Thu 8/27 @ 6:30PM
Pike County is in the south-central tip of Ohio, deep in rural Appalachia. The almost all white county of about 27,000 people mixes beautiful scenery with high poverty. And it’s moved strongly to the right in recent decades: Obama lost it by one vote (!) in 2012, but Trump won it in three increasingly large landslides. It became nationally known for a gruesome mass murder in 2016 when eight members of an extended family were killed; an ex-boyfriend of one of the victims and father of her daughter pleaded guilty and was convicted along with three of his family members. The story attracted widespread fascination and speculation, particularly before the killers were discovered.
Cleveland-based documentary filmmaker was attracted to Pike County by the story’s sordid fascination, planning to document its impact on the community. But instead she found that the community itself was a rich lode of stories of people coping with living in a place that prosperity abandoned and what it’s like to grow up there. The result was her 2025 film, This Is Pike County, which she made while living in a cheap motel featured in the film.
The film will be screened at the Cleveland Institute of Art Cinematheque this Thursday August 27, its Cleveland premiere. It will be followed by a discussion with the filmmaker.
Paglin’s extensive documentary filmography includes 2016’s Unseen about Cleveland serial killer Anthony Sowell, who was convicted of murdering 11 women at his home on Imperial Avenue in near Luke Easter Park in Cleveland’s Mount Pleasant neighborhood (Other women he kidnapped and raped escaped.) She also made No Umbrella (2006) about the 2004 presidential election in Cleveland when Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell under-resourced inner-city polling places, causing confusion and multi-hour waits to cast a ballot. The footage of the late Cleveland councilwoman Fanny Lewis with a phone clamped to each ear begging for help at a packed, chaotic polling place is unforgettable.
Go HERE for tickets to the screening.
cinematheque/this-is-pike-county/