Coach Ray Ostrowski

After forty years in front of the camera, I’ll be directing my first feature film, SO HELP ME GOD: a Civil War epic about a Union soldier named Albert Townsend, who should have received the Medal of Honor but didn’t. Clerical error. I learned of Albert through his descendants’ archival research. What I found was more than an injustice waiting to be corrected. It was a story of friendship and extraordinary courage: an unassuming young man becoming a soldier who held his ground, and his principles, under fire. That’s a story worth telling on the largest possible scale. And we’re inviting the people who want to see it told to help bring it to the screen, as investors in the film through Republic. We intend to do it justice: real cannons, one hundred horses, and the cast in period-accurate uniforms. We’ve brought on Mark Huffam, whose work includes Saving Private Ryan, Game of Thrones, and The Martian, to produce it. He knows what it takes to make an epic, and how much depends on the human story at its heart. At the Medal of Honor Heritage Center in Chattanooga, Tennessee, I introduced the project alongside Civil War historian Brad Quinlin, members of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, and representatives of Civil War Roundtables. We’re also supporting the campaign for Albert’s posthumous Medal of Honor. His descendants are still fighting to see his courage properly recognized. This picture is about friendship, love, and honor — and common people rising to accomplish extraordinary things. I want to give that story everything it deserves. I hope you will lift the banner with us. Learn more about the film and the opportunity to invest: sohelpmegod.film