SANTA BARBARA INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2026 REVIEW! The Alabama Solution is one of the most important and astounding documentaries ever made. Co-directors Andrew Jarecki and Charlotte Kaufman detail the horrors and abuses in the Alabama prison system, as covered and narrated by the prisoners themselves, facing retribution, torture, and even murder for speaking out. The film starts with a BBQ put on by one of the prisons — a yearly show by the state, attempting to put their best foot forward to the media.B ut as soon as the filmmakers are out of earshot of the guards and minders, they are beseeched by the inmates to investigate the horrific, abusive conditions they are living under. This, of course, presents a dilemma how do you make a documentary when the state can prevent you from filming? The answer is that the prisoners film it themselves with contraband cell phones.
A central event in the film is the killing of Steven Davis at the hands of prison guards. The filmmakers follow Davis’s mother on a search for justice on the outside as she gets a lawyer involved, while on the inside, they are following tips from prisoners to uncover first-hand accounts of what transpired. As they get closer to the truth, they find some prisoners who put their lives on the line to accuse one of the guards of murder, while others are terrified to speak out, or have clearly been coerced to give the official version of the story. This fear is not unfounded, as there are signs that the murder did not stop there, and the guards will do anything to prevent the real story from getting out.
“…detail[s] the horrors and abuses in the Alabama prison system, as covered and narrated by the prisoners themselves…”
At the core of The Alabama Solution are three heroic prisoners, Raoul Poole, Robert Earl Council (aka Kinetik Justice), and Melvin Ray. Together, they founded the Free Alabama Movement, documenting prison abuses, acting as activists and social organizers, organizing protests and strikes, acting as jailhouse lawyers, and filming their circumstances, all from behind bars. What they and dozens of other prisoners uncover is an astoundingly dysfunctional prison system, one at 200% capacity, and staffed to only a third of its needs. From April 2019 until late 2024, over 1000 inmates in Alabama died from causes including homicide, suicide, and drug overdoses, an astoundingly high rate, dwarfing that of the next-closest state. Open corruption is tolerated by the guards, even to the point of allowing murder, which is then promptly covered up by the system.
Another aspect of the system addressed is that it amounts to modern-day slavery. The prisoners are forced to work on jobs so that the state doesn’t have to pay people to do them, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of labor and goods produced. The prisoners discuss how to peacefully protest their conditions, and they decide that the best way to hit the state is economically. They go on strike, and the prison system effectively collapses. Of course, then the state cracks down brutally on the strike organizers.
"…a deeply human and moving story."
