The documentary The Librarians unravels the truth behind a tale as old as time, book banning. Directed by Oscar-nominated and Peabody award-winning filmmaker and producer, Kim A. Snyder, it takes a firm stance against censorship and unites librarians and educators to protect the first amendment.
The film first premiered at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival and was later screened at the South by Southwest film festival. It opens in US theaters on October 3rd, 2025.
The documentary follows the librarians of a small town in Texas as they are criminalized for the mere act of indiscriminately supplying children with reading material. On account of a repressive government agenda, librarians are called out as dangerous and radical for simply distributing books about matters such as LGBTQ+ rights, ethnic stories, sexual education, and more. The librarians quickly call out this censorship as an act of forcing one’s own world view while suppressing different ways of thinking, therefore violating a child’s fundamental right to learn and to think freely.
In order to protect their constitutional rights, they stand up for the children, despite the fear among librarians and teachers that they could face penalties, lose their jobs, and even deal with legal action for ensuring access to knowledge.
Alongside the political fight, the documentary reveals the personal cost of censorship, showing librarians who deal with personal issues as as well as children who lose access to books that reflect their lives, voices, and questions, underscoring how vital diverse stories are to their sense of identity.
In an IndieWire interview, actress and executive producer of the film, Sarah Jessica Parker says, “One of the things that is so important that I think gets lost in the politics of it is the sensitivity, the necessity, the importance, the gateway that is a book and the way we talk about books and the relationships that cultivate among people… Books have been, for a large majority of us, for hundreds of years, an important companion, but also the bridge to understanding, to information, to compassion, to broadening a child’s opportunities in the world.”
According to Variety, The Librarians is “a gripping story of what is at stake when curiosity and thinking are endangered.”
Watch the official trailer for The Librarians above.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.