Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story

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Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story
DVD cover
Directed by	Vondie Curtis-Hall
Produced by	Sue Bugden, Eva Garofalo
Written by	J.T. Allen
Starring	Jamie Foxx, Lynn Whitfield, Lee Thompson Young, CCH Pounder,
Music by	Tree Adams
Distributed by	fX Network, Twentieth Century Fox
Release date(s)	January 21, 2004
Running time	120 min.
Language	English
Budget	$75,000
IMDb profile

Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story is a (2004) TV-movie starring Jamie Foxx and Lynn Whitfield. The film was directed by Vondie Curtis-Hall. Other cast members in the film include Lee Thompson Young and CCH Pounder.

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The film touches on the life of Stanley Tookie Williams, a founding member of the Crips street gang, principally on his life in the streets and his life in prison. It also shows some of the work he did while incarcerated to help decrease gang violence in the world. The film was shot in 2003 while Williams was still imprisoned. On December 13, 2005, Williams was executed by lethal injection in California.

After its debut at The Sundance Film Festival, the film was released in January of 2004 via the FX cable network on television and went on to become a successful venture for the network. The film was nominated for 19 different awards and won 11 of them. Among the awards the film was nominated for include American Cinema Editors, Black Reel Awards, Golden Globes, NAACP Image Awards, Independent Spirit Awards, MovieGuide, Satellite Award, Screen Actors Guild, and Writers Guild of America. At the Golden Globes, Jamie Foxx was nominated for three performances: Redemption, Ray and Collateral.

Shot in 38 days during July and August of 2003, all of the filming took place in Toronto (except for one full day in South Central Los Angeles and one 1/2 day of exteriors in San Francisco). The Toronto water treatment plant was used as a double for the exterior of San Quentin. Production was almost shut down when Michael Mann refused to release Jamie Foxx from his rehearsal schedule on Collateral. But Foxx, who had met with Stanley Williams for many hours at San Quentin convinced Mann to give him a 3 week window. Jamie's performance was shot over only 3 six day shooting weeks in Toronto. During that period, Toronto suffered a massive city wide blackout, and the production only had power from its backup generators. Jamie Foxx's dialogue coach during the shoot was a former inmate of San Quentin.

Of note is that one of the victims was misidentified as "Alvin" Owens instead of his real name, Albert Owens. Although the film is mostly accurate, it does depicts a scene of Lynn Whitfield being showered with blood by a pro-death penalty advocate. This event that was not documented in any news accounts and is thought to be dramatic license on the part of the writer.^{[citation needed]}.