Must Watch: Untouchable NOW AVAILABLE
Untouchable, the film by David Feige that features Ron Book and the impacts of the draconian sex offender laws he created is NOW AVAILABLE.
When the most powerful lobbyist in Florida discovers that the nanny has sexually abused his daughter, he harnesses his extraordinary political power to pass the toughest sex offender laws in the nation. UNTOUCHABLE chronicles his crusade, and its impact on the lives of several of the 800,000 people forced to live under the kinds of laws he has championed. The film interweaves intimate portraits of men and women who have been branded sex offenders with the heartbreaking stories of those who have suffered sexual abuse. It is a film that pushes viewers toward an uncomfortable place, requiring them to walk in the shoes of those who have survived sexual abuse, but to still bear witness to the experiences of those we revile.
This is a MUST WATCH. You can rent or purchase the film from these links:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/movie/untouchable/id1447179564
https://play.google.com/store/movies/details?id=ZFJiob9Cdgk.P
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Another perspective on Untouchable, ‘Untouchable’ Makes the Case for More Lenient Sex Offender Laws in America:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/untouchable-makes-the-case-for-more-lenient-sex-offender-laws-in-america
I think anyone who believes this film will help our cause is delusional. It’s all about the Books and what heroes they are. Balanced? Hardly. Where are the stories of the suffering they have, and will continue, to cause to us, and more so, to our families?
You didn’t watch the film did you? It focused on how a mother is unable to care for her kids, work or take them to the park. They interviewed WAR about how the registry hurts the families too.
For me, for a film to “focus” on someone or some group, would mean that a majority or substantial part of screen time would be dedicated to them. Shawna Baldwin gets a total of 9 minutes out of a 105 minute documentary. WAR (Vicki, Shirley, and Terri) gets just 2 minutes of screen time. So together, about 10% of the film.
By contrast, and with few exceptions (Eric Janus, Val, Jill, and Ira Ellman presenting statistics in an abstract fashion for about 8 minutes); about 2/3 of the film focuses on evoking pity for Lauren and thus justification for Ron to continually hate and punish.
The rest of the film introduces a random parade of Book supporters spewing vitriol and a couple of registered citizens who self-identify as “monsters” and pedophiles.” I don’t see how the film, in toto, helps our cause.
I guess we agree to disagree, as the husband of a registrant I felt Ron Book made himself look like a fool. The man shining his shoes, his comments about having people in Honduras. No one is going to watch that and feel sorry for the Books.
I think the film maker best captured the sentiment of the registry by his interviews with Patty Wetterling. Here is someone who has every right to support the registry but she admits it has become a huge mess. The film concluded on that point.
We just watched this film and found it be quite interesting but a little shallow in its treatment of the variety people on the registry. Ron Book is probably guilty of “failure to protect” by leaving his daughter alone with a house keeper who appears to be an illegal alien.
Ron Book failed his daughter not the State of Florida.
He’s obviously a bitter and tormented man. Somehow, he’s taken his failure as a parent and capitalized it into a perverse “professional celebrity victim” status. Watching him strut around New York City in his custom fur coat while his “professional celebrity victim” daughter promotes her for-profit book seems to be a far cry from a righteous call for change and more like wanton profiteering and brazen opportunism. And now, this young woman is a State Senator no less. Only in Florida can a political creature like Ron Book transmute his own failure as a parent into a multi-layered, multi-generational for-profit power grab by perpetually posing he and his family as “professional celebrity victims”. Thank God that he openly admits that all of the sex offender legislation he has strong armed through our system would have DONE NOTHING TO PROTECT HIS DAUGHTER. His lovely house with all its toys and swans bring him neither happiness, peace or contentment. He cannot accept that he failed his daughter and seems hell bent on attacking the world as a result. Misery loves company indeed.
Excellent observation, Douglas!
And Ron Book is not the only one. John Walsh where were you when your son was kidnapped from a mall? It seems a lot of “parents” are the main cause because they aren’t paying any attention to the child they help create. Then when God forbid something happens to that child they will do anything say anything pay anything to make their guilt go away. If you leave a pile of money in front of a thief he’ll take it. If you leave matches and a can of gas in front of an arsonist he’ll burn something down. But you as parents have a responsibility to KNOW what your child is doing, Where they are going,etc. But too many parents hand their kid a phone or tablet and let them do whatever they want as long as they are not bothering you. Next time you go to a mall,restaurant look around you and you’ll see what I’m talking about. And by the way I am a registered sex offender in the state of Florida even though I never touched anyone and have no 1000 ft restrictions curfew none of it. And did 5 years prison 5 years probation.
RoM, well stated. Too many parents try to avoid the responsibility of their children and when something terrible happens they look all around to find someone to blame, and nowadays that can be someone who had absolutely nothing to do with the event. I hope John Walsh and Ron Book are happy with all the money they are making off of their irresponsibility…may they choke on it.
Totally agreement with you RoM
While everyone else is heaping praise on this film, I have to temper i with a glaring problem and it makes me really hate this film even though I’m in it (albeit briefly).
I was hoping the story of the Anti-Registry Movement would have been told in this film, but instead the film is about the Books. That means challenges to the Books in this film are sugar coated. Why? David Fiege told me face to face that our message was “too harsh.” Really? In this film, Ron Book talks about wanting to waterboard us. Yet I was censored in the film for discussing that Ron Book is a twice convicted felon? (Ron Book pled No Contest to Fraud in the 1980s and pleaded guilty to 4 counts of illegal campaign contributions in 1995, yet is still allowed to lobby the state.)
This film could’ve really cranked up the heat against the Books and their criminal activities, but instead, Feige softballed them. Book is never truly grilled by the filmmakers. Sure, there are arguments against the Book family’s practices that forced Miami registrants to live homeless for years, but no one challenges the Books directly. This was the fault of Feige because he catered to the Books. Imagine the supposedly invincible Book family cowering in fear over a small protest of a “dozen people,” or as Feige told me, “Skittish AF.”
If you want to see the Book Crime Family in action, watch this:
https://www.liveleak.com/view?t=uDwrL_1526695160
THIS is some of the stuff that should’ve been in the film. You dropped the ball, David Fiege. You punted on first down. This film had potential but at the end of the day, Feige had to cater to the Books rather than tell the full story, and in doing so, you have presented a mediocre project.
Someday there hopefully will be a film from a filmmaker that thinks of us as more than mere window dressing. I’d like to point out it wasn’t just that it wasn’t solely because our protest wasn’t properly explained in the film, but also he wasted the time of a lot of NARSOL members and people who were interviewed at the conference. None of them were in the film, either. Even when our protest was covered, it was all about the Books, NOT about our protest.
And yet, this movement continues to heap praise on this guy who treated this movement as if we were nothing. We’re way too eager to lick crumbs off the floor like starving dogs while the rich get richer.
Derek, appreciate your comment. Respectfully, most of the feedback we’ve hear is that it’s balanced. Feige allowed Book to make himself look like a pompous, bitter, guilt-ridden man. Nothing anyone could have pressed him on would have done a better job of making him look ignorant than Book did to himself.
Correction — TO US, Ron looks like a pompous, guilt-ridden man. To those on the other side of the fence, he looks like a hero. It is all about whose side you’re on.
Ron Book SHOULD HAVE BEEN CONFRONTED with the bad things he has done. Lauren needs to be grilled even more. I think she’d shatter under pressure.
I believe that Fiege softballed them at least partially out of fear of backlash. But we’ll never know for sure. But I knew something was up when I aw that interview of Feige just before I left for NYC and he said Ron Book loved the film.
Derek, I agree with you completely re: the “hero” comment above. I have a feeling that the Books only gave as much time as they did to this film because they had some sort of deal with Feige. I wonder whether the Books would have been allowed to pull their interviews had they deemed the film ‘unfair’ to them. I hope that some intelligent viewers, unaware of the ugliness of registration, will be moved by the film. Those ‘on the other side of the fence’ from us are people who don’t think, so there’s no hope for changing their opinions anyway.
Derek please don’t let your personal feud cloud your judgment in order for any documentary to be taken seriously it has to provide both points and allow for the viewer to make a decision on their own. If you want and unhinged tirade about the registry ask Michael Moore and see if anyone takes it seriously.
“RegistrantNotAnOffender” tell me you’re real name instead of hiding behind a computer screen. It is interesting that you brought up MIchael Moore because he’s the kind of guy that gets attention, can provide the facts in a way that is entertaining yet can be understood by a mainstream audience, and because of that, Michael Moore would make a far better documentary because he’s not afraid to rattle the cage. He would not have shied away from controversy. He would not have softballed the Book Crime Family like Feige did.
My “anger” isn’t clouding anything, because my “anger” does not absolve the fact that Ron & Lauren Book has ample examples of animus towards everyone on this registry. Tell us what you’ve bothered to do for the people of Miami? Did you go to the camp? If you did, you’d be angry, too. I went down to the camp three times, staying twice. I’m GLAD I have a rinky-dink apartment in Ohio, it is better than the smell, the heat, the humidity, and the squalor that the Books created down there. You do that, then get back with me, and no hiding behind anonymous screen names, THEN we shall talk.
Michael Moore is considered a polarizing documentary maker because he lets his personal biases direct his films. A lot of people dont take him seriously, I cant say I am surprised you are a fan of his.
Registrant – no need to target comments towards others.
My wife got the impression that Ron is kind of a hero, passionate about protecting children.
She assumes others will come away with a similar impression, at least from the preview.
I believe this filmmaker did his best to get into the minds of the viewers and work to change their perspective by subtly educating them with a lightly dramatic and eye opening film.
Imagine not being on the registry, nore having ever known what it’s like to be on the registry or even to know anyone else on the registry and then be given the “harsh” message you want to share to the people watching the film. From an outsider’s perspective, this film would be a tough one to view all the way through but just palatable enough to perhaps get the message across without sounding like an educational film. Rather, the story is told in such a way that outsider can handle.
For an insider like you and I, the the film recaps what most of us already knew. As much as we want the full story told, the outsiders may not be ready for the information. If the government did detect alien life outside our planet, do you think we’d be able to handle it as human beings? Being on the registry is alien to the general public. They don’t realize the full impact and never will until they are directly affected by it. They will be confused and lost, just like we once were.
I think the filmmaker balanced the film’s mission with the need to get the information to the viewer. Perhaps this film is a nexus to the next steps needed to help further educate and perhaps change the perceptions the general public, the “outsiders” have on this subject matter.
Your mission goals and the goals of the filmmaker may in fact differ slightly and even if they were perfectly aligned, it was his film to produce with his experience and knowledge in filmmaking.
The goals and mission of various groups and individuals that make up the anti-registry movement and the registry law reform movements were for the most part not ready for the public to know a lot about. I think it was appropriate not to include this aspect of the situation into the film due to the potential for the hard work so many of us have done, being brought into the radar of the people watching the film. The best thing for us to do is to enjoy the fact that there is a film documenting more about what’s going on in Florida and around the country and leverage that to our advantage. The film is based in facts not lies, which is absolutely refreshing to say the least.
Well registery is bull these people get only half or none of why people are actually on it yes registery came a law after children were aducted raped molested killed but yet alot are from being on sites talking to adults sex sting guess what alot of the sex crimes are mostly miami article in jacksonville union ti?ed paper a judge in supreme court read that aug 8 2014 tampast petersburg paper about sex crime read people stick together fight back
I will have to wait until it comes out on DVD or featured on a big network like HBO. I don’t have any of those streaming services. Although HBO is well known for having some great docs, so they should try to pick it up and show case it. Big audience there.
indeed HBO would be a great platform to showcase this documentary. Large long time network with years of showcasing award winning docs.
Director should try pitching it to them.
I disagree with you not everybody like HBO….I go for Netflix or Hulu, Netflix has some awesome documentary to watch. I am not trying to be cheap here I notice along time ago The movies and other videos come out today go on Netflix in a few months time Unless it something I am a fan of Star Wars,Star Trek(with KIrk and crew) or Batman movie would I pay for it at the Movies. It cheaper to wait for it to come out on Netflix I would like to watch this movie but.. It has Ron book in it He isn’t worth my time or money to spend on it. I just wait!