Charleston. Newtown. San Bernardino. Tucson. Aurora.
Before they were the sites of mass shootings, or arenas for politicking and arguing online, they were Anywhere, U.S.A.
Filmmaker AJ Schnack and 20 cinematographers captured those crime scenes as they stand today in his short documentary, "Speaking Is Difficult," published to YouTube on Tuesday.
Each scene is a raw look at towns that were torn apart by violence, suffocated by media and national attention, and then left to rebuild. Schnack juxtaposes the scenes with audio of the 911 calls and gunfire that erupted as each mass shooting began.
It's a sobering reminder that small communities in the United States have faced some of the country's worst violence in the past five years.
"A lot of [the film crews], even though they film stuff all the time, said this was one of the few times that they felt really uncomfortable being in a space and filming, because a lot of [the incidents] were still very fresh." Schnack said in an interview with The Intercept.
"We shot in Oregon, then a couple weeks later, we added -- before we went to Sundance -- San Bernardino and Colorado. They had just happened. ... Then, as the film goes along, since the film goes backwards in time, you reach a point where it’s just back to normal."
Watch the short film above.
Before You Go
