Man on Fire

Grand Saline, Texas, a town east of Dallas, has a history of racism, a history the community doesn’t talk about.

Series
Independent Lens
Premiere Date
December 17, 2018
Length
60 minutes
Director

Joel Fendelman

With roots in Miami, Austin and New York City, Joel Fendelman has written, produced and directed a number of award-winning narrative and documentary films. In 2016 Joel’s short film Game Night, a film about aging and unfulfilled dreams, premiered at Tribeca Film Festival and won Best Super Short at the Savannah Film Festival. His second narrative feature… Show more film Remittance was filmed 2013 in Singapore and the Philippines and follows the story of a Filipino mother who travels to Singapore to work as a maid in order to bring a better life to her family back home won many festival awards including "Best Actress" and "Best Screenplay" at Brooklyn Film Festival and is currently being distributed worldwide. In 2011, Joel completed his first dramatic narrative feature David, a coming of age story about identity and friendship between a Muslim and a Jewish boy screened at Rome and Montreal World Film Festival, which awarded the film its prestigious Ecumenical Prize, and at many other venues around the globe. Joel strives to embrace socially conscious stories that deal with religion, social class, minorities and communicates the underlying connection between us all. Show less

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The Film

Grand Saline, Texas, a town east of Dallas, has a history of racism, a history the community doesn’t talk about. This shroud of secrecy ended when Charles Moore, an elderly white preacher, self-immolated to protest the town’s racism in 2014, shining a spotlight on the town’s dark past. Man on Fire untangles the pieces of this protest and questions the racism in Grand Saline today.

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