For those who want a "Dear Zachary" spoiler ***spoiler you have been warned***

[Anonymous]

Young vibrant American doctor and only child of elderly parents living in the UK is shot and killed by his crazy girlfriend he was trying to break up with.

His parents were planning on seeking justice for him and then killing themselves since their only child is dead. Find out she is pregnant. Find out she is Canadian and extradition is all messed up.

Documentary filmmaker is his best friend and wants his unborn son to know about his dad so he makes a film included stories from all close to his dad. Andrew was an amazing man with many friends and relatives who loved them dearly. The story is told in a way that half way through you feel like you knew him too or would have liked to.

She has the baby. Grandparents move there to take care of baby Zachary. She is released on bail.

3/4 of the way through she kills herself and thirteen month old Zachary.

We get reactions from all the people who told us about Andrew.

You will be gutted and ripped apart by how raw and brutal this part of the documentary is. Especially reaction from Andrew's father.

Grandparents now fight for victims rights and thankfully have not killed themselves.




It is brutal and I highly recommend you watch it. No summary can really sum it up.

[Anonymous]

^ should have added

All of Andrews friends tell his parents that they are not childless, because they are all their children too. Their son was awesome because they were are awesome and loving and they should never forget that or give up hope.

So it is both beautiful and brutal.

[Anonymous]

NP here. I'll add that when it's revealed that the baby was killed, it is a gut wrenching shocker. I wasn't prepared for it, and wasn't expecting it.

[Anonymous]

Oh wow - I saw this years ago. Pretty sure I did the ugly cry.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NP here. I'll add that when it's revealed that the baby was killed, it is a gut wrenching shocker. I wasn't prepared for it, and wasn't expecting it.

Yes because the parents had reached a point of tolerable cordiality with the mother, who worked with them so they could see their grandson Zachary. They were so kind to her, even though she had killed their son, because she was Zachary's mother.

[Anonymous]

This is a good summary. And I'm not trying to be snarky. But whenever I hear about a movie or book, and know I'm not going to watch/read it, I go to Wikipedia. They provide summaries (including spoilers) for most. So when this doc came up on the thread about best docs you've seen, and people talked about how gut wrenching it was, I read about it on wikipedia. Not having seen it, this summary seems to align with wikipedia, though there are more details on wikipedia, which seemed to emphasis how awful the courts treated the grandparents and how negligently (it appears) they treated the murderous mother.

That said, I do appreciate hearing how others felt about it - reaction spoilers (rather than recitation of what it is about). I doubt I would ever watch it, that's for sure!

[Anonymous]

^ some people don't want a more detailed spoiler

Especially in this case they may want to watch it but are not sure if they can handle the "gut wrenching" part.

Just the basics are what they are looking for.

[Anonymous]

I saw it knowing that the boy had been killed, and I still think it was an excellent movie. It definitely made me ugly cry, but I was not as traumatized as others who did not know the backstory apparently were.

And you should watch it! It is sad, but also tells the story of some truly wonderful people (Andrew and his parents). I was definitely inspired to live a better life after watching it.

[Anonymous]

I posted on the other thread asking about what happened. So thank you for sharing this. My DD is 13 months so I think I need to wait a little bit longer before I can handle this. Maybe in a few more months. It will stay in my netflix queue until then.

[Anonymous]

I have watched this movie several times and as sad and depressing as the subject matter is I've come away with two main thoughts. The first was how lovingly Andrew's friends portrayed him. He must have been a special person. Which leads me to the second-good people raise good people. You watch Andrew's parents go through the worst experiences any person could imagine and at the end of the film they are not only still intact but as strong as they were from the beginning. They made feel positive after watching one of the saddest stories one could imagine.