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The students who made the film graduated, but stayed in touch with Cassanello and Mills about the films success. And The Janes offers a template for organized feminist action. The documentary serves as a cautionary tale, with its release just weeks after a leak from the U.S. Supreme Court suggested the landmark 1973 ruling that established abortion rights nationwide . Essential Partners Madeline McComish (top row, center), a retired chemist, is past president of Massachusetts Citizens for Life. Watch documentaries chronicling Americas abortion battle and the transformation of the U.S. Supreme Court. Actress Sarah Jessica Parker narrates the piece, acknowledging briefly in the introduction that her own family faced financial difficulties during her childhood. The couple said they wanted to send a message of being "pro-love" rather than "pro-choice" or "pro-life," but viewers have . The film details how the women of the Chicago-based group worked and helped women obtain safe and affordable abortions. ET Wednesday, featuring the voices of more than a dozen former members of the group, informally known as Jane, who recount their experiences helping women get access to abortions when they were illegal. Members were able to set up a much more compassionate setting that was respectful to women, she said. The procedure is done by a licensed healthcare professional.. WUCF-TV is now streaming The Committee for FREE on their website! To help you learn more about the history behind this courts contentious ruling, TheWrap has gathered five essential documentaries to watch. Documentary filmmaker and video producer Aaron Hos, representing the UCF Center for Distributed Learning (CDL), was brought onto the project as Producer and Supervising Editor. Funding for FRONTLINE is provided through the support of PBS viewers and by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Abortion reversal laws are based on contested science but states keep passing them. Exclusive: letter from human rights groups says overturning of the constitutional right violates USs obligations as a UN member state. ANDY HUSE, ARTSERVE FT. LAUDERDALE To arrange a press screener, an interview with the filmmakers, Josh Sabey and Sarah Perkins, an interview with an Essential Partners expert, or an interview with participating members of THE ABORTION TALKS dialogues, please contact: Daniel Pritchard The collectives origin story is not unlike the origin stories of other movements: A call for help catalyzes an action, which results in another related action, and another. Top human rights organizations are calling on the United Nations to intervene over the destruction of abortion rights in the US. Editor's note: This review was originally published at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. DEL BARCO: Booth gathered an underground collective of women who called themselves Jane. Now, the American Medical Association is fighting back. Although some initially hesitated to appear on camera, all of them understood that these rights were slipping away and that these stories were relevant, said Tia Lessin, who co-directed the film with Emma Pildes. You'll receive access to exclusive information and early alerts about our documentaries and investigations. As the day nears that the Supreme Court might overturn Roe v. Wade, the directors said they hoped viewers would draw inspiration from the former Janes.. The Jane group evaded law enforcement until seven Janes were arrested in 1972. It has become almost tragically ironic that the US government uses the language of human rights to condemn state abuses against citizens of other countries, be that in Iran, or Belarus. A doctor hugs a patient at an abortion clinic in Santa Teresa, New Mexico, on 13 January 2023. Weve seen consistent lip service from the Biden-Harris administration, but not enough action, she said. According to the media gossip platform Def Noodles, the video received more than 33,000. CT proposal causes confusion, concern, Shelton group to host Syrian refugee family, Suspect in rape at CT housing authority property rejects offer, West Haven public housing waitlist highlights 'national crisis', Is CT recycling going into the trash? The film, which premieres on HBO and HBO Max tonight (June 8) at 9 p.m., tells the story of a group of women who ranand were. CARL VAN NESS to meet secretly for six years under the guidance of Essential Partners co-founder Laura R. Chasin. Inspired by Depression-era photographer Walker Evans whose iconic work documented rural poverty on behalf of the Interior and Agriculture departments the committee assigned itself some creative extra credit: producing a documentary movie. We did it. Connecticut Gov. The limitations included performing abortions with no formal medical training. The committee was tasked with producing a report with policy recommendations, but Himes wanted to go further than that. It has repeatedly called on States parties to the CEDAW Convention to remove punitive measures for women who undergo abortion and to legalize abortion at least in cases of rape, incest, threats to the life or health of the pregnant woman and girls . Students were required to read And They Were Wonderful Teachers, a book by Karen Graves, Ph.D., about the Johns Committees persecution of public school teachers. The US government just took two big steps on abortion. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. After Tiller is an essential watch to understand the emotional and misunderstood elements of the late-term abortion debate. Select screening events will also have an opportunity to host the filmmakers, an Essential Partners representative, and/or participants from The Abortion Talks for a post-screening Q&A or panel conversation. In the 2020 documentary AKA Jane Roe, the original anonymous plaintiff of Roe v. Wade, now known to be Norma McCorvey, speaks out about her 1995 decision to condemn abortion. The film will debut on HBO on Wednesday, June 8 and will then be available to stream on HBO Max. Interviews with former members and with women who sought their services are interwoven in the documentary with archival footage from septic abortion wards in Chicago hospitals, where women who had illegal abortions or tried to induce their own often wound up with infections and sometimes took their last breaths alone. "I wanted it over with and I didn't . Arcana, now in her 70s, and other members, who were college age to middle age, were known as Jane, a code name used to avoid being caught. These developments follow a decades-long effort by U.S. Anybody can be a catalyst for change. Send questions and comments to Lisa.Mills@ucf.edu. It also details cases of several patients who had to travel out of state for an abortion after being refused care for an ectopic pregnancy, and others who were denied chemotherapy care due to pregnancy. (The reason, he alludes to on camera, is that the Mafia was closing in on him.). The law was rendered unconstitutional after the passage of Proposal 3 in November. Dont want to be? The . A new documentary tells the story of "The Jane Collective," a group that helped women with nowhere else to turn for a safe abortion, in the days before Roe v. Wade. The abortion debate has long dominated political discourse on Capitol Hill, particularly in recent years. Arcana was married to Pildes father, Michael, so she was familiar with the history of Jane, Pildes said. Mississippi residents might get back the ability to enact public policy through statewide ballot initiatives. Though illegal under Illinois law, the Janes, as they called . GEOR, IOWA, KAET, KBDI, KCET, KCPT, KCTS, KENT, KENW, KLRU, KLVX, KNME, KOOD, KPBS, KQED, KQEH, KRCB, KRMA, KRSU, KTOO, KTWU, KVCR, KWSU, NDAK, NEWH, NEWJ, OREG, SDAK, WCET, WCFE, WCVE, WEDU, WFSU, WGBY, WGCU, WILL, WITF, WJCT, WKAR, WLIW, WMHT, WMVS, WNED, WNIN, WNIT, WNMU, WNPT, WOUB, WPBA, WPBT, WPTD, WPTO, WQED, WQPT, WSRE, WTIU, WTVI, WUCF, WUSF, WXXI. Rebecca Hodges Cole and Savannah LaBrant, who run a family YouTube channel called "The LaBrant Fam" where they have over 13 million subscribers, have faced backlash for releasing a video on April 9 labeled a "documentary" about abortion. / 54m. Gasparilla International Film Festival 2012. Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and conservative allies to secure an ideological majority on the Supreme Court a successful push FRONTLINE chronicled in the 2020 documentary Supreme Revenge: Battle for the Court. After a Supreme Court draft opinion was leaked last month indicating that the justices are likely to overturn Roe v. Wade, it felt like the time for us to come together to give women a platform to talk about what it looks like when abortion is criminalized, Pildes said. We knew that some would be injured. Senator Bob Graham. And why it wasnt stopped sooner. It was updated to reflect the correct year. And while showing how the collective was informed by the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s, the documentary misses an opportunity to situate the Janes work within both a historical and global context. In the spring of 2012, the film began screening in film festivals in Florida and over the next two years it screened in festivals all over the world, winning many competitions, prizes, and awards. On June 1, 2016 the film will be released to more than 70 local public television stations via APT. The students, with backgrounds in English, accounting, journalism, computer engineering, art, and radio/TV production, were assigned into production teams where they would best be able to use their abilities. Supreme Court Strikes Down Louisiana Abortion Law, 6 FRONTLINE Documentaries for Supreme Court-Watchers, How a Hacking Case Could Shape Protections For Abortion Clinics, As "Abortion Reversal" Laws Spread, Doctors and Scientists are Pushing Back, After Abortion Ban Attempt in Alabama, a Flood of Confusion and Phone Calls, With Planned Parenthood Out of Title X, Clinics Face A Terrible Choice, Medical Abortions Have Changed Abortion Access And They're Available on the Internet, How States Are Preparing For A Potential Roe v. Wade Challenge, What's Changed Inside and Outside Abortion Clinics Over 30 Years. This documentary tells the story of a young doctor named Rebecca Gomperts. Here is a partial list of stations that will air The Committee. Taking the lead in the red state race to make The Handmaid's Tale a documentary, South Carolina Republicans have introduced a bill that would impose the death penalty on women who get abortions. In the documentary, members of Jane, who themselves were predominantly middle- and upper-class white women, spoke about recognizing the problematic dynamic. After realizing the consequences of anti-abortion law around the world, she took it upon herself to provide abortions on ships in the ocean. Many people around them, including children that they already had, would suffer. In the ward at the former Cook County Hospital in Chicago, now John H. Stroger, Jr. Hospital of Cook County, death was a common occurrence, according to a 2019 BuzzFeed essay written by Allan Weiland, who worked in the ward as a medical student and appears in The Janes.. Thirty-six years after FRONTLINE released 1983s Abortion Clinic, the documentarys producer returned to Pennsylvania to find a community more bitterly divided than ever. Drawing on a landmark FRONTLINE film from the 1980s, the documentary takes a look at both sides of the abortion divide in a community still embroiled in the conflict. And although they continued to disagree, together they successfully prevented future violence. That is, until May 1972, when two women went to the police to report the collective, after attending a counseling appointment with their sister-in-law, who was seeking an abortion. These courageous leaders risked their personal safety and professional livesto meet secretly for six years under the guidance of Essential Partners co-founder Laura R. Chasin and mediator Susan Podziba. Released in 2018, Just after Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement from the Supreme Court, Reversing Roe examines how the abortion debate became more heated than ever before. Click here to find a screening in your area. BOOTH: And word spread, and someone else called. This interdisciplinary seminar was a cooperative effort between the History Department and the film program in the School of Visual Arts and Design. This documentary, accompanied by dozens of in-depth interviews published as part of the FRONTLINE Transparency Project, examined then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnells decades-long campaign to transform the nations highest court and its profound implications. Some women left the collective because they felt both personally betrayed and that they had betrayed the women they counseled. June 8, 2022. The US must be castigated on the world stage for its treatment of women, girls and others who can become pregnant the scale and intensity of human rights violations that the US is inflicting on its population are near unfathomable at this point, said Christine Ryan, legal director of the Global Justice Center, in a phone interview. Lets hope that incites us to action, and not to despair. The experience would forever change how they speak to and about each other. The Idaho House State Affairs Committee moved forward a bill on Friday that would make it a felony crime to transport or recruit a minor for an abortion without parental consent. snoopy happy dance emoji 8959 norma pl west hollywood ca 90069 8959 norma pl west hollywood ca 90069 The assurance, the trust, the respect I got when I tell you they changed my life, they changed my life., She added, holding back tears, When I saw women caring about women it was a whole new world for me., The Jane Collective is estimated to have provided around 11,000 abortions from 1969 to 1973. Howard agreed to help the friends sister and continued to perform abortion services for women who came to Booth for assistance until she lost touch with him. With lower costs and more scheduling availability (they could sometimes perform up to two dozen abortions a day), women of color from the South Side and West Side of Chicago quickly became their main clients. The U.S. Supreme Court intends to overturn Roe v. Wade, according to a draft majority opinion Politico obtained and published May 2. How the Supreme Courts Conservative Majority Came to Be. University of Central Florida College of Arts & Humanities. COMMANDER MICHAEL CALDERIN AND THE When a draft opinion from the Supreme Court leaked last month, suggesting the court could be poised to overturn Roe v. Wade, the directors of underground abortion network documentary The Janes . They each were charged with eleven counts of abortion and conspiracy to commit abortion. They each were charged with eleven counts of abortion and conspiracy to commit abortion, and each faced up to 110 years in prison. What we must remember is that the institutions that serve us are not broken. This renewed interest is of course not a coincidence. Efforts to revise the ending of the film began shortly thereafter and WUSF-TV in Tampa agreed to pitch the film to the American Public Television Exchange for national distribution. Funding for FRONTLINE is provided through the support of PBS viewers and by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Directed by Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes, this film spotlights the Chicago-based underground abortion network called The Jane Collective. The film tracked abortion opponents actions: lobbying state legislatures, looking to see where courts drew the line on what constituted an undue burden, then seeking to incrementally restrict abortion access within those evolving parameters. You know, Netflix or HBO isnt going to distribute it, but were hoping that there will be continued interest in showing it around the country., Jim Himes-led committee releases documentary on economic disparity, Tyler Sizemore / Hearst Connecticut Media, 2023 Hearst Media Services Connecticut, LLC, New Milford aids The Silo nonprofit with $107K facilities upgrade, Stratford resident stunned by earthquake destruction in Turkey, In Photos: African-based food tasting event held in New Canaan, Greenwich parking an obstacle to outdoor dining's return, Arming guidance counselors? Florida Film Festival 2013 We must care with compassion, and unlike in the male-dominated medical establishment, encourage collective care and knowledge. Dorrie Barron tells us what it was like for her to get an abortion before the Janes and Roe v. Wade came along. ACOG Committee Opinion No. Natasha Hellerich UCF OFFICE OF LGBTQ SERVICES The broadcast version of the film is significantly different from the film festival version, in that it highlights USFs role in bringing media attention to the Johns Committee, ultimately causing the committees downfall. While most of the Janes were white, middle-class women, most of those they served were low-income Latinas and Black women. Abortion: Stories Women Tell is streaming on HBO Max. These norms must be deployed against the state here at home as well. Two new films tell the story. Officials from the US mission to the UN and the US Gender Policy Council, a White House office established by the Biden administration, did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication. This was a pivotal shift within the collective, not only in the services they provided but whom they provided them to: They never turned any woman away, no matter her financial situation. In the letter, the signatories ask recipients to communicate with the US about these violations, to request an official visit to the US, and to ask the country to comply with its obligations under international law as a UN member state. Both projects wrapped up this month. Others turned to Chicagos organized crime syndicate, but its services were expensive and often unsafe. Wes Moore, behind her, during a news conference in support of bills to protect access to abortion. Abortion restrictions compound economic, social, and geographic barriers to healthcare, including contraception, disproportionately impacting Black womens ability to access the care we need.. That is when such a situation arises. Could I help her find someone to arrange for an abortion? CHUCK WOODS Nobody wants to spend an hour on [Interstate] 95. And many private . COLLEEN HAMILTON, LYNN AND LOUIS WOLFSON II Her civil rights activism also introduced her to Dr. T.R.M. I was just laying there trying to, you know, get my breath, and I knew I was bleeding. Get in the bathroom. Detailing the decades-long abortion debate, these docs give context to the historic Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade. Beginning in the late 1960s, signs hung up around the city and advertisements in underground newspapers offered a vague alternative: Pregnant? Among the signatories are the Global Justice Center, Pregnancy Justice, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. JUDITH ARCANA: Women did awful things out of fear and desperation. She pointed out, for example, that even with the loss of Roe, the Biden administration could make abortion drugs more readily available by removing unnecessary regulations on certain drugs. All rights reserved, WUSF Knowledge (16.4) PBS is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization. Served with the US Army in the Philippines in World War II. It uses medicine or surgery to remove the embryo or fetus and placenta from the uterus. And for too long, the US has been able to avoid that type of international scrutiny, she said. Web Site Copyright 1995-2023 WGBH Educational Foundation. The Common Good: A Documentary (2010 Video) 21 min | Documentary, Short, Comedy Rate Two Catholic women who have reconciled their faith with their support of the right to choose travel across Wisconsin to spread their message. PBS is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization. A doctor hugs a patient at an abortion clinic in Santa Teresa, New Mexico, on 13 January 2023. . Even before last year's Supreme Court overturning of Roe v. Wade, a recent international surge in films about abortion rights and the endangerment thereof from period pieces like . The description of the arrest of seven Janes is almost comical. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. Shout Gladi Gladi. Copyright Laws of the United States, So, Mike trained the Janes to perform abortions themselves. Lets hope it incites us to action, and not to despair. Melissa Kogut (bottom row, center) wasExecutive Director of NARAL Pro-Choice MA at the time of the clinic shootings and throughout the six yearlong dialogues. The Dobbs ruling pushed the US even further out of line with its human rights obligations, including its obligation to ensure access to abortion and to eliminate structural racism and discrimination, said Annerieke Smaak Daniel, womens rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. Experts believe that the use of a law traditionally used against physical threats could change the landscape. Jane filled the vacuum. FRONTLINE goes inside the fight over abortion, told through the stories of women struggling with unplanned pregnancies. Arrange a preview screening of THE ABORTION TALKS in your campus, library, faith center, or community. Almost daily, the Reproductive Health Services clinic in Montgomery, Alabama, receives several versions of the same call: Are yall still doing abortions?". In 1994, John Salvi, a radical young abortion opponent, opened fire on two clinics in Brookline, Massachusetts, just outside Boston, and killed two women: Shannon Lowney, a receptionist at Planned Parenthood, and Lee Ann Nichols, who worked as a receptionist at PreTerm, the clinic down the street. After the genocide in Rwanda and atrocities in Srebrenica, Bosnia, in the 1990s, the world vowed never again. Then came the conflict in Darfur, Sudan, which began 20 years ago. Jane, nonetheless, is having a moment. Excellent, important, timely, urgent, and needs to be seen and discussed widely., Peter Coleman, expert and author of The Way Out. Lee. She reached out to women at various activist meetings and, quickly, dozens of women joined her. 1970. Authored by Justice Samuel Alito in February, the draft opinion would override 50 years of legal precedent, striking down the landmark 1973 Supreme Court ruling that determined women have a fundamental right to an abortion, and instead would grant individual states the full authority to regulate or prohibit abortion. Roe v. Wade Appears Poised to Fall. You'll receive access to exclusive information and early alerts about our documentaries and investigations. Web Site Copyright 1995-2023 WGBH Educational Foundation. In 2009, one of the very few remaining providers of third-trimester abortions in the country, Dr. George Tiller, was shot to death. Many of them hadnt even told the stories to their families or their friends, so this was a big move for them, Lessin said. In documentaries and related reporting, weve tracked developments related to this contentious issue including, in recent years, the Mississippi law at the center of the draft Supreme Court decision and the ways states have prepared for a potential post-Roe v. Wade world. JOHN TILESTON Interviews were conducted with members of the Florida public school system, survivors of the Johns Committee, a retired police officer who worked with the committee, and former Florida governor and retired U.S. UCF Center for Distributed Learning, 2015 - University of Central Florida BOOTH: A friend of mine said that his sister was pregnant, nearly suicidal, not prepared to have a child. 833. Powerful evidence of the unimaginable Clara Germani. Emphasized again and again is the message that we cannot rely on antiquated laws propping up white-supremacist patriarchal institutions to support or care for us. But doing so gave them a real understanding of what they were capable of at a time when a lot of women were told they werent capable of much, Pildes said. 3 min read The Supreme Court's Dobbs decision has successfully overturned a woman's federal. It chronicles the real-life story of a group of women who helped those seeking abortions in Chicago more than 50 years ago. later, the body is removed and disposed of as medical waste. Legislation across the U.S. indicates that states are bracing for the potential of a post-Roe world. Signatories in the letter list prior actions from the UN Human Rights Committees over abortion access in countries such as Ireland and El Salvador, arguing for similar scrutiny of the US. The leaked draft opinion from the Supreme Court signaling an intention to overturn Roe v. Wade makes HBO's upcoming documentary "The Janes" extremely timely. BOISE The Idaho House State Affairs Committee passed a bill Friday making it illegal for an adult to transport a minor across state lines for an abortion, with the intent to conceal it from . Try some deep breathing - very reassuring. DORRIE BARRON: I was petrified. Anti-abortion activists have tapped into that sentiment in Virginia and elsewhere and are proposing changes to zoning laws to stop the clinics from moving in. MARIE LERNER: We need to turn the anger, the fear, the concern we've got into protest. Capitol Police removed a pro-Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) protester from a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday after the woman interrupted a line of questioning from Republican South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham. Booth tells her story in "The Janes." Maryland House of Delegates Speaker Adrienne A. Jones gestures to Gov. That feminist history is the subject of The Janes, an HBO documentary set to premiere on the network and begin streaming on HBO Max at 9 p.m. They note that the UN committee has already established that denial of abortion can cause physical and mental suffering so severe in pain and intensity as to amount to torture. Ultimately, just three were included. Washington D.C., Jun 23, 2021 / 09:00 am. Out Twin Cities Film Festival 2014 ARCANA: I think that folks who watch this film will be prompted to ask themselves, what would I do? The following people and organizations have made the public television broadcast of our film possible through their generous contributions. Im just enormously happy with the outcome of the committee, Himes said. Filmmakers Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes wish their new HBO documentary, The Janes about a group of Chicago women who covertly helped thousands safely obtain abortions in the late . Rep. Barbara Ehardt, R-Idaho Falls, and Rep. Kevin Andrus, R-Lava Hot Springs, presented the . April 23 and August 27, 2019 Not all materials collected were included in the resulting new documentary about the Johns Committee. So we had about over 100 counts of felony homicide against us, each of us. But people would be banned from using the process to change abortion laws.