The Dead Boy You Didn’t Know
A modern fairy tale set in East Palo Alto, where two children are forced to reconnect with the ghosts that haunt a changing community.
Support the FilmFrom scholarship to cinema
The Dead Boy You Didn’t Know is inspired by Antonio López’s research and oral histories of East Palo Alto — exploring grief, memory, gentrification, and the ghosts communities carry through change.
Through magical realism and urban fantasy, the film transforms years of scholarship and lived experience into a cinematic story rooted in remembrance, community, and resistance.
Antonio is also a longtime member of the ISF community, having received multiple ISF scholarships throughout his graduate and doctoral studies. This collaboration reflects the long-term impact of investing in Muslim storytellers, scholars, and artists.
A haunting journey across town
On their way to a neighborhood vigil, siblings Andre and Nesa are sidetracked when they are lured into the home of a mysterious Old Lady, who sends them on their way with a token to deliver.
What begins as a journey across East Palo Alto becomes something deeper: a confrontation with ghosts, erased landmarks, community memory, and the question of who is worthy of being mourned.
Help bring this story to life
Your support helps move The Dead Boy You Didn’t Know from vision to production, giving the team the resources needed to tell this story with care, creativity, and community-rooted intention.
This film is more than a creative project. It is an act of remembrance, a tribute to community elders, and a cinematic response to the grief of displacement.
Donate Today- Production costs
- Cast and crew
- Locations and equipment
- Editing and post-production
- Festival submissions
- Community screenings
Memory, ghosts, and the city
The film uses urban fantasy and magical realism to portray East Palo Alto as both a real place and a haunted emotional landscape, where the past is always trying to speak through the present.
Mr. G (Ghufran), the Arab shopkeeper, in conversation with the kids inside the corner store.
Andre and Nesa with the cat at the Old Lady's gate — the fairy-tale opening.
The neighborhood vigil — candles, community, the emotional heart of the film.
The scholar and the filmmaker
This project brings together Antonio López’s scholarship, poetry, lived experience, and community-rooted research with Anthony Solorzano’s cinematic vision.
Antonio López
PhD Candidate at Stanford University, Poet Laureate of San Mateo County, author of Gentefication, Obama Foundation USA Leader, and former Mayor of East Palo Alto.
Anthony Solorzano
Independent filmmaker and USC School of Cinematic Arts alum whose debut film, Varsity Punks, won at Urbanworld Film Festival in 2017. His work includes music videos, commercials, and short documentaries.
Help preserve the stories that refuse to disappear
Your gift helps bring The Dead Boy You Didn’t Know to life and supports a powerful story about memory, grief, community, and resistance.
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