GALO: Boger’s immediate reaction to meeting Zaal, and realizing who he was, was fueled by anger and thoughts of revenge. Zaal’s reaction ranged from trying to place blame on the victim, to making excuses about his own actions that night. So when they were asked to start a presentation together by the Museum of Tolerance, both men said they were averse to the idea and uncomfortable with it, though they eventually complied. Had they not been asked to talk about their experiences in such a manner and been in some context forced to learn more about the other, in what ways do you think this story would have turned out differently? Do you think Boger would have been able to forgive Zaal if he didn’t have that outlet?

JC: We did want to show that in the film — essentially, when they first started doing their presentation, they probably weren’t ready. They certainly hadn’t forgiven each other; they were just back in each other’s lives. But if they hadn’t started doing the presentations, they probably wouldn’t have had the face time, just being around each other. A huge part of them going through this process was getting to know each other. And they talk about how when they were doing these presentations, they would be traveling with each other and essentially locked in a room on their way to a location. They were forced to hash things out. I think it did move things along, it was a very long process and things still come up even today — obviously, they’re friends now and there’s forgiveness that’s happened, but I just think the presentation and being around each other was therapeutic for them. This was their therapy. This is not the way some people would go about doing this, but, in the end, it did work out for them, and I think they both acknowledge that. It was sort of kismet that it happened that way.

GALO: Boger’s narration of the story of his childhood was juxtaposed with home movies which heavily featured his mother. Was this footage difficult to acquire because of Boger’s circumstances, and did his mother have any part in getting them to you?

JC: Matthew was kicked out of the house at 13 and was living on the street. He never saw his mother after that. His mother died about nine years ago and they were never able to reconcile. Most of Matthew’s family had also sort of disowned him, but he was still in touch with one brother and he had gotten these home movies back in the ’80s. He had gotten them transferred to an old format of tape that is pretty much impossible to even see now, so he had these tapes but he had never watched them. We got them transferred.

When the film was done, and Matthew finally saw a final of the piece, that was the first time he had actually seen these home movies. It was tough for him. And so, I gave him a little bit of a disclaimer before and let him know that they’re in there, and that we had gotten great shots of him and his mom. I think Matthew’s relationship with his mom was one of the things that came out as the most emotional part of the film, and it was a really big awakening for him, confronting the feelings he had for his mom and what he went through.

GALO: The general message of this documentary, at least for me, seems to be about finding one’s inner strength. But the documentary also touches on issues of bigotry, self-acceptance, homosexuality and tolerance, to name a few. Were you consciously trying to bring them to the forefront or was that part and parcel to the nature of the story?

JC: I couldn’t ignore the fact that there were relevant topics and themes that we talk about every day, most of that being bullying and hate crimes, in addition to forgiveness and reconciliation. We didn’t want to ignore that this was a hate crime. Back in 1980, this was not called a hate crime, it was called gay bashing. There was no such thing as a hate crime back then. This was bullying. This still goes on today and we wanted people to take that away from the film, in addition to the story on forgiveness. Obviously, it all ties together.

We’re not saying that the victims of any of the bullying or hate crimes that happen now need to forgive their perpetrator(s), but we did want to recognize that this was a hate crime before there were hate crimes, and that this is how this particular story ended.

But yeah, I mean, when you make a film, you want people to be interested in it if there’s a relevant theme like this. I think it really has struck a chord with a lot of people, particularly in the LGBT community. We’ve gotten great support and it premiered at Outfest and got a great reaction, so yeah, that’s something we’ve certainly recognized and we want it to be part of the film.

GALO: You’ve given us quite an in-depth look into the story as well as the struggles and the positive outcomes from this venture. Is there anything else you would like to add?

When people see it, I hope they do come in with an open mind that this is not a film that should be boxed into one theme in particular, and they should take away as much as they can from everything that’s touched on. We went in to make a film about forgiveness, but we are happy that these other themes bubbled up and are being talked about as a result of the film being seen.

For more information about the film, please visit http://www.facingfearmovie.com.

Video Courtesy of: Jason Cohen Productions.

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Featured image: Matthew Boger in the documentary film “Facing Fear” by Jason Cohen. Photo Courtesy of: Fetzer Institute/Jason Cohen Productions.