Book Riot – “In a room filled to the brim, attendees at the American Library Association’s (ALA) annual conference in Philadelphia this summer watched Kim A. Snyder’s documentary The Librarians. The Librarians debuted at Sundance Film Festival in January 2025, and in the following months, traveled the country doing shows at libraries and festivals. ALA attendees watching the show gasped and shouted numerous times throughout, as they saw fellow librarians whose lives have been turned upside down, thanks to the nearly five-year fight over books and education in America’s public schools and libraries. The Librarians is now set to release nationwide, beginning in New York October 3. It will run for a week in Los Angeles starting October 10, then it will expand to 40 cities across the country. The film also has an international rollout, hitting screens in the United Kingdom and Ireland beginning September 26. Viewers in select cities will have the opportunity to engage in local town halls about the film. The documentary will be made available to stream through PBS’s Independent Lens and the BBC later this fall. In anticipation of the film’s wide release, the team behind it have released their first official trailer:
The film stars librarians who’ve been thrust into the local and national spotlight over their commitment to the freedom to read. Among the leads are Martha Hickson, slandered relentlessly for defending her students’ rights to access books in her New Jersey library; Amanda Jones, who stood up for the right to access books in her Louisiana Parish’s public library; Suzette Baker, former library director in Llano County Library (TX); former Clay County Schools librarian, Julie Miller; and more. Intellectual freedom fighters and librarians Carolyn Foote and Becky Calzada make appearances, as do parents like Laney Hawes, involved with the Texas Freedom to Read Project. Much of the film covers censorship efforts in Florida and Texas. Those stories provide a lens into the coordinated, nationwide moves that attempt to ban books and color librarians as “groomers” promoting “inappropriate” materials to minors. In addition to the librarians’ voices, others are included to add even more context to the story. Among the most potent voices is that of Reverend Jeffrey Dove, a Clay County pastor who worked with Miller when books were being targeted. He hammers home how these bans are about erasure of marginalized voices and history…”
