Blog [with]tv

Lives Worth Living On PBS: Independent Lens, October 27

Click the following links for details of the recent PBS program, Lives Worth Living, which aired on Thursday October 27th, a compelling documentary on the disability rights movement, and its profiles of courageous people in the Independent Lens series.

Trailer for Lives Worth Living     Photos and Press Kit for Lives Worth Living

2011 Sprout Film Festival Schedule Announced!

The schedule for the 2011 Sprout Film Festival, showcasing films related to the field of developmental disabilities, has been announced and is available at the Sprout Film Festival website. The festival will take place from Friday April 29  through Sunday May 1 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC, and this year will screen 50 unique films from 16 different countries!  In addition to the festival, those interested in films related to the field should visit www.sproutflix.org.

Through sproutflix, you can purchase many of the memorable, entertaining and important films screened at this film festival over the years. 

The Sprout Film Festival was founded in 2003 and is programmed and supported by Sprout, a NYC-based non-profit organization, dedicated to bringing innovative programming to people with developmental disabilities. Please contact [email protected]  if you have any questions.

2010 Sprout Touring Film Festival!

As the New Year approaches, it's not too soon to start marking your calendars for noteworthy events! The 2010 Sprout Film Festival will be held in New York City on Friday April 30th - Sunday May 2nd at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's New Uris Education Center.

The Sprout Film Festival was founded in 2003 and programmed and supported by Sprout, a NYC-based non-profit organization, is dedicated to bringing innovative programming to people with developmental disabilities. Sprout has been making videos related to the field of developmental disabilities since 1995 and has witnessed the myriad benefits these videos have for this population and the general public. Click here to see a sampling of previews from these powerful films.
 
In addition to the annual Sprout Film Festival in New York City, the SFF has begun touring the country, screening an ever-growing selection of films to areas around the United States. For information and updates on periodic screenings, please call the Sprout office toll-free 888-222-9575 or email: [email protected].  Send your email address to be notified when the Sprout Film Festival comes to a venue near you, and help promote disability awareness through these powerful, educational films !

The Sprout Film Festival - May 1 – 3, 2009 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art!

We are excited to once again showcase an exceptional collection of films at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This year, we will be presenting 26 films in 12 unique programs.  Click the following links to see samples of our offerings:

Bar Mitzvah Boy

Children of the Stars

The Eighth Day

A Trip Across America

We encourage you to come with friends and family to enjoy memorable films, light refreshments and the festivities. For more information, please visit the film festival site at http://www.sproutfilmfestival.org 

Sprout Touring Film Festival!
Bring a custom-designed version of the Sprout Film Festival to your area! You pick the date and location and we will work with you to tailor any number of programs, bringing a custom version of the festival to your area.

Select from our library of over 120 amazing films!
Ideal for conferences, universities and agencies interested in presenting quality, educational, entertaining films related to developmental disabilities. A Sprout representative will be present to coordinate each screening.

Upcoming screenings will take place in the following cities:
Feb. 6 - 7: Great Barrington, MA Community Access to the Arts
March 13: Charlottesville, VA Piedmont Regional Education Program (PREP) / Parent Resource Center
April 5: Williamstown, MA Berkshire County Arc
May 14: Eugene, OR Full Access Brokerage
May 15: Bend, OR Full Access Brokerage
October 7: Penticton British Columbia Penticton and District Society Community Living

For additional information on this exciting program and a complete listing of available films please visit:  www.sprouttouringfilmfestival.org.

Film Lovers
If you would like to view memorable, entertaining and touching films relating to the field of developmental disabilities, we have many videos and previews posted on YouTube that you can enjoy now.  Visit www.youtube.com/user/gosprout to see previews and complete videos from Sprout’s Make-A-Movie Program. Please show your support by subscribing to our Youtube pages. As a subscriber you will be notified every time we upload a new video.

If there are any films that you feel would be of interest to friends and family, please spread the word.. Log on to www.youtube.com/user/STFFestival and enjoy some 60 short films and previews that we have presented over the previous 6 years of Sprout Film Festivals.

The Sprout Touring Film Festival - For All Who are Interested in Film Related to Developmental Disabilities!

The Sprout Touring Film Festival will be screening films at the 50th Anniversary Conference / Canadian Association for Community Living, on Thursday November 20th in Ottawa, Ontario. 

 

For details on the CACL global vision of inclusion, read Community Living at Fifty.

 

For a complete listing of the films available through the touring festival and other scheduled venues visit www.sprouttouringfilmfestival.org.

Please contact Anthony Di Salvo, Executive Director of Sprout, at  212-222-9575, if you have any questions.  Anthony can also be reached by mail at:  893 Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10025. 212-222-9575

 

Disability on DVD - Quid Pro Quo

(Reviewed by Stephen Snart).

Released quietly on a handful of screens in select markets this past June, Quid Pro Quo offers the potentially provocative story of a journalist who uncovers a group of able-bodied people who pretend or desire to be disabled. But writer/director Carlos Brooks handles the subject matter in a somber and cautious manner, perhaps even to the point of indolence. It’s been compared to David Cronenberg’s Crash (1996) but – for better or worse – features none of the seediness or shock of that film.

The lead character, Isaac (played by able-bodied actor Nick Stahl from HBO’s Carnivale, is himself a paraplegic. As a boy, he was the victim of a car accident that proved fatal for his mother and father. He’s been a wheelchair-user ever since and while that hasn’t impeded his career as a radio journalist, it has become an obstacle for his love life.

Blindness: The Movie

Beth Haller writes about the new movie Blindness recently reviewed at the Cannes Film Festival here and here and here.

"I ... hoped that some blind actors would be involved but haven't heard that they are. I wish non-disabled actors who have some connection to disability would think about advocating on behalf of hiring actors with disabilities. Mark Ruffalo survived a benign brain tumor in 2000 that left him with partial paralysis, which was not permanent. Ruffalo is fine stage and screen actor, who is gaining much more power in Hollywood, and I'd love to see him put that power to good use in assisting actors with disabilities to get hired."

I was pleased to be able to leave this comment on her blog Media Dis&Dat

Blog [with]tv said...

I'm so pleased to have discovered this new movie thanks to you! Steve (Kuusisto) and I (Connie) will be very interested in following this...

As for your comment: "I wish non-disabled actors who have some connection to disability would think about advocating on behalf of hiring actors with disabilities"... That's exactly what Howard Renensland is doing with [with]tv. (www.with-tv.com) The rest of us just need to support him by spreading the word, as I know you have. Thanks for that, too!

~ Connie

Congratulations, Marlee Matlin

[with]tv would simply like to congratulate Marlee Matlin. 

Although she was eliminated from the TV program Dancing with the Stars last night she demonstrated that she can dance with the best of them.  Poised, gracious, beautiful and talented, Marlee has deservedly enjoyed the spotlight recently and we hope this only means we will see more of her, and soon.

For great coverage on Marlee's accomplishments, turn to the blog Fookem and Bug.  And read Marlee's own comments here. 

LINKS:

Marlee Matlin eliminated, OK Magazine, On Marlee Matlin, Deaf Community Abuzz with Varied Reviews of "Sweet Nothing in My Ear" (Marlee's most recent movie)

Hollywood is knocking!

INCLUSION DAILY EXPRESS
International Disability Rights News Service

[with]tv highly recommends this (Inclusion Daily Express) subscription for useful articles regarding disability in the news, including this one: Hollywood's doors opening for actors with disabilities

Why We Need TV and Movies That Include People with Disabilities: Part 104

So there I was today on NPR’s “On Point” program with two terrific blind professionals and I was feeling like the school kid who has to use the bathroom and can’t wait any longer to announce the matter. I needed to say that the reason blind people are so woefully unemployed and the reason that the public marvels at the accomplishments of exemplary blind professionals like Gordon Gund or David A. Paterson is that the film and TV industries continue to make blindness look horrible.  Who wouldn’t imagine, after seeing that dreadful movie “At First Sight” (with Val Kilmer and Mira Sorvino) that being blind isn’t a minimal life? That movie came out at the same time as my memoir “Planet of the Blind” and it reinforced every cliché about blindness that I was trying to conquer. If the human resources professionals saw a prime time television show in which a blind person confidently uses state of the art assistive technology—heck, even showing the non-disabled characters a thing or two about the gizmos, well that would be as big a step toward changing the climate of unemployment for the blind as our well intentioned celebration of Governor Paterson’s oath of office. Let’s face it: the public thinks that blind people are scarcely able to navigate their living rooms. How could they possibly serve as good employees? That Ph.D. or Master’s degree must be some kind of a trick. That’s it! The “brainiac” blind woman or man is probably “faking it” just like those guys you see  begging for money with the phony sunglasses. Yep! That’s gotta be it! How do I know this at (insert company name here)? Because I just saw Disney’s film version of Mr. Magoo. Now there’s a blind guy for you! Ha! I laughed til  I dropped my popcorn on my plaid shorts. Boy Oh Boy  was that ever a good movie!

In case anybody’s wondering, I was once interviewed by a producer of ABC’s television program “20/20”about the possibility of an interview associated with the publication of “Planet of the Blind”. What did I do to ruin the deal? I mentioned that ABC is owned by Disney and that the new film of Mr. Magoo was a disgrace. They were very nice as they showed me to the door.

S.K.   

Professor Stephen Kuusisto
Department of English
The University of Iowa
308 EPB
Iowa City, IA 52242

Links:

Remembering Mr. Magoo

Cross-posted on Planet of the Blind