Documentary Educational Resources - Geography / North America / United States / Kansas / All Films

Flock of Dodos

Wed, 29 Aug 2018 14:53:00 GMT

Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus is the first feature length documentary to explore the Darwin vs. intelligent design controversy. Filmmaker/evolutionary ecologist/surfer Dr. Randy Olson pokes fun at both sides of this debate and eventually uses his own mother, Muffy Moose, to make sense out of the issue that both Time and Newsweek has featured on their covers. He travels to his home state of Kansas, the top battle ground for evolution, where he sits down with his mother's neighbor, John Calvert, one of the top lawyers backing intelligent design, for a confrontation that leaves audiences squirming in their seats. "It's a reflection of the current culture wars," Olson says. "It's the age old split between science and religion, with a few new twists."

Labeled by early audiences as "a polite Michael Moore," Olson challenges top advocates for intelligent design (including Dr. Michael Behe, author of Darwin's Black Box). With a sense of scientific inquiry, he tries to understand a movement that so misfired last year in Dover, PA., a Republican-Bush appointee judge labeled local efforts to teach intelligent design as, "breathtaking inanity." School districts are now grappling with the new efforts to introduce intelligent design, the movement evolutionists prefer to call, "creationism in a cheap tuxedo." However, Olson, in a surprising turn given his evolution background, also paints an unflattering portrait of his fellow scientists. Pulling together eight evolutionists for a night of poker, he reveals them to be arrogant, condescending, and self-certain until they eventually turn on themselves in a spat that sounds like...a flock of dodos.

From the opening statistic (a pie chart in the form of an apple pie) the film provides equal amounts of laughter, guffaws, and eventually enough serious thought to prompt hours of discussion. And unlike recent political rants, the film maintains an atmosphere of fairness, allowing audiences from both sides to watch it together.

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Manhattan, Kansas

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 14:49:00 GMT

Manhattan, Kansas
Buy Now: $320.00

The parent-child relationship is emotionally charged from the moment a person is born. But it becomes especially complex when your single parent is mentally unstable, as is the case for filmmaker Tara Wray.

In her first film, Wray travels to rural Kansas in an attempt to reconnect with her mother, Evie, for the first time since Evie's psychotic breakdown five years earlier. She finds a parent still chasing her demons, both real and imagined, struggling to make a career for herself as an abstract artist and searching for the Geodetic Center of the United States, the finding of which, Evie says, will bring about world peace.

When Tara takes it upon herself to help in her mother's search, it sets into motion a surprising chain of events that may just rescue Evie from a catastrophic fate and help Tara reconcile with her mother on different terms.

"A touching portrait of [Wray's] tumultuous relationship with her mentally unstable mother; never self-indulgent, the film shows Wray unabashedly exhibiting her frustration with and love for her mother, in the process creating a story about self-healing and moving on that many will relate to."
— Filmmaker Magazine, Fall 2008

"[an] evocative personal documentary...that unfolds with increasing resonance; a poetic, universal journey."
— Utne Reader, November-December 2008

"Painfully intimate, Manhattan, Kansas plumbs a contentious mother-daughter relationship, showing a family's journey from estrangement to reconciliation and posing lingering questions about the line between mental illness and unconventionality. It's an honest look about growing up and letting go... it's everything a personal documentary should be."
— Marrit Ingman, The Austin Chronicle

"Manhattan, Kansas is extremely emotional; it will make you question your own relationship with your mother, because there is no such thing as a "normal" relationship. The film has its moments where you will tear up, and Tara's expression of emotion will have you pulling for her and her pursuit for a happy family."
— Elizabeth Stannard Gromisch, Feminist Review

SELECTED SCREENINGS & AWARDS

Best Film, Brooklyn Arts Council's 41st International Film and Video Festival, NY, 2007

Audience Award Runner-Up, SXSW Film Festival, Austin, TX (World Premiere), March 2006

Docúpolis - International Documentary Film Festival of Barcelona, Spain, 2009

Peninsula College Screening Series, Port Angeles, WA, 2008

Broadcast, KPTS, Wichita, KS, 2008

Women & Creativity Film Festival, National Hispanic Cultural Center, Albuquerque, NM, 2008

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What's the Matter with Kansas?

Fri, 24 Aug 2018 12:26:00 GMT

What's the Matter with Kansas?
Buy Now: $320.00

Based on Thomas Frank's best-seller, What's the Matter with Kansas? shows how Kansas transformed from an outpost of radicalism to a bastion of hard-core conservatism. Unforgettable characters and their stories shed new light on our nation's political divide.

Angel Dillard helps run the most popular booth at the Kansas State Fair: Kansans For Life. She’s a lifelong Republican activist. Brittany Barden is a tireless veteran of several rounds of Republican campaigns. Her mission is to return America to its roots as “a Christian nation.” She’s 18 years old. Donn Teske describes himself as “a red-neck Kansas farmer.” He also says corporate greed is “not very Christian.” He fights to save his family farm and others like it.

Suddenly, the winds of change blow across Kansas. Keep watching – you’ll be surprised who you’re rooting for.

"★★★½ One of the Ten Best Documentaries of 2009... I've rarely seen a documentary quite like it. It has a point to make but no ax to grind. It doesn't connect the dots, nor does it need to. It takes no cheap shots. It is all there to see. " – Roger Ebert

"Other documentarians have approached the denizens of the heartland as if on safari. The filmmakers spend enough time with those profiled to get a sense of what led them to where they are." – Variety

"Winston presents us with a broad view of Kansas and Kansans. He's chosen to interview people in depth and let them speak at length. That's the mark of a good documentary." – Time Out Chicago

"Carefully cultivating a nonjudgmental tone that's largely free of condescension - no small achievement - the filmmaker's approach pays off in the final reel, when everyone's dilemmas touch us." – Village Voice

"A fascinating and, really, heartbreaking doc... What's beautiful about the movie is its lack of judgment by the filmmakers. They just let their subjects - good people whom you like - talk. Draw your own conclusions." – San Francisco Chronicle

"A funny, smart and important look at the intersection of religion and politics in America today. It's a movie that needs to be seen in both red and blue states, by liberals and conservatives alike." – In These Times

"Suitable for high school classes and college courses in cultural anthropology, political anthropology, and American studies, as well as general audiences." – Jack David Eller, Anthropology Review Database

"The film would do very well in classes that treat social movements, social change, religion, politics, identity, family, or any other staple of introductory sociology." – Contemporary Sociology: A Journal of Reviews, July 2012

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