A plague of child labor affects 246

million children. These are not part-

time workers, these are kids for
whom life is nothing but work. Little
kids . . . teenagers, all have had
their childhoods stolen from them
and have no hope for the future, no
chance for an education or a decent
life. They are hidden in fields, back
rooms, on fishing platforms, in
brothels, in factories - exploited
and often enslaved. Every country
we filmed in had some good people
trying to help, and successful
programs for change - but the task
is overwhelming. Child laborers are
victims of poverty, prejudice,
economic policy and international
profiteering. But when the children
speak for themselves, it is impossible copyright Romano/Stolen Childhoods
not to listen and not to act. These
children are resilient. They deserve
a chance. We hope that STOLEN
CHILDHOODS will allow them to be
heard, will reveal working solutions
and inspire the determination to
offer a decent life to all of our
children.

- Len Morris, Director

 ANECDOTAL ACCOUNT

Excerpts from the e-mails that producer Len Morris sent home to his wife reveal
the true nature of the experience of filming child laborers at work.

Day 1. This is not going to be easy. The government has

assigned us a “monitor” to travel with us and watch every
move we make. They are edgy. Child labor is sensitive here.

Day 5. Yesterday, filmed a dozen children picking coffee and

noticed a large black wound on a girl’s leg and stopped shooting
to treat it. Today we went back to the plantation to
meet the girl’s family, change the dressings and give her
antibiotics. People lined up for the simplest medicine.

Day 9. I can’t remember from one day to the next what I’ve
written. This is a haze of sleep deprivation, malaria drugs,
filming and breathing thick pesticides everywhere. Silvia's
leg wound has had two dressings. We returned Sunday for her.
When we arrive she beams. We treated another line-up. Filmed
so many children working.

Day 14. Today a plantation owner sent thugs to threaten us

and our government monitor stepped in and insisted we be
allowed to film! He said to me, ‘You know, when you helped
that girl it touched my heart. I thank you on behalf of my
government and people.’ He’s coming with us now on his own
time. I’m amazed, and touched.

copyright Francis Irungu

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 SYNOPSIS

Stolen Childhoods is the first feature documentary on global child labor ever
produced. The film features stories of child laborers around the world, told in
their own words. One of the stories is about children picking coffee in Kenya,
another is about a child prostitute in Mexico City, one is about a boy who had
been pressed into forced labor on a fishing platform in the Sea of Sumatra,
children picking crops in Texas and children picking through garbage at a
dump in Brazil. Throughout the film, we have tried to present local, national
and international solutions to child labor, programs that have been successful
in removing children from the workforce and returning them to school, so that
they have a chance to develop as children and also have a chance of making
a reasonable living when they grow up. Stolen Childhoods challenges the
viewer to help break the cycle of poverty for the 246 million children laboring
at the bottom of the global economy.

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 BIOGRAPHIES

Len Morris
Producer, Director, Writer
Len has produced, directed and edited television documentaries for over
twenty years. His films have been syndicated and broadcast on HBO, TNT,
PBS and other cable and international networks. His independent production
company Galen Films has produced numerous award-winning documentaries.
Len is a recipient of an Independent Filmmaker Award from the American Film
Institute. His films are on subjects as diverse as schizophrenia, environmental
justice, street children, hunger in Africa, legal aid during the apartheid era in
South Africa, the Holocaust . . . and a string of specials on Hollywood . . . film
noir, the American Western and singing cowboys.

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Robin Romano
Co-Director and Director of Photography
As a writer/director/cameraman, Robin Romano has worked in Canadian
news programming and international documentary television. His most recent
projects have been Death of a Slave Boy, a two-hour special shot in Pakistan
for European broadcast and Globalization and Human Rights, hosted by
Charlayne Hunter Gault for PBS. As a still photographer, Mr. Romano is
represented by Alan Kaplan Studios. He has taught Advanced
Cinematography at the Graduate Film Institute of NYU, was visiting instructor
at Columbia Graduate Film School and has lectured at Rhode Island School of
Design and the Oak Institute for International Human Rights at Colby College.

Petra Lent
Co-Producer
Petra has worked at the heart of all Galen Films productions for twenty years,
as editor and producer. She was editor of Big Guns Talk: The Story of the
Western for TNT, was recently supervising editor for In-her’it-ance, an oral
history of the Hallmark company and editor of Forty Years of Passion for the
Theatre Communications Group. She holds a BA from Swarthmore and an MA
in English Literature from Columbia University.

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Jonathan Deull
Consulting Producer
Jonathan produces radio and television on issues of global concern, including
conflict resolution, the environment, sustainable human development and
international disaster assistance. His non-profit company, WorldWorks
Communications, Inc., produces radio and television for both the US and the
developing world, including his award-winning, Africa on the Move. Most
recently he served as Series Producer for Africa: Search for Common Ground,
a 13-part radio and television series broadcast in three languages in twenty
African countries. A member of the Bar of the State of New York, Jonathan
has a J.D. from George Washington University and B.A. from Wesleyan
University.

Barbara Broccoli
Executive Producer
Barbara began her career as an assistant director on the James Bond films,
Octopussy and A View to a Kill, and then became Associate Producer on The
Living Daylights and License to Kill. She produced (with Michael Wilson),
Goldeneye, Tomorrow Never Dies, The World is Not Enough and Die Another
Day. Through her independent film company, Astoria Productions, she
produced Crime of the Century, about the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby
for HBO, which was nominated for four Golden Globes. Barbara is a
graduate of Loyola University in Motion Picture and Television
Communications.

Georgia Morris
Writer
Documentary script writer, playwright and screenwriter, Georgia is a co-owner
of Galen Films and has written numerous Galen productions. Her work has
won several Cine Golden Eagles and was nominated for a Cable Ace for Best
Writing for Big Guns Talk: The Story of the Western. Recently, Georgia
directed a retrospective for Theatre Communications Group, Forty Years of
Passion. Her plays have been produced in New York and Martha's Vineyard
and her screenplay won an Independent Filmmaker Grant from the American
Film Institute.

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Mark Jonathan Harris
Writer/Editorial Advisor
Mark is an Academy Award-winning documentary filmmaker, journalist,
novelist and film professor at the School of Cinema-Television at USC. He
wrote and directed The Long Way Home, a documentary about the period
following the Holocaust, which won an Academy Award for Best Feature
Length Documentary of 1997. His most recent feature documentary, Into the
Arms of Strangers won the Oscar for Best Feature Length Documentary in
2000. Mark writes journalism for The New York Times, Los Angeles Times,
Chicago Tribune and New West magazine. He has also published five novels
for children.

Miriam Cutler
Composer
Los Angeles-based film composer Miriam Cutler has been writing, producing,
and performing music for over 20 years. Her evocative scores have graced
numerous narrative features and award-winning documentaries, as well as
television, corporate videos, cartoons, and even two circuses. She's known for
her versatility, her soulful integration of world music styles, and her enthusiasm
for working collaboratively. Some recent credits include Pandemic: Facing
AIDS (United Nations screening; HBO), Lost in La Mancha, which won the
Evening Standard 'Peter Sellers Comedy Award' at the Savoy in London and
received nominations for Best Documentary—Prix Arte at the European Film
Academy Awards and the British Independent Film Awards, Scout’s Honor
Best Doc Audience Award, Freedom of Expression Award Sundance Film
Festival, and Amy’s Orgasm, a theatrically released comedy feature film.

Sara Nesson
Editor
Part of the Galen Films team for three years, Sara edited In-her’it-ance, a three-
hour a documentary on the history of the Hallmark Company. Prior to Galen
Films, she edited news releases for European news stations and CNN as well
as educational video for Outward Bound and Expeditionary Learning. All
Children Sing, a documentary on cultural diversity which she edited for
European Communications Management, was broadcast in Europe and Asia.
She also has produced, shot and edited two independent shorts, Panhead
Mike and Capawock.

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Jeremy Mayhew
Title Design / Assistant Editor
Jeremy is a Film/Video graduate of the University of the Arts in Philadelphia.
His independent films include The Overwhelming Overflow of ‘No’, The
Discovery, The Purloiner El Magnifico and Strikers Passing, an award-winning
documentary on the harpoon swordfishermen of New England. Jeremy also
was Director of Photography for a documentary on fish farming in Haiti and
First Camera Assistant on the feature film, Mistover.

Pharis Harvey
Senior Program Consultant
Pharis is a founder of the International Labor Rights Fund. He is the author of
Trading Away the Future: Child Labor in India’s Export Industries and
numerous articles on child labor. He is Chairman of the Board of Directors of
RUGMARK Foundation - USA and a member of the boards of RUGMARK
International, the Asia Pacific Center for Justice and Peace, the Coalition for
Justice in the Maquiladoras, the US Labor Education in the Americas Project
and the Consumers Choice Council. He is a co-chair for the Child Labor
Coalition and a committee member for the Global March Against Child Labor.
Pharis received the Letelier-Moffitt Human Rights Award for “Lifetime
Achievement” in developing and defending labor rights law internationally.
Pharis holds degrees from Oklahoma City University and Yale University and is
an ordained Methodist Minister.

All photographs copyright Romano/Stolen Childhoods, except as otherwise noted.

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