Category Archives: Documentary

Coming to PBS’s American Masters tomorrow, Friday, February 7: ALICE WALKER: BEAUTY IN TRUTH

Pratibha Parmar’s portrait of the author and activist had its world premiere at London’s Women of the World Festival last year. It has gone on to screen at Seattle, Frameline, Outfest, Chicago, Athena, St Louis, Vancouver, African Diaspora, Bronze Lens, Mill Valley, Inside Out, and Napa Valley, among others.

Famously known as the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of THE COLOR PURPLE – the first African American woman to win the award – Walker has been a friend and collaborator of Parmar for several years, producing the latter’s acclaimed 1993 documentary WARRIOR MARKS, and together co-authoring the book of the same name. Parmar’s latest film is a celebration of Walker’s life and career, not only as a writer, but also as a passionate political and human rights activist, tracing her beginnings as the daughter of Georgia sharecroppers under Jim Crow, and revealing how education, spurred on by her mother, gave her the opportunity to develop her voice as a writer while simultaneously becoming involved in the civil rights movement. With an intimacy borne of their long friendship, Walker candidly addresses a range of topics, including controversies that erupted around her work, relationships, sexual identity, and family, but Parmar never loses sight of the primacy of her subject’s written work and of her inspirational, iconic, place in America’s literary world.

Coming to PBS’s American Experience and to DVD today, Tuesday, February 4: THE AMISH: SHUNNED

Callie T Wiser’s exploration of the consequences Amish face when they leave their communities debuts on the popular PBS program, and simultaneously becomes available on DVD.

A follow-up to the series’ earlier documentary, THE AMISH, an exceptional portrait of the famously reclusive traditional religious community, Wiser’s affecting film zeroes in on one of the previous film’s points of intrigue – Amish people who have chosen to live in the “English” world – that is, outside of the fold and within modern American society. Interweaving the stories of seven brave men and women – representing both older and younger individuals, some who left decades ago, and others much more recently – Wiser reveals their complicated, emotionally painful separation from the only world they had ever known – a separation in most cases that comes with ostracism from family and community. This public shunning – not just excommunication from their all-important church, but often deeper, more fundamental erasure from virtually all familial interaction – is meant to protect the pious from the sinners, lest their undue influence lead others to stray from the flock, pointing to the Amish fear of their authority and traditions being undermined – a theme resonant from the first film as well. Subjects here share their experiences, and reasons, for leaving the Amish ways; the efforts of family members to convince them – sometimes successfully, for a time – to return; and the challenges – beyond the emotional blackmail of shunning – of adjusting to life in the modern world.

Coming to DVD today, Tuesday, February 4: HAWKING

Stephen Finnigan’s intimate profile of the world’s most famous contemporary scientist had its world premiere at SXSW last year. Other fest appearances included Edinburgh, CPH:DOX, Seattle, and Cambridge, and it debuted on PBS nationwide last week.

I previously wrote about the doc here.