AllMovie

Cathy Crowley was a loving, dedicated, and resolutely apolitical mother and Maine housewife prior to a shattering 2004 event that changed her life forever: the sudden and unanticipated demise of her emotionally troubled son Laurier Belanger, Jr. of the Army National Guard. That death happened deliberately, when Larry walked into the local Wal-Mart, bought a gun, and shot himself a day and a half later. Emotionally shattered, Cathy visited the Wal-Mart and chatted with the clerk who sold the gun to Larry - only to have the manager suggest that she write her congressperson to complain about the ease with which young people in Maine can buy firearms. Crowley took immediate action, by writing individual letters to all of the elected congressmen and congresswomen in Maine; eventually, she obtained legislative support for a bill that would impose a 10-day waiting period on any young person interested in purchasing a gun. As co-directed by Shoshana Hoose, Anita Clearfield and Geoffrey Leighton, the documentary There Ought to Be a Law chronicles Cathy's evolution into a dedicated and aggressive political activist striving for social change and unafraid to take on the NRA.