Videos

"A Sentence of Their Own" (2001)
By Edgar A. Barens. 64 minutes. Chronicles one familys annual pilgrimage to a New Hampshire State Prison and reveals the damaging impact incarceration has on families.
www.asentenceoftheirown.com

Corrections (2000)
By Ashley Hunt. 58 minutes. The story of justice turned to profit.
http://www.independentfilms.com

How Do You Spell Murder?
Chronicles a year in the life of a group of men who are illiterate and incarcerated in New Jersey. It explores the powerful connection between illiteracy and crime. The film profiles several of student-tutor teams working together. The prisoners recount years of humiliation in the public school system, where they were either held back repeatedly or promoted without adequate preparation. Many have undiagnosed learning disorders. Almost all are dropouts. Their years of frustration and anger were brought to unyielding conclusions at criminal trials where they could barely grasp the legal documents and procedures that determined their fates. The film profiles one such student-tutor team from their first session through to a year later when the student can read. Inmate tutor Sammy recounts that he was functionally illiterate when he entered prison. While in prison he taught himself to read and is now a poet as well as a tutor.
http://www.howdoyouspellmurder.com

Prison Town, USA
In the 1990s, at the height of the prison-building boom, a prison opened in rural America every 15 days. "Prison Town, USA" tells the story of Susanville, one California town that tries to resuscitate its economy by building a prison - with unforeseen consequences. Weaving the stories of a laid-off mill worker turned guard, a struggling dairy owner and an inmate's family stranded in Susanville, the film illuminates the legacy of an industry that is transforming rural America.
http://www.pbs.org/pov/prisontown

Red Hook Justice
Imagine a court that works for change instead of punishment. A film by Meema Spadola. 60 minutes. From the http://www.reentrymediaoutreach.org">Reentry National Media Outreach Campaign, which offers media resources that will facilitate community discussion and decision making about solution-based reentry programs. A list of documentaries and media resources is available by visiting their website.
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/redhookjustice/film.html

This Black Soil: A Story of Resistance and Rebirth (2004)
Directed by Teresa Konechne and produced by Working Hands Productions. This film chronicles the successful struggle of Bayview, Virginia, a small and severely impoverished rural African-American community, to pursue a new vision of prosperity. Catalyzed by the defeat of a state plan to build a maximum-security prison in their backyard, the powerful women leaders and residents created the Bayview Citizens for Social Justice non-profit organization, secured $10 million in grants, purchased the proposed prison site land and are now building a new community from the ground up.
www.bullfrogfilms.com/catalog/this.html

Troop 1500
Follows five young Girl Scouts - sisters Caitlin and Mikaela, Jasmine, Jessica and Naomi - whose mothers are serving time.
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/troop1500/film.html

Up the Ridge
"Up the Ridge" is a documentary produced by Nick Szuberla and Amelia Kirby. In 1999, Szuberla and Kirby were volunteer DJ's for the Appalachian region's only hip-hop radio program in Whitesburg, KY when they received hundreds of letters from inmates transferred into nearby Wallens Ridge State Prison, the newest prison built to prop up the region's sagging coal economy. The letters described human rights violations and racial tension between staff and inmates. Filming began that year and, through the lens of Wallens Ridge, the film offers viewers an in-depth look at the United States prison industry and the social impact of moving hundreds of thousands of inner-city minority offenders to distant rural outposts. Up the Ridge explores competing political agendas that align government policy with human rights violations, and political expediencies that bring communities into racial and cultural conflict with tragic consequences.
http://www.appalshop.org/h2h/film/screenings.htm

Voices in Time
36 minutes. A window into the lives of women who have served time in prison. In emotionally charged interviews, women share their experiences before, in and after prison and examine the relationship between the prison system and poor communities and communities of color.
www.beyondmedia.org

What I Want My Words to Do to You (2003)
This program goes inside a writing workshop led by playwright Eve Ensler, consisting of 15 women inmates of New York's Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, most of whom were convicted of murder. The women delve into and expose the most terrifying places in themselves, as they grapple with the nature of their crimes and their own culpability. The film culminates in an emotionally charged prison performance of the women's writing.
PBS Videos Link

What We Leave Behind (2000)
Produced by Visible Voices and Womens International Information Project. 20 minutes. A video made by formerly incarcerated women that challenges stereotypes about women in prison and examines the impact of their incarceration on their children.
http://www.beyondmedia.org

Yes In My Back Yard (1999)
By Tracy Huling. 57 minutes. Examines rural dependence on prisons and probes the impact on the keepers and the kept.
E-mail galgirls@francomm.com

For a more extensive guide to videos go to: http://www.360degrees.org