Born in Brooklyn NY on October 16, 1972, Jerry Lamothe is amongst the growing batch of independent filmmakers to look out for coming out of NYC. The Brooklyn native founded Tru Life Films and released his directorial debut in 2000. Lamothe wrote, produced, starred and directed the critically acclaimed Amour Infinity. This award winning film was the talk of the 2000 Urban World Film Festival and went on to win Black Cinema Cafe, the Jamerican Film Festival, Atlanta independent film festival and finally the Hollywood Black Film Festival where it won the 2001 Audience Choice Award. The same year, the film was released in select cities for a limited engagement. It is now available on DVD where it continues to grow as a cult indie classic and was featured this past February on primetime television for Black History Month. Jerry and his company would then later ink a deal with Queen Latifah and Shakim Compere (Flava unit Entertainment) to produce the family comedy, Kidnapped co-written by Lamothe slated to go into production this year by Lions Gate films. In 2002, Lamothe went to work on his dream project, the coming of age ensemble, From The Outside Looking In. Lamothe successfully gained the interest of Mos Def, Terrence Howard, Isaiah Washington, Billy Crudrup and Wood Harris who would sign on to the ambitious, independent project. Slated to go into production August of that year, two weeks into rehearsals the funding collapsed. A despondent Lamothe knew he had to shake it off, return to the laptop and begin work on another project. The following year, the infamous blackout of 2003 would take place. Lamothe̢۪s personal experience in his own neighborhood during that fateful evening would spark the inspiration he was looking for. The project would simply be titled Blackout, a story of how a Brooklyn community was affected and the change of events that occurred in a mere twenty-four hours during the blackout. Based on true events, the story would contradict the public perception of how the disaster was handled. A first draft was completed in three weeks And Lamothe immediately began the grueling task of shopping the project and seek funding. In the fall of 2005 Lamothe successfully inked a deal with Judith Aidoo and her Caswell communications/Uptown Movie Network to fund his independent feature. Lamothe and his team would once again secure a top notch cast securing, Jeffrey Wright, Zoe Saldana, Latanya Richardson, Saul Rubenek, Sean Blakemore, Jamie Hector, Anthony Chisholm, Prodigy (Mobb Deep) and film maverick and icon, Melvin Van Peebles to bring his vision to reality. The film was shot on location in East Flatbush Brooklyn on the actual streets where the events took place. Look out for the film in 2007.
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