Documentary filmmaker Allison Walsh is on a roll. Her documentary All of the Above has drawn rave reviews – and awards — at film festivals across the country. But nothing excites her more than to be able to present the film back where it all started, at her alma mater, Prospect High School.
John Camardella and Allison Walsh at the Santa Barbara Film Festival.
Screening of the film will take place Aug. 19 at Prospect, in its theater. Tickets go on sale on Wednesday, Aug. 5.
“I’m so glad we can finally bring it back to the community,” says Walsh, a 2012 Prospect grad. “I’d been thinking for months about how to do that, and I’m really glad it’s working out to bring it directly to Prospect High School. It’s accessible, easy to find since people know the school well, and I get to go back one more time.”
The documentary follows Walsh’s former teacher, John Camardella, and Prospect’s long-running World Religion course. The experience left a lasting impression on Walsh and ultimately inspired her career as a documentary filmmaker.
“I had a pretty profound experience in John’s World Religion class when I was a high school senior,” Walsh says. “It opened up my world and revealed something inside of me, a passion for learning about different perspectives.”
John Camardella talks to students in class.
Camardella began teaching the World Religions course in the Social Studies department at Prospect, in 2009. It continues to be one of the most popular electives in the school. Last year, he taught five sections each day, or 140 students per semester, in a course that is dual-credited through Eastern Illinois University.
Camardella says the course is really about trying to create a unique learning space while furthering cultural and religious literacy in young people.
“What makes this class resonate right now is that our Prospect students are growing up in a world where they’re constantly encountering differences, whether religious, cultural or political,” Camardella says, “but they don’t often have the tools to make sense of it.”
Allison Walsh takes questions from the press at the Santa Barbara Film Festival.
Walsh spent 55 days inside Camardella’s classroom filming the documentary, as she tried to capture students’ questions and observations. The result has intrigued audience members of all ages, who come away with a better sense of cross-cultural understanding.
“I know a lot of community members and alums have been waiting for the film, but I’m just as excited to see current students at the screening,” Walsh says.
“I’m excited to share it with current students who maybe know nothing about documentary or filmmaking, and who can see their own community documented in this film,” she adds. “I think storytelling has always been incredibly important, maybe more so now, so seeing their own school on film might give them a spark to consider that path — or at least know it’s an option.”
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