all before the age of thirty—money, cars, women."
These are the narrator's opening words to the ground-breaking
documentary film about how Eddie Redzovic, founder and host of the
worldly-renowned The Deen Show, came to Islam.
However, the narrator's next words are those thattruly open this film:
"But beneath the surface…"
And "beneath the surface" is the story of one man—a troubled and
broken soul—who makes the streets his battleground and the nightclub
his place of refuge. Yet, as he repeatedly throws himself into throes
of violence and death, he discovers that his most dangerous
battleground lies within…
The story of troubled Eddie—who was born in Buffalo, New York, to
Yugoslavian immigrants—begins while Eddie is inChicago, where his
parents moved while he was still a child.
With two working parents and lots of time on his hands, young Eddie
fills his days with what could only be described as every parent's
nightmare: bad friends, complete disregard for school, and,ultimately,
gang membership.
"Children are like a garden," Eddie's uncle reflects regretfully on
what happened to his nephew during those years. "If you miss [even]
one week of watering, it's overcome with weeds."
Like so many troubled souls before him, it is within the somber
solitude of a jail cell yearslater that Eddie realizes that his life
is in disarray. Ironically, it is the absence of his closest
companions—his fellow gang members, his "family"—that inspires this
realization.
"I'm in a jail cell thinking…These people don't care about me."
Then comes the ultimate question that every soul must surely ask
itself at least once upon this earth, "What am I doing with my life?"
Yet, even after his release, the light still doesn't come on for Eddie…
It isn't until he sinks deepinto the insobriety of self-indulgence
that the fault lines begin to make way to redemption…
But even after he embraces spirituality to feed his ailing soul,
Eddiefinds that his battle of the self is not yet over…
"You have three types of brothers…" Eddie tells theattendants to a
lecture at a school he visits after accepting Islam and founding The
Deen Show, "blood brothers…brothers in humanity…and brothers in
[faith]."
And this film offers a moving story for each and every one of them—the
members of our families, our brothersand sisters in humanity, and all
people of faith.
In a world of Islamophobia, media-hyped "Islamic extremism," and
spiritual depravation, this documentary is a "must-see" for every
journalist, every writer, every intellectual…And every soul.
This film will touch each differently. But each will be touched.
This movie truly is, as the commentator said of Eddie himself, "an
example of redemption."
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