Renaud brothers film earns Emmy nod
Craig and Brent Renaud, the documentary makers from Little Rock, have earned a nomination today in the 27th annual News and Documentary Emmy Awards for their HBO film "Dope Sick Love." The film was nominated for 2006 Best Documentary, the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences announced in New York.
"Dope Sick Love," presented without music or narration, was shot entirely on the streets of lower Manhattan over a period of 18 months by the filmmaker brothers.
“We didn’t want to make just another sensationalized drug film,” Brent Renaud said in the press release. "Drugs continue to be an epidemic that ruins the lives of millions of Americans and their families. It is an endless cycle that conquers every aspects of a user’s life. In order to understand this dark reality, we had to live and document this life everyday around the clock to show how drugs systematically destroys its victims’ lives.”
The film follows two couples into apartment buildings, where they shoot up in corridors and elevators; into the homes of johns who pay for their services; back home to meet family that has given up on them; and onto the streets of Greenwich Village as they hustle to score cash for their next fix. But more importantly, the film examines the human need for love and escape, and underscores the virtual impossibility of finding anything more than temporary relief through drugs. Drugs have destroyed everything in their lives, and all they have left is each other.
The News and Documentary Emmys will be presented on Monday, Sept. 25, at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York.
