[T]wo weeks ago, I was sitting in the living room playing with a little 16-month-old boy named Cole. I was paid to broker access to my client’s house for two hours. The Ex-wife, who had falsely put a restraining order on the Dad, was preventing him from seeing his son or monitoring the removal of her belongings from their house.
My client was texting me crying. I occasionally texted back pictures of a son he could not freely see, nor visit, in what I knew would turn into an ugly drawn-out divorce and custody hearing. For the past 20 years, I have witnessed, comforted, cried, assisted, coached, mediated and waited through the horrors of my own and hundreds of others sucked in the child custody road.
Unless you have been down this road, you cannot appreciate the pain and crazy choices a parent will resort too, in an effort to gain reasonable access to their kids. Not since the 1979 movie, Kramer vs. Kramer has there been a movie that cuts to the heart of the pain a Dad feels when fighting for child custody.
Custody Road Review Summary
Director John Lacy lays out a hauntingly desperate, spontaneously violent, and very painful movie. A struggling stand up comic goes to extreme measures of kidnapping his party-girl Ex-wife from winning sole custody of their young son. What happens at a remote cabin in the high desert of California will cause you to reflect on the ugliness of the child custody process.
Why You Should See this Movie
Parents, this is not a happy movie. Nor one I want you to watch with your kids. John Lacy has put together a graphic heart-wrenching show that addresses lots of the issues you will face in your child custody pursuit.
- In the past, there were moments when the relationship worked. Is it really worth the being ugly now?
- Could two parents work out a reasonable co-parenting relationship without all the influence of attorneys?
- Who is really in your corner when the chips are down?
- Is it really worth it to alienate one parent over the other?
- Is the process of divorce and custody fair? To you? The kids?
- Could a life-altering decision be made in a courtroom in a matter of minutes?
- Where is the line of right and wrong in helping a friend struggling with their custody process?
John Lacy answers none of these questions but makes you ponder this process. I sat in silence after this screening. It’s a thinking movie and one you should experience to understand the process of child custody. In the end, there are no winners.
I highly recommend this movie! Rent or own the movie from iTunes here, or visit the movie’s website at https://CustodyRoad.com for more information.
PS. I’m going to try and see if the director is open to an interview on the Daddy Got Custody podcast. Stay tuned, co-parent well.
Feature and post images © 2018 Five Tool Entertainment.
This is definitely food for thought. I have always appreciated that my ex and I seemed to mostly get along when co-parenting our daughter. I am not sure she ever saw enough of her dad, but we tried to make it as seamless as possible so that she could. He always did what he said he would do, and I give him credit for that. I’m an empty-nester now, but it’s always heartbreaking to see families torn apart like this. It only takes a bit of relenting to help things along.
Thanks Andi! The Custody Road is certainly a touch one. I pray that no two parents take it to this level.