Yet another great piece from Salt! This exploration of deafness and CI is a great introduction. I think a great follow up piece could be about deaf culture and the evaporation thereof should CI become widely successful. Deaf identity, which the producer has so expertly indtroduced us to, is absolutely facinating and important for the hearing world to understand.
This is a great piece about a very complicated issue of young motherhood. Cathy doesn't hold anything back from us, and I think we are able to genuinely celebrate her successes with her, and mourn her losses. Great job with this piece, really moving, very complete.
The strengths of this piece are in the great editing, music and of course, the facinating subjects. I think it would have been a better piece if we had gotten to know one of the collectors a little better, and followed them through some kind of dramatic arc. It was like a series of snapshots, very descriptive but not as deep as I would like. Super editing brings the package together.
This is a really brilliant piece, obviosuly put together by someone with a lot of talent. It's hard to describe, or at least it is for me, because I don't have much of a music background. The producer is able to make the industrial music, and that's fairly impressive. See also: dancer in the dark.
This is actually a piece about an FTM, a female-to-male transsexual, not the "woman trapped in a man's body" the description lists it as. Justin is a really unique subject, a transgender individual living in rural America and negotiating gender. I would have liked to hear more about Justin's experience with the corrections system, because that seems like it would be a stressful place for gender variant people to live, yes, even more than everyone else. I was also disappointed that the producer didn't seem to do any research about FTMs and chose to focus on the idea of a "functining male organ" as the only determinant of gender rather than really thinking about Justin's day to day life. i.e. 99% of the time Justin's penis or lack therof is really not going to make a difference--what is really the issue with him living in rural Maine? That he can't pee standing up or that he can't walk around town without getting strange looks. The individuals to whom your story will really matter, to whom it isn't jsut some novel coffee table conversation, are going to be interested in hearing about what Justin thought about hormone therapy and top surgery and passing and his family. For those people, check out www.ftmi.org
This is a wonderful opportunity to get into the head of a child who, like many of us, didn't get what she wanted out of her public middle school experience. Zoe is intelligent and articulate but still very much in her own head--she doesn't try to wax poetic about the trials of youth, she is just happy to explain her own journey. It makes me wish my parents had the courage to do the same for me.
Comments by Tom Leger
Comment for "Learning to Hear"
Tom Leger
Posted on October 15, 2004 at 11:53 AM | Permalink
Review of Learning to Hear
Yet another great piece from Salt! This exploration of deafness and CI is a great introduction. I think a great follow up piece could be about deaf culture and the evaporation thereof should CI become widely successful. Deaf identity, which the producer has so expertly indtroduced us to, is absolutely facinating and important for the hearing world to understand.
Comment for "Cathy, 16, Mom"
Tom Leger
Posted on October 15, 2004 at 11:40 AM | Permalink
Review of Cathy, 16, Mom
This is a great piece about a very complicated issue of young motherhood. Cathy doesn't hold anything back from us, and I think we are able to genuinely celebrate her successes with her, and mourn her losses. Great job with this piece, really moving, very complete.
Comment for "Naked Barbies and Deflated Basketballs: A look inside the world of collectors"
Tom Leger
Posted on June 08, 2004 at 03:31 PM | Permalink
Review of Naked Barbies and Deflated Basketballs: A look inside the world of collectors
The strengths of this piece are in the great editing, music and of course, the facinating subjects. I think it would have been a better piece if we had gotten to know one of the collectors a little better, and followed them through some kind of dramatic arc. It was like a series of snapshots, very descriptive but not as deep as I would like. Super editing brings the package together.
Comment for "Internal Combustion"
Tom Leger
Posted on June 08, 2004 at 03:18 PM | Permalink
Review of Internal Combustion
This is a really brilliant piece, obviosuly put together by someone with a lot of talent. It's hard to describe, or at least it is for me, because I don't have much of a music background. The producer is able to make the industrial music, and that's fairly impressive. See also: dancer in the dark.
Comment for "Justin on the Inside"
Tom Leger
Posted on May 27, 2004 at 11:58 AM | Permalink
Review of Justin on the Inside
This is actually a piece about an FTM, a female-to-male transsexual, not the "woman trapped in a man's body" the description lists it as. Justin is a really unique subject, a transgender individual living in rural America and negotiating gender. I would have liked to hear more about Justin's experience with the corrections system, because that seems like it would be a stressful place for gender variant people to live, yes, even more than everyone else. I was also disappointed that the producer didn't seem to do any research about FTMs and chose to focus on the idea of a "functining male organ" as the only determinant of gender rather than really thinking about Justin's day to day life. i.e. 99% of the time Justin's penis or lack therof is really not going to make a difference--what is really the issue with him living in rural Maine? That he can't pee standing up or that he can't walk around town without getting strange looks. The individuals to whom your story will really matter, to whom it isn't jsut some novel coffee table conversation, are going to be interested in hearing about what Justin thought about hormone therapy and top surgery and passing and his family. For those people, check out www.ftmi.org
Comment for "Who Needs Math?" (deleted)
Tom Leger
Posted on May 26, 2004 at 12:58 PM
Review of Who Needs Math? (deleted)
This is a wonderful opportunity to get into the head of a child who, like many of us, didn't get what she wanted out of her public middle school experience. Zoe is intelligent and articulate but still very much in her own head--she doesn't try to wax poetic about the trials of youth, she is just happy to explain her own journey. It makes me wish my parents had the courage to do the same for me.