Vox Populi
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Video: Inside, The Valley Sings
Trapped in the never-ending horror of solitary confinement, three prisoners in the United States seek comfort and escape in the boundless landscapes of their own imaginations.
Running time: 15 minutes
Directed by: Nathan Fagan
Animation Director: Natasza Cetner
Producer: Seamus Waters
Production Company: Wonderbread
Sound design & original score: Die Hexen
Funded by: The Arts Council of Ireland / An Chomhairle Ealaíon
Sponsorship: International Documentary Association (IDA)
Uploaded on Dec 23, 2025
Director’s Statement
Right now, all across the United States, there’s a hidden world made up of 6×9 cells – where individuals are forced to endure near total isolation from anywhere from a few weeks to a few decades.
Cinema, for me, is an empathy machine. It allows us to step outside of our own perspective and to experience the world through someone else’s eyes, even if only for a moment or two.
Right from the very beginning, my goal with this film was simple: to give a voice to this largely voiceless population. To give audiences a glimpse into life in this sunken, subterranean world.
I first began researching this project in the early months of 2020. Over the next two years, I conducted dozens of conversations with survivors of solitary confinement. Despite significant differences in many of their accounts, quite a number of these survivors told me something surprising: they explained that the border between reality and fantasy – between the inner world and the outer world – begins to shift during prolonged isolation.
That, in order to survive the harrowing reality of their daily existence, they began to construct elaborate, sensory-rich worlds in their own imaginations.
‘’These fantasies’’ – as our interview subject, Frank De Palma, explains in the film – ‘’were as real to me as your life is to you.’’
Although I’d seen other films about the horrors of solitary confinement, this was something I’d never seen explored before. I realized there was something deeply tragic – but also beautifully human – about this surprising revelation.
By exploring this unique perspective and phenomenon, my hope is that audiences will understand what survivors have been telling us for years: that solitary confinement is a form of torture, pure and simple. That, regardless of an individual’s guilt or innocence, we all share a common humanity – we all possess our own individual hopes, dreams and desires for a better life.
And any justice system that claims to be grounded in the dignity and rights of the individual must recognize this.
– Nathan Fagan, Director
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So painful to watch, but so necessary to help understand the unthinkable cruelty of solitary confinement. The resilience and courage of these prisoners, their imagination, is so moving. This should be required viewing. Thank you Michael.
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Thanks, Jan. The whole US prison system is very cruel and barbaric, especially the use of solitary confinement for long periods of time.
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I am so moved by this film. The humanity of it as opposed to the suffering it shows. Thank you.
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The film tells us so much about the cruelty of the state and the heroism of individuals. I think of the film Papillon with Steve McQueen which records the life of a man imprisoned on Devil’s Island…
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I remember that film very well. The whole concept of punishment, the deliberate cruelty of the prison system is abhorrent to me. I am always staggered by the amount of alternative thinking on this issue – and yet no government ever gives time of day to other ways of dealing with the breaking of society’s rules. To break and shatter seems to be a general rule.
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This breaks my heart — I really can NOT imagine what years and years and years of such utter solitude did to those men and women. This is so, so deeply sad… It does, indeed destroy as one of the prisoners said with an audible knot in his throat…
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And yet, they saved what they could of their sanity and humanity by creating a life of the imagination.
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So powerful. It makes the reality/unreality of solitary confinement vivid. And is completely convincing concerning its premise, that solitary confinement is a form of torture.
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America treats people worse than any other country. Only the wealthy have rights.
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I love this film because it is a profound illustration of the power of the imagination.
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