Multimedia Collection
Silences: A Documentary About Race, Family and Identity
DVD
22 min
2006
HQ777.9 .S55 2006 DVD
´Silences´ is the true story of the filmmaker and his family's refusal to acknowledge that he is bi-racial. This film gives humorous (and sometimes painful) insight into how families often, with best intentions, end up hurting those they love.
Set in Maumee, Ohio, an idyllic Midwestern suburb with manicured lawns and historic homes, ´Silences´ follows the filmmaker's journey to understand his mother, Harriet Warnock, and her refusal to discuss the circumstances of his birth. What happens when an interracial person's identity is completely ignored by his white family and friends? The camera captures one family's inner demons -- one mention of Graham's half-black parentage nearly gives his white grandmother a heart attack. Graham's family embodied the denial found in multicultural families across the country, and reminds us that the ideal of racial purity persists in America.
Distributed by New Day Films (www.newday.com).
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