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1-8 of 8
- This eight-minute experimental video evokes the doubly-historic date, November 9 (the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the Nazi pogrom of Crystal Night in 1938). Shot while the Berlin Wall was being dismantled, this is Petzall's personal response to the Wall's monumental concrete panels and to vestiges of gravestones from the Holocaust. An impressionistic collage, shapes and colors blur as quickly as the historic ideas they depict. Petzall uses the sensuous forces of video to to catch a point in time when the wall's tomblike structure still hovers as a symbolic presence of oppression, and just before it is is lowered into the collective grave of the painful past.
- Imagine you are a child forced to leave your homeland... its customs, traditions, and all things familiar. Will there be peace half-way around the globe? Meet five Vietnamese adolescents who, decades ago, barely survived escapes in squalid boats. Years later, they still struggle with others' prejudices, their own ambitions, and bridging two cultures in the U.S. Midwest. In a weaving of personal accounts, this half-hour documentary tries to highlight how stories of desperation and survival still go on all over this globe. Since 1975, several million South Vietnamese, Cambodians, and Lao have left their homelands in rickety boats, fleeing the communists' claim on their lives. Of the millions of Boat People who escaped out to sea, more than 50% died in the ocean trying to reach free shores. Of those who survived the journey, more than 200,000 have been waiting in refugee camps, caught between disaster and freedom. Many were unaccompanied minors, uncertain even of refugees status, they exist somewhere in crowded camps. 920,000 managed to reach the United States. SOS - Stories of Survival is a about several young survivors' stark process of becoming 'American.' Youngsters who escaped the war's disasters tell of school days under Communism, inter-generational conflicts and the way Western prejudice has assaulted their dreams - but have not diminished their dignity.
- The hands of a teenage girl provide a metaphorical interpretation for a true story of trust betrayed. This five-minute, experimental video is based on an actual letter by an adolescent reaching out to understand a childhood of abuse. The portrayal of the effects of child abuse on the child provide helpful insights for adolescents and adults.
- Just a generation ago, it was legal for a man to beat his wife, provided he used a stick no thicker than his thumb. Now a new "Rule of Thumb" across the US makes spouse abuse against the law. Commissioned by the St. Louis section of the National Council of Jewish Women, this documentary inspires as it informs women how to seek legal protection from abuse. "Rule of Thumb" offers help for women in the grip of spouse abuse. This twenty-five minute program provides insights into the complex phenomenon known as "domestic violence". The new 'rule of thumb' shows that spouse abuse is no longer a private affair - the law now treats it as a criminal matter. In this delicate, evocative documentary, five abused women reveal to one another their own ambivalence and the victory each felt when they reached out for help and escaped their abusive husbands. The women describe their emotional traumas, and concrete information is offered about how victims can access the Order of Protection, a law which is finally on a woman's side in making spouse abuse a crime. The women's first-hand stories are sensitively blended with candid insights from a formerly abusive husband, and from criminal justice professionals helping to challenge the traditional cycles of violence. Rule of Thumb invites viewers from all segments of society: men and women, young and elderly, professional and struggling, to realize that the idea of "domestic" violence can no longer be treated as a private, family affair - instead it must be understood as a criminal affair.
- Created to promote family literacy, this animated video invites families to strengthen their own communication bonds by falling in love with books together. The story features both hand-drawn and computer animation techniques and original music meant to attract diverse groups of viewers ranging in age from kindergarten children to their parents and guardians. Once Upon a Book shows both children and adults that reading together is a way to strengthen family bonds and foster success in school and in the workplace.
- Here is a video poem that celebrates the struggles and triumphs of women throughout the world. Through words and visual imagery, it gives an intimate face to female courage, mercy, and faith in the human spirit. It is built around the poem "Dedication" by Jill Evans Petzall: DEDICATION This.. This is dedicated..... This is dedicated to the women. This is dedicated to all the women who dare meet the world with new eyes, as if they had never seen it before ... to women who take chances with their visions.... who choose the path of their compassions... ... who practice the invisible artistry of prayer. This is dedicated to all women who are good at what they do. This is dedicated to all the women who must leave the land of fairy tales to live with wolves. To the "widow, the orphan, the child in our gates..." ...to the "poor, the sick, the ignorant..." to people who never belonged and to those who ask for more. This is for everyone who walks with others in their pain. ... to the men who are partners in the journey, working at Love in daily life. ... to all mothers who must pay a price for their children's safety; ... and to every woman fighting back, whose fury can not be stilled. This is dedicated to all the victims who've ever been blamed.... And to the women who believed it was always their fault. This is for all the heroines who have triumphed with tenderness, who prevail with laughter and song, It is for everyone who understands that Love, like a miracle, like a cure, takes time. This is dedicated to all the men and women cleaning up the broken gardens of war zones, whose touch bears witness to the wounded soil, whose hands tend and tame the hopeful fires that lean into the future sky. This is dedicated to people who are always in crowds, ...always in step, in need, in control, indifferent, in motion, in charge, up for grabs, in danger, in secret, in doubt, ... always alone... ....'til mercy found their hiding place. This is dedicated to those women who have forgotten who they are .... ... to the friends who remind each one of all that they are meant to be... And to the possibilities that wait for them while they remember. This is dedicated to those whose instincts pushed them onward, the winter birds in flight, toward grace. This is dedicated to all the women who have no words for this. This.... This is dedicated. This is what dedicated is. This is what dedicated is about...... When the fullness of life overflows the rising sun... When you "use your own freedom to answer to another's need...". When the power to change lives becomes your humble prayer.... When mercy finds its home - in you. This. Just this. This is dedicated to all people who know how life feels, and how it counts.... ... who "dance every evening" to the shifting shapes of Love, .. who are pulled forward by the hand of promise. This is dedicated to the hungry fires burning in our sisters' eyes.
- It has been said that when you incarcerate a woman, you imprison a family. Most female inmates are mothers, and most are locked up for non-violent offenses. As prison populations rise, so does the problem of lost children - already a quarter million of them. This hour-long documentary looks from the children's perspectives at three Missouri families. The children's day-to-day lives in the film gives a clear picture of how the US justice system perpetuates the very problems it seeks to prevent. "When the Bough Breaks" questions who does the harder time, the inmate mothers, or their children? The youngsters make clear that, regardless of a mothers' crime, the urgent desire for her love shapes their lives. "When the Bough Breaks" explores the emotional impact on children whose mothers are imprisoned for non-violent crimes, particularly drug-related prostitution and theft. The children's day-to-day lives give a clear, up-close picture of how the American justice system perpetuates the very problems it seeks to prevent. Filmed over the course of a year, three Missouri families tell their stories as the children are bounced between social workers, foster parents, grandparents and visits with their moms in prison. This intimate documentary reveals how entire families are punished when mothers are imprisoned. These youngsters are often left in the custody of extended family members where their needs are misunderstood, where poverty prevails and where they suffer emotional neglect and abuse. With prison populations quadrupling and more than a quarter million children left behind, responsibilities confronting our society become real through their young, articulate voices. Although those who break the law must expect punishment, how can we balance the needs of children against a justice system that often deals lengthy sentences for victimless crimes? When drugs are the cause, why is prison the solution? And who does the harder time, the mothers or their children? The youngsters make clear that regardless of a mother's crime, the urgent desire for her love shapes their lives. As sons and daughters reveal their longings, which are palpable especially during their visits to their moms in prison, their common desire for love makes them eloquent examples of the more than 250,000 youngsters in the United States who suffer from this separation daily. WHEN THE BOUGH BREAKS asks whether separating families is wise public policy, and raises real questions about the nature of a society that prizes punishment more than restorative justice. In the hour film, mothers, their children and their caretakers openly discuss their personal experiences and heartaches. The following summarizes their stories... Laura and Missy Eight-year-old Laura cannot control her temper, while six-year-old Missy cannot control her tears. "I see changes. I know Laura, my eight-year-old, she is angry, she's so angry. Missy, she's just withdrawn. She still sucks her little finger," says their mother Susie, who has been in jail for two years for one count of forgery. There was no one else to care for them, so they moved in with their ailing grandparents. Their grandmother resents the burden, while their loving grandfather cares for the two girls' emotional and physical needs. "It's hard on me, hard on her grandmother. It's hard on a lot of people. You think you send one person to jail? Uh-uh, it affects a lot of people," says Grandpa. As months stretch ahead before their mother's release, Grandpa suddenly passes away and the girls are moved down the street, forced to cope with their aunt who is herself in emotional distress. She says, "They latched onto me, to where I can't...God bless their heart -- I don't mind, but they just, I couldn't hardly breathe." Meanwhile, the children fear they will never see their mother again. Roosevelt, Jr. Handsome 15-year-old Roosevelt, Jr. calls three different women "Mom": his inmate mother, his stepmother and his favorite foster mother. He returned to live with his stepmother and ex-convict father after three years in the foster system. His stepmother Ophelia, who has cared for him the longest, is determined to keep him from repeating his parents' mistakes. "Just 'cuz his mom's been there, his father's been there, it's not like a hereditary thing. You don't inherit incarceration." Since Roosevelt's father has spent most of his own adulthood behind bars, he is at a loss as to how to nurture his son. "It was something new to me, really, after being away so long. 'Cause when moms and grandmothers were standing in for the sickness and all them nights up, I didn't have to deal with it." His new wife, Roosevelt's stepmother, is a strong and caring woman. "He's my kid. Yeah. And even when his mom comes home, he's still gonna be my kid. She's gonna have to really prove herself to get my baby back. She's not gonna get him back really easily. She's gonna have to deserve him back, earn him back. Not because she's just Mom," says Ophelia, Roosevelt's stepmother. "You go through changes with children coming into the foster care program. They come into your house. So you go through a honeymoon stage. And then they're mad, they're angry, 'Why is my life like this?'" says Roosevelt's foster mother Sonya. As Roosevelt, Jr. admits, "With your mom and dad, you score a touchdown. With your step-parents, you're always one yardline from the goal." Once his mother is released from prison, who will he choose to live with? About his mother, Roosevelt says, "It's nothing she can do to bring it back or anything. It's like a big piece of a puzzle missing. And when she gets out, we'll just continue it from there. Within time, I guess it'll fit itself back in. But we'll have to wait on that." John, Angie and Tanya "She says that she hopes that I don't end up like her and stuff. I tell her I ain't gonna end up like her. I ain't." --Angie "I don't never cry or get mad when she gets arrested. 'Cause it's her fault. Ain't nobody's fault but hers. I ain't cried in three or four years. I don't never cry." --John John has spent most of his teenage years in homes for troubled youths. "Me and my mom's boyfriend used to get into fights a lot. He used to try to beat me up until I started hitting him back. One time I got fed up with it and started trying to hit him with baseball bats and stuff. That's part of the reason I got a behavior problem now." Thirteen-year-old Angie counts her foster homes at five, but their younger sister Tanya thinks she has lived in fewer than that. Sometimes they all stay together with their grandmother. John, Angie and Tanya are but three of their inmate mother's seven children; three others have already been adopted out of the family. Then, a year ago, their baby brother James was born while their mother was once again in prison. The infant was immediately placed in foster care where he has just begun calling his foster mother "Mama." From prison, Denise, James's birth mother, fights for custody of James. "I want a life, I want a family, I've had seven children, haven't raised one of them, so it's time for me to buckle down and raise the one I had, the last one I had, at least." After Denise's upcoming release, James might be returned to her custody -- if she finds housing, a job and stays drug-free. "This is my sixth time in prison. And, I would think after five times, if it was going to help me, it would, " she explains. "It's not going to change me. It makes you harder. It makes you not as caring." She will return once more to society unprepared, impoverished, but optimistic -- though there are no residential treatment programs immediately available to her. Mechelle, James's foster mom, says, "I see myself as his mother. I didn't give birth to him, but I've had him since birth. I just don't wanna think about losing him." The baby's fate is observed through the anguish of his foster mother and the hopeful eyes of his older siblings. When John, Angie and Tanya get evicted from their rented dilapidated flat, their dire circumstances underscore how repeated prison sentences for addicted women magnifies the instability of their children's lives.
- SLATKIN! A SYMPHONY features Yo-Yo Ma, Emanuel Ax, the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, the Saint Louis Opera Theatre Orchestra, and the Saint Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra. Produced in 1987, this documentary offers a rare opportunity to learn about the inner-world of a major conductor, to discover a Maestro that concert audiences can not experience in a symphony hall. With humor and candor, this documentary probes the mystique that surrounds the conductor while showing how one leader compels a hundred strong-willed musicians to follow his musical vision. The story is structured as a classical symphony, in four discrete "movements". ALLEGRO-VIVACE shows the speed of Slatkin's wit as a public persona. Performing here with Slatkin is pianist Emanuel Ax. In ADAGIO, Slatkin meditates on his boyhood spent in a musical family. The third movement, SCHERZO, shows Slatkin in rehearsals with his orchestra and his youth orchestra. He is also shown rehearsing with singers and acting directors in Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. MAESTOSO climaxes in the Maestro's most intimate musical moments with cellist Yo-Yo Ma. Additional scenes feature Slatkin and Yo-Yo Ma in a tense Senate sub-Committee hearing on increasing NEA funding for the arts. The documentary culminates with his final 1986 performance conducting his Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra. This program has broad appeal in terms of its educational applications, its artistry, and the international caliber of its featured artists. Produced and written by Jill Petzall, directed by Deeds Rogers, Edited by Wally Bonham, the program emphasizes the personal intensity required to become a maestro of international stature while maintaining one's original commitment to making fine music. First broadcast on A&E in 1987. Nominated for a Cable ACE Award, 1987