Sundance Review: Kim A. Snyder's Emotionally Devastating Documentary 'Newtown'

How do you make a film about the Sandy Hook Massacre in Newtown, Connecticut? How do you wrap your mind around 26 children and teachers gunned down in an elementary school with an assault rifle? It hurts to think about it, the concept too great too bear. Documentarian Kim A. Snyder undertakes this task, reckoning with the horror of December 14th, 2012, and its aftermath, in the film “Newtown,” to emotionally devastating results. 

It’s hard to speak critically about a film like this, because there’s no real way to detach from the emotion of the piece. It’s really the only choice for Snyder, to grapple with this unspeakable act through the emotional aftermath, because to speak to the cold, hard details and facts would just be too much. During an early interview, a state trooper who entered the school says no one needs to know the details of what he saw. Just the emotion. In their interviews, both the EMT at the scene and the attending ER doctor are rendered speechless by their...