Parents' Guide to Song of Parkland

Affecting and immediate, this brief documentary isn't long enough to really let you get to know its student-subjects but the healing power of art and an empathetic authority figure is vividly clear. Left grappling with unthinkable pain and what one student says is a city and school that's "broken," these teens clearly take solace in each other's company, the firm support of their teacher, and in having a common goal to take their mind off the terrible thing that's just happened. This is made immediately clear in an early scene, when phone and news footage shows students running terrified out of the school, followed by a scene after which classes have resumed and the drama students gather in a small space, sharing bean bags and leaning on each other's knees, to sing a song from their forthcoming musical. What's happened has happened. But they are alive, they are together, and they have a job to do.

The musical goes on, the students are shown speaking at rallies -- in fact, some of #NeverAgain's most eloquent speakers have mentioned Herzfeld when asked how ones so young could be so profound. It's hard not to tear up when you see faces so young discussing subjects so grave, especially with the knowledge that thus far, not much has changed about gun laws on a national level despite their advocacy (although changes were made to laws in Florida). It's also hard not to hope that someday Song of Parkland will be a glance at a movement that was to burgeon and swell, making real positive changes -- or to fear that instead it merely depicts interesting people caught in a tumultuous moment of time that is destined to repeat itself.