys of Baraka, 12th & Delaware and now, DETROPIA). Sidi also edited many other

prestigious and high profile films, including The Betrayal (nominated for an Academy Award) and the popular documentary hit Billy the Kid. She is a native of Tel Aviv but cant wait to visit Detroit live and in person. TONY HARDMON Cinematographer Tony Hardmon is a veteran DP who has collaborated with many acclaimed documentarians. His recent feature documentary credits include Stacy Peralta's Crips and Bloods: Made in America and Michael Moore's Sicko. Other credits include A Walk to Beautiful and Boomtown. Hardmon was the director of photography on The Boys of Baraka and Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady's segment of Freakanomics: The Movie. He was an additional cinematographer on 12th & Delaware and the Academy Award nominated Jesus Camp. He recently made his directorial debut with Semper Fi: Always Faithful. CRAIG ATKINSON Producer, Cinematographer Craig Atkinson is originally from Detroit and has worked closely with Loki Films for the past three years in various roles, including on 12th & Delaware, Freakonomics: The Movie, and True Life: Saudi Arabia. He holds an MFA in Film from Emerson College in Boston. DETROPIA is his first documentary credit with the role of cinematographer.

DETROPIA IS NOW PLAYING IN THEATERS NATIONWIDE: FOR MORE INFORMATION GO TO www.detropiathefilm.com