The Hearing
On 10th May 2008, Jimmy Mizen (16) strolled to his local South London bakery to buy a sandwich with his brother Harry. He never came back. Following the Mizens throughout the murder trial, this documentary observes the impact of teenage violence on one family as they await the jury's verdict.
The Hearing takes us into The MizensÂ’ home during the period of the trial of Jake Fahri, 19, accused of murdering their son on the day after his 16th birthday. We are there when they eat their breakfast, we are there when they take the children to school. We receive their friends with them, and we are with them when they leave the court each day and when they head home to reflect on the dayÂ’s events.
This is a film is about life and death. Anyone who has experienced the loss of a loved one will feel connect to it. But more than that, anyone who loves their children, or who worries about bullying at school, or who wants to be safe on their streets, will be impacted by the emotion that emerges in the Mizen household during these few Spring weeks. What is grief? How can I deal will such intense feelings? Will there be a satisfactory ending to all this,
and what if there is not? How can life go on when everything falls apart? Naturally, bigger questions arise. What does justice mean in a case like this? Should a teenage criminal get a second chance at normal? Does it make sense for the mother of a 16 year old boy to forgive the man who slit his throat with a shard of broken glass just a few hundred yards from her home?