The Greater Good Ensemble performs in the courtyard of the San Quentin Rehabilitation Center, October 10, 2024. (Phil Bray for San Quentin Film Festival)
San Quentin Film Festival, the first-ever film festival inside a prison, took place October 10 and 11 at the San Quentin Rehabilitation Center. Festival attendees, who consisted largely of filmmakers and other industry professionals, were met with a live band and greeted by lines of incarcerated men offering handshakes and friendly smiles.
The festival opened with short films made by former and currently incarcerated men. One documentary short, called “Unhoused and Unseen,” focused on the intersection between homelessness and incarceration. The film highlighted the stories of two men who were unhoused before becoming incarcerated at San Quentin.
“[Telling my story] was a really eye opening experience,” said George “Mesro” Coles-El, who was featured in the film. “A lot of times when people are dealing with their pain and suffering, they think they’re doing that alone.”
Mesro was sleeping on friends’ couches at the time when he was arrested and sent to prison. “[I] felt like I would do people a favor if I wasn’t around anymore…I was done with life,” he said.
Mesro said he struggled to get support while he was searching for stable housing. “When I was telling people how I was feeling, it was like, well, you’re a man, you know, get over it. So I stopped talking about it and just kind of went through my suffering on my own. People would ask me how I was doing, I put a brave face on.”
Kolby Southwood, who was also featured in the documentary and is incarcerated at San Quentin, was living in Mariposa County when he became homeless at 18. He lived in a tent and used jail as a form of shelter.
“I would get in trouble just so that I could be in jail and not out in the [cold] weather,” said Southwood.
Since being incarcerated, Southwood has learned coding, and plans to use those skills when he gets out of prison. “If they gave us the resources we have in here, out there, a lot of the people who are coming to prison wouldn’t be coming to prison,” said Southwood.
Dante D. Jones (left) with San Quentin Film Festival co-founder and director Cori Thomas (right), October 10, 2024. (Phil Bray for San Quentin Film Festival)
Co-director of the documentary, Rhashiyd Zinnamon, said he was inspired to tackle the topic of homelessness because of stories he’d heard from other incarcerated men.
“Basically, the reason they say they committed the crime was to get away from the cold at that particular time. And so it gave me an idea. I wonder how many other people are walking around here with that same sentiment.”
Dante D. Jones, who also co-directed the film, said he was inspired to tackle the story because of the connections he sees between homeless and incarcerated people. “People look at prison and people look at people who are unhoused, basically in the same way. They look away from us, like we don’t matter,” Jones said.
Zinnamon said he sees connections between mental health, addiction, homelessness, and incarceration. “When we shed light on the connection and the parallels that lead people here, it may change the perspective of how it’s ended and how it’s dealt with.”
Films debuted at the San Quentin Film Festival were also available online through October 29. We will update the online version of this article if the films become available again in the future.
Caron Creighton is a journalist and filmmaker based in Oakland where she reports mostly on homelessness and displacement. She has previously worked for the San Francisco Chronicle, AJ+, and the Associated Press.