In theory, I should love American Promise. First, it is a documentary, and I generally love most documentaries. Second, it unfolds in NYC, my hometown and one of the most photogenic cities in the world. Third, it allegedly focuses on middle class black children attending Dalton, one of nine of the best “independent,” i.e. private, schools in NYC, and I happened to attend one of them so it is a subject near and dear to my heart for personal reasons. Fourth, after watching Boyhood, I was attracted to the idea of a documentary version of that concept. American Promise is not about anything that it initially appears to be on its surface. It is about how well-meaning parents who believe that their children’s dreams and discovery of self can only be achieved through academic excellence instead of just nurturing the child as an individual with weaknesses and strengths. Unfortunately American Promise horrified me for two reasons. First, the boys did not consent to the incessant filming, and it was really more about what the parents wanted instead of what was best for their children. Second, even though one of the two boys’ father was a psychiatrist, and the boy begged for medical treatment when he recognized that he suffered from ADHD, his parents were in denial for years, refused his request for treatment and berated him as lazy when he fails to meet their academic expectations. The child even says that he knows his parents love him, but their actions don’t reflect it. American Promise is a perfect cautionary tale for parents: your expectations and projections of what your child can be may inadvertently end up destroying your child. Also American Promise suffers from lack of focus and fails to tell a cohesive story using all its footage because the filmmakers are the subjects. They are too close to the story to look at it objectively and effectively convey whatever their intended message was to the audience. The portions that ended up in the bonus features were better than what was included. American Promise was a heartbreaking miss.