‘All The Empty Rooms’ Trailer: Joshua Seftel’s Netflix Film Documents Void Left By Innocent Victims Of School Shootings
EXCLUSIVE: More than 200 children have been killed in school shootings in the U.S. since 1999, according to the nonprofit Brady group.
That devastating reality underpins the Academy Award-contending documentary short All the Empty Roomsdirected by Joshua Seftel (Oscar nominated for 2023’s Stranger at the Gate), which peers into the void left by the young victims of these shootings.
“All the Empty Rooms follows veteran CBS News correspondent Steve Hartman and photographer Lou Bopp as they embark on a seven-year-long project to document the empty bedrooms of children killed in school shootings,” notes a synopsis. “Hartman steps away from his heartwarming human interest stories and unbeknownst to his network’s bosses, pursues a piece on absence, memory, and the unseen ripples of America’s gun violence epidemic. As these senseless incidents claim more young lives than any other cause in America, these quiet bedrooms reveal truths more powerful than statistics ever could.”
‘All The Empty Rooms’
Courtesy of Netflix
The film, winner of awards at the SCAD Savannah Film Festival, Santa Fe International Film Festival, Montclair Film Festival, among others, premieres on Netflix on December 1. We have your first look at the documentary in the trailer above.
“After Sandy Hook, Parkland, and so many other school shootings, I began to feel numb,” Seftel writes in a director’s statement. “As a parent of two little girls, it was hard to even let myself even think about the possibilities. Then, last year, my phone rang.
“It was veteran CBS News Reporter Steve Hartman. In the late 90s, I was Steve’s producer as he became nationally known for telling one-of-a-kind uplifting, good news stories. But it had been twenty-five years since we had spoken.”
‘All The Empty Rooms’
Courtesy of Netflix
After agreeing to collaborate on the project, they traveled to the sites of school shootings – in Nashville, Uvalde, TX, Santa Clarita, CA. Parents of murdered school children granted them access to their homes. “We get to know the children through the rooms they left behind,” Seftel writes. “They came to life for us and the weight of their absence was crushing.”
Seftel continues, “We were filled with sadness and sorrow as we observed these rooms through a cinema verite approach – allowing space for the viewer to be transported to the room.
“After returning home, I came away with a new perspective on family and life in America. It’s impossible not to feel a greater sense of gratitude toward my children and a burning desire to change the course of this crisis.”
Director Joshua Seftel speak at the ‘All The Empty Rooms’ Q&A during the 28th SCAD Savannah Film Festival on October 31, 2025 in Savannah, Georgia.
Derek White/Getty Images for SCAD
Seftel concludes his director’s statement writing, “Through this film I hope we’ve opened a door for all of us to step out of the numbness and rekindle an urgency to do something.”
All the Empty Rooms is directed and produced by Joshua Seftel and produced by Trevor Burgess, James Costa, and Conall Jones. Executive producers include Claire Aguilar, Sigrid Dyekjær, Steve Kerr, Anna Bick Rowe, Geralyn White Dreyfous, Conrad Fischer, Mary Judelson, Roy Judelson, Jon Levin, Adam Lewis, Melony Lewis, Kim Magnusson, Adam McKay, Kevin J. Messick, Cheryl Milstein, Phil Milstein, Eric Nichols, and Regina K. Scully.
Watch the trailer for All the Empty Rooms above.
