Searching for Angela Shelton

This film touched me in ways beyond what is ostensibly ordinary. More than the usual “If I can do it, so can you” film about changed lives, it offers silver linings after a very bad storm, letting go and moving on. This movie was very brave for showing so much pain that your tear ducts run dry, for showing how much strength we have within ourselves by baring it all for everybody to see. What hurts the most is that this topic is not new anymore, but then it keeps staring us in the face and nobody takes notice, not even the abused herself. It’s rampant. It’s epidemic. Yet, we keep on turning a blind eye as if this is almost normal. This issue is so close to home. It started simple, finding other Angela Sheltons, never thought she was in for a big surprise. By finding them, she found herself instead.

She found them bruised, pained, abused and marked for life by their own past demons, just like her. And just like her, most of them were harmed by the same people who were supposed to make them feel loved and protected, and that is why it pains them so much. It made me think, for lots of times, about the idea that if they were able to hurt their own Angela Shelton, how much more harm can a complete stranger do? It was deeply terrifying.

But I was thankful that this movie focused more on the light at the end of the tunnel. Life had not been fair, but it’s still your life. You should be the one to take charge of it and not your ugly past. The movie attempts to tell us not to forget, but to move on. Though it is not your fault that you have been deprived of somewhat normal childhood life, it would be as if it is your fault by depriving yourself of a somewhat better life, and all you have to do is to simply try. Hope, and keep on hoping. Never let hope leave you. Fight your own demons and win your life back. This life should not suppose to be all gloomy and dark, but then life is all about choices. I just hope that all those Angela Sheltons, maltreated women and children in general, would just choose to be happy and strong. Perhaps, it would make this world, a little more bearable. And it’s all up to you, really.

Works Cited
“Searching for Angela Shelton.” 2 November 2008. 25 January 2007
Hanke, Jeremy. “Special Critique: Searching for Angela Shelton.” 2 November 2008. Microfilm Maker Magazine Film Critiques. 15 October 2005.