Film Overview

"A Little Lower Than the Angels" explores the value of human life, chronicling the lives of childhood friends Marilyn Chambers and Carolyn Nytch.

In 1944, at age 5, Marilyn Chambers, born with profound mental retardation, was placed in the Rome State School, in Rome, New York. She remained institutionalized for the next 48 years. Her parents never discussed their daughter again, even to their closest friends, and it was generally believed that she had died as a child. Decades later, Carolyn Nytch discovered that Marilyn was still alive and began a search for the truth of what happened during those missing years.

The feature documentary contains interviews from experts in the field of disability, archive newspaper accounts, and photographs from the institution days, but the primary focus of the film is the extraordinary frienship that develops between these two women when they reconnect late in life.