Documentary

Docu-Drama

Independent

SWEET NOTHING IN MY EAR - Hallmark Hall of Fame (2009)

A married couple deal with separate realities when their only child loses his ability to hear. Starring multiple Golden Globe Award winner Jeff Daniels and Academy Award and Golden Globe Award winner Marlee Matlin in Sweet Nothing In My Ear as Dan and Laura Miller. This happily married couple have different points of views about their son Adam's (Noah Valencia) early hearing loss. Laura, who is deaf herself, sees this occurrence as a minor problem, something she has dealt with her whole life. Dan, on the other hand would prefer his son regain his hearing and live a more normal life. Locked in their own worlds, the couple must find a way to mend their differences and make the best decision for Adam's future.

This unusually taut thriller features James Garner playing against type as John Potter, a humorless FBI agent negotiating with an escaped convict, who, along with two cronies, has kidnapped a school bus full of deaf students and their teacher (Marlee Matlin). Stashed in an abandoned slaughterhouse, which is as much a character as the people in this HBO movie, the convicts and their prisoners sweat out Potter's refusal to give in to demands, despite the fact that he lost hostages--and the public's faith--his last time around.

LOVE IS NEVER SILENT   (1985)

This film depicts the struggles a Deaf family faces during the depression. Their story is told through the hearing daughter's perspective, having grown up with Deaf parents. The Deaf actors are sensational. The actress that stars as the mother also co-produced the film, which may account for many of the visual foreshadowing and subtleties of Deaf Culture that are in this film.

Eamon, a disillusioned college dropout takes a job as a gas station attendant in rural Ontario. There, he purposefully cuts himself off from society. The narrow life he prescribes for himself is disrupted by Daisy, a lonely, hearing-impaired girl with a persistent crush on him. Told through flashbacks and home movies, 'Elephant Shoe' makes a statement on true love and the post-modern condition.

The film began as an audience favorite at the 2006 IFCO Winter Gala. It went on to screen at the 2006 Montreal World Film Festival and is now available for the first time on DVD. Fall in love with Daisy and Eamon.

CHILDREN OF A LESSER GOD (1986)

BEST ACTRESS: MARLEE MATLIN

This film stars Academy award winning actress Marlee Matlin and William Hurt. It depicts the culture and controversy of Institutes for the Deaf amidst a love story between a Deaf and hearing couple.

Rachel Griffiths, the Academy Award-nominated star of Hilary and Jackie, portrays Amy’s mother, a single parent haunted by the loss of her husband and fiercely protective of her child, who is deaf.  The title role is played by the gifted Alana De Roma in her astonishing film debut.

MR. HOLLAND'S OPUS (1995) 

The story spans 30 years in the life of a passionate musician as he struggles to create an opus that he hopes will become the musical crowning achievement of his lifetime.  Throughout the film, the character of Mr. Holland (a high school music teacher played by Richard Dreyfuss) struggles with a yearning that his deaf son, Cole, (played, as he grows older, by Nicholas John Renner, Joseph Anderson, and Anthony Natale) might share his love for music, and seeks to resolve profound grief because his child does not share his appreciation and zest for music, the thing that is Holland's life's blood.

When John Singer, who is deaf, moves to a Southern town to continue his friendship with a recently institutionalized friend, who is also deaf, his compassion changes the lives of a small circle of struggling people--who discover The Heart is a Lonely Hunter.

BEYOND SILENCE  (1996) 

"In Caroline Link's film ''Beyond Silence,'' the story of a gifted young musician and first-born child in a family where both parents were deaf becomes a powerful metaphor for the inevitable communication gap between children and parents in even the happiest of homes. Imagine the frustration of being a gifted musician whose parents are literally unable to hear." - From the New York Times online

  ACADEMY AWARD NOMINEE

This moving documentary shows one family's struggle over whether or not to provide two deaf children (cousins) with cochlear implants, controversial devices that can stimulate hearing.

 "The life of the Artinian family of Long Island was chronicled in the Academy Award nominated film "Sound and Fury " that came out in 2000. "Sound and Fury Six Years Later" is another engaging look at this extraordinary family in the years since their first movie captured audiences around the world."  - From SoundAndFuryFilm.com

FOR A DEAF SON  (1994)

When Thomas Tranchin was one year old, his parents discovered he was profoundly deaf. His father, a filmmaker, produced this program (in video diary format), which originally aired on PBS.  The program tells of a family's journey through a maze of emotional, educational, political and social factors as they face life-changing decisions. Includes interviews with family members, audiologists, and others.  The "speech versus sign language" conflict is documented in detail. Oral, manual, and cued speech approaches are outlined and supplemented with viewpoints from a variety of sources as Tommy's parents struggle to find the best way for their child in this rare glimpse into the difficult choices faced by hearing parents of deaf children.  Tragically, Tommy Tranchin killed himself in 2004, at age 15.

TOUCH THE SOUND  (2002)

Documents the amazing talent and experience of celebrated Scottish deaf solo percussionist, Dame Evelyn Glennie.

THROUGH DEAF EYES  (2007) 

A PBS documentary narrated by Stockard Channing, explores a 200-year history of d/Deaf life in America.

"The first American film to be fully subtitled for the country's 30 million deaf and hard of hearing viewers and opens the door into deaf culture for those who are "signing impaired." Deaf culture is unique. Out of the nearly 30 million deaf and hard of hearing Americans, only 10% have a parent who is deaf, making deaf culture one of the only heritages in the world that is rarely handed down from parents to children. Deaf culture is composed of a community of people who consider deafness to be a difference in human experience rather than a disability. There are deaf entertainers within the community who perform mostly for deaf audiences, many of whom are trying to cross over to the mainstream. This film is about four of those entertainers."  - From SeeWhatImSaying.com

DUMMY HOY: A DEAF HERO  (2007) 

Follows the life of William Ellsworth “Dummy” Hoy, the first deaf baseball player in the Major Leagues. Hoy died at the age of 99 while on a quest to be included in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. His record not only included 82 stolen bases on his rookie year, but also it's disputed that he single handily was responsible for the creation of hand signals in baseball.

THE MIRACLE WORKER

This biographical film stars Patti Duke as Helen Keller and Anne Bancroft as teacher Annie Sullivan.  Scarlet fever left Helen deaf and blind at a very young age.  Tutor Annie Sullivan, from the Perkins School for the Blind, is sent to the Keller household to assist the young Helen to communicate.

An HBO documentary film by Irene Taylor Brodsky.  The poignant story of Ms. Brodsky’s parents, Paul and Sally, both deaf since birth, as they undergo cochlear implantation in their mid-sixties.

Laura a young deaf girl has never been taught to communicate and believes that her own stupidity has earned her tortuous beating from her father. Enter Pam Willis a champion of abused women. Pam vows to provide stability in Laura s life. When social worker Ned and Pam learn that district attorney s office will not prosecute Laura s father for his brutal assaults it becomes crucial that Laura to learn to communicate well enough to demand justice for herself.

William "Dummy" Hoy is one of two people who have "laid claim to the signs of baseball. But like the origins of the game itself, the genesis of baseball's greatest innovation is steeped  in legend and fraught with polarizing opinions. Signs of the Time is a dynamic story of triumph over adversity that exposes the myths and mysteries of the game with fascinating anecdotes of the past, historically accurate depictions of early baseball and interviews with the most influential names of the game. The signs of baseball now transcend the game. They have become an integral part of our collective consciousness, influencing not only the way we view America's game but also how we view our culture."  - From SignsOfTheTimeMovie.com

The Texas Association of the Deaf (TAD) and Davideo Productions hosted its world premiere of a documentary film about TAD on June 11, 2009 at the Buena Vista Theatre located at University of Texas-San Antonio in San Antonio, Texas. 
 
Chronicles the history of TAD since its inception in 1886 and its historic accomplishments that have had an impact on deaf and hard of hearing Texans. This film kicked off the 45th biennial TAD conference at the El Tropicana Riverwalk Hotel in San Antonio on June 12 & 13, 2009. 

This film is available for theatrical exhibition in your area. For more information on bookings, please contact Stephen C. Baldwin at Steve [at] DeafTexas.org.

by Miriam Nathan Lerner  "[This film] intercuts interviews and archival footage of performances that have never been seen before because they were in private collections. Eric Malzkuhn, Robert Panara, Bernard Bragg, Ella Mae Lentz, Dorothy Miles, Patrick Graybill, Peter Cook, and Debbie Rennie are highlighted. The first half of the film deals with the older style of Deaf poets mostly translating written English works into sign, and then with growing pride in the deaf community and ASL, more experimentation with ASL generated pieces. The second half segues into a time in Rochester, NY, (the  mid-1980s) when Deaf and Hearing poets in this community were privy to each others' works because of the local interpreters' attempts to translate and voice the ASL for the hearing audiences, and translate and sign the spoken poetry, the two communities crossed into each others' realms in a fusion that was unprecedented." - From Ms. Lerner

This page was edited: 09/15/2009
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