Foster Boy Movie Screening Benefits Families Helping Families

The public is invited to a private movie screening of the new film, Foster Boy, starring Matthew Modine and Shane Paul McGhie, and featuring Academy Award Winner, Louis Gossett Jr. on Thursday evening, December 12th at 7 pm at the Wilmette Theatre. Written by Chicago attorney, Jay Paul Deratany, Foster Boy, which was partially filmed in Chicago, is based on true events from several of Deratany's foster care cases, and sheds light on the horrible mistreatment of children in the for-profit foster care system. Shaquille O'Neal is the movie's executive producer.

A $20 donation per person includes an appetizer buffet prior to the movie, as well as a “Q & A” talk back with Jay Paul Deratany immediately following the screening. All proceeds benefit Families Helping Families Chicagoland, which supports families and foster children in need and/or in crisis throughout Lake and Cook Counties. Doors open at 6 pm. The movie starts 7 pm. The talk back will begin at 9 pm. The Wilmette Theatre is located at 1122 Central Avenue. For more information and to register for the event, please visit www.fhfchicagoland.org. For more information about Foster Boy, please visit www.FosterBoy.com.

About Families Helping Families:

Based in Gurnee, Illinois, and started by public school teacher, Amy Newman, Families Helping Families Chicagoland supports families and foster children in need and/or in crisis throughout Lake and Cook Counties. They do this by hosting monthly donation drives, collecting birthday gifts for children living in foster care, and hosting other fundraising opportunities in order to help and positively impact as many families and children as possible. They are a grassroots organization mobilizing and linking local communities with families and children in foster care during times of crisis and hardship. Their goal is to help as many kids and families as possible to thrive and succeed.

Film Synopsis

Michael Trainer (Modine) is a lawyer at the center of a trial in which a for-profit Foster care agency puts a known sex offender into the same foster home as his young client Jamal (McGhie), with catastrophic results. Michael, a successful litigator with a long career in protecting corporate clients, has been blinded from recognizing the real damage they can cause. He wants nothing to do with Jamal's case until a Judge (Gossett Jr) forces him to accept it. Initially, he sees Jamal as a thuggish African American youth trying to get a piece of corporate profits. But when Jamal refuses to settle the case for any amount of money, Michael begins his representation in earnest. As their work together reveals the horrifying depth of the corrupt and abusive for-profit foster care agency, Michael is transformed from reluctant defender to fierce warrior in the battle for justice.