HERE AFTER is a feature length documentary that takes a deeper look at three unconventional American cemeteries, told through the wit and wisdom of their caretakers.

In Miami, over a thousand cremated remains have been placed undersea by Jim Hutslar at The Neptune Memorial Reef. In upstate New York’s Greensprings Natural Burial Cemetery, Jen Johnson manages 130 acres that double as a wildlife preserve. In Texas, Dr. Lori Baker is exhuming a mass grave of undocumented immigrants, to identify and repatriate the remains. HERE AFTER interweaves their stories, creating a rare glimpse into the memorialization process that reveals the social and ecological implications of our final mark upon the earth. This project was graciously supported by a grant from The Princess Grace Foundation USA and a MacDowell Colony Residency.

A coral reef made of cremated remains, a green burial wildlife preserve, and a mass grave of unidentified people along the southern border: this documentary looks at three cemeteries in the U.S. and the shifting ways our resting places define us.

Esy Casey’s (Director, Producer, Cinematographer) work can be seen in the Emmy nominated BORN TO FLY (shot with DPs Albert Maysles and Kirsten Johnson, Independent Lens PBS), BEFORE YOU KNOW IT (Dir. PJ Raval, America Reframed PBS), and THING WITH NO NAME (Dir. Sarah Friedland). Her directorial debut JEEPNEY premiered on PBS in 2015 and won the jury prize for Best Cinematography at the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival. She has received awards and fellowships from The New York Film Festival, The Princess Grace Foundation USA, The Ford Foundation’s JustFilms Initiative, The Center for Asian American Media, The Flaherty Seminar and The American Association of University Women.

Sarah Friedland’s (Director, Producer, Cinematographer, Sound Recordist) works with Esy Casey have screened widely in the US and abroad and have been supported by grants including The Jerome Foundation, The Paul Newman Foundation, and The William H. Prusoff Foundation. In 2009, after the debut of her feature documentary Thing With No Name, she was named one of the Top 10 Independent Filmmakers to Watch by The Independent Magazine. She is a recipient of the 2014 Paul Robeson Award from The Newark Museum for her feature documentary The Rink, which aired on PBS (WNET/NJTV) in May 2017. Her recent documentary Jeepney (Produced with Esy Casey) was broadcast on PBS in 2015. She has received residencies and fellowships from The Center of Contemporary Art in Pont-Aven, the LABA House of Study, the MacDowell Colony, and Meerkat Media. Friedland is currently the Director of the MDOCS Documentary Storyteller’s Institute at Skidmore College.