Special Report: Etched in Pavement (2026)

The Joe Louis Fist is among Detroit's best-known monuments, yet plenty of people have forgotten whose fist it is. Etched in Pavement (2026), a festival documentary from Detroit photographer-turned-filmmaker John Sippel, brings that legacy back through two young fighters from Southwest Detroit. Sippel spent four years inside the grassroots Guns Down, Gloves Up movement, where boxing becomes an answer to gun violence, addiction, and loss. After Woods Hole and a packed Detroit homecoming, the film is now on digital and VOD.

Mike talks with Sippel about two and a half years of shooting, screening the first rough cut for his subjects in his living room, an $80,000 post-production budget raised through boxing gyms and Kickstarter, and Joe Louis's children speaking on film about their father for the first time.

Visit the film's official website for more details.

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