I thought the film interpretation of The Laramie Project did a very good job in showing how they interviews may have gone in real life. Some sentences in the book didn't make sense to me because I put emphasis on the wrong word, changing the meaning of the whole sentence; however, in the film, the actors put emphasis on a different world which changed the meaning of the sentence completely. The music in the film really helped to create emotion when telling the story of what happened the night Matthew Shepard was murdered. Another part of the film that helped me understand the book and sides of the argument was at one point when the theater was interviewing McKinney's friends. The interviewer asked her what McKinney thought of gays. She started saying that McKinney doesn't like gays, but stopped half way through her sentence, looked at the guy next to her (McKinney's friend that's a guy), and stuttered and changed what she was saying. It made me wonder, especially after seeing the interview with Doc O'Connor, if McKinney might actually be bisexual because she stopped and changed her sentence while looking at a close friend, that's male, of McKinney's. In one scene, a lady says "it could happen to any of us at any time," and the room went completely silent. I thought it added a lot of emotion because everyone stopped talking and there was a long pause which really made you think about what she had just said and how scary the truth was. Later, the leader of the Mormon church said that he wants the accused to have the death penalty, but that "I hope as he [Shepard] was tied to that fence, he thought about his lifestyle,". The camera slowly zoomed in onto the Mormon leaders face as he said this and the music was really quite which made it a very tense scene where the leader seems to care that Shepard was beaten, but at the same time he doesn't agree with the lifestyle and doesn't seem to show any sympathy for Shepard. I thought the film was a well done depiction of the play because the music and camera angles really added to the emotion of every scene. After that, we watched a speech that Obama made, concerning the new hate crime law, created for Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. I am glad that Obama understands these crimes and knows that it is wrong and was able to help support a new law. During his speech, he stated that 7600 hate crimes were committed in 2009 which really surprised me and bothered me. After that, he explained that the law is to stop any crime that wants to instill fear into other beings which I think is a good way of stating what a hate crime is.

The "20/20 Special Report" had a lot of very interesting topics discussed in it that really surprised me. The first was in the beginning of the video when they said that Matthew got raped in a high school trip to Morocco. They said that this horrible experience could have led to the decision to do meth, which makes sense because some people turn to drugs after awful experiences such as that one. Then, the video goes on to talk about how McKinney planned on robbing a drug dealer of $10,000 that night which changes his motives. He said that all he wanted to do was rob Matthew, but ended up killing him in the end. McKinney, his girlfriend, and a man all go on to say that it wasn't a hate crime, but that he just wanted to rob Matthew for money to buy drugs, which definitely changes the perspective of the whole story and makes me question what actually happened that night. When I heard that McKinney hit Russel in the mouth after trying to stop him, it surprised me because it shows that Russel tried to stop him, but wasn't able to. And if Russel had tried harder, I wonder if McKinney would have ended up killing both of them, neither of them, or what would have happened. Later in the video, when Doc is talking about McKinney he says, "He's [McKinney] been exposed to a lot of guys,". The part that I found interesting was that Doc raised his voice when he said a lot of guys, making me wonder what he meant, however immediately after Doc says that, he goes on to say that McKinney had a threesome with himself and a girl. I was shocked by this statement because the book gives the impression that McKinney hates gays, yet this statement is the exact opposite. It really makes me wonder, once again, if the motive behind McKinney'y attack really was just to get money for drugs if everyone else is right saying that he killed Matthew because he was gay. After Doc talks about the threesome, McKinney says "No," when asked if he has ever done anything sexual with a guy, however he raises his voice when he says it. I think that Doc is telling the truth about the threesome because he says it casually and when McKinney says "No," his voice gets really high which often indicates that somebody is not telling the truth. McKinney really does seem afraid of gays because even after hearing about his threesome, McKinney continues to deny any sort of sexual intercourse with guys, even though his girlfriend says that she thinks he is bisexual because he asked her to have threesomes with another guy. I wonder if McKinney is really scared to admit that he may be bisexual and is so willing to defend himself that he will kill a homosexual man in an attempt to prove himself. The 20/20 Special Report was very interesting and had a lot of insight into this murder and the lives of everyone that had something to do with the murder.

Throughout Act I, the majority of Laramie citizens repeat that they don't care if somebody is gay and they say that's the mindset of the whole town. Doc O'Connor is the limousine driver that drove Matthew to the bar the night he died. Doc says, "And I don't think Wyoming people give a damn one way or another if you're gay or straight, that's just what I just said, doesn't matter," (Kaufman 21). However, in between what the citizens of Laramie say, they say small things that sound homophobic, without them even realizing what they said. After hearing many interviews it sounds more like the town doesn't accept gays even though they all say otherwise. Doc says, "But I liked him [Matthew] 'cause he was straightforward... Maybe gay but straightforward, you see what I'm saying?" (Kaufman 19). The citizens of Laramie all say that they accept gays, however as Doc is mentioning that he likes Matthew, he adds in that Matthew's gay even though that was not needed as part of his statement. I think that everyone says they accept gays to make the town sound better, but in reality most of them are homophobic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OoNBxhc8Q-U