When the city of Atlanta announces plans to build the largest police training center in the US—destroying a vital urban forest in the process—a decentralized activist movement mobilizes to stop “Cop City”.

Forest defenders occupy the Weelaunee Forest, disrupting construction through direct action. Their resistance delays the progress of police militarization, but the celebration is cut short when police raid the camp and kill one of the activists, Tortuguita. Grief turns to defiance as protests spill into the streets, transforming a local land struggle into a national reckoning over policing, environmental justice, and democracy.

With rare access, A City in the Forest witnesses the power of collective organizing in an urgent and historic struggle.