She had many problems communicating with her foster parents, and she ran away ten times before she had even been arrested for aggravated assault. Even though there is an intense argument, after she tells her mother never to talk to her again, she has a nervous breakdown (Garbus, 2003). Girl Hood Winner of the audience award for documentary at 2003 SXSW Film Festival, Liz Garbus' "Girl Hood" is a grim but engrossing look at lives of two troubled teens who must convince . Some are held while they are waiting for a bed in a treatment center. Challenging Attachment The film is intense and very blunt but it also does a great job of showing the human side of these two young people over a three year span of time. Megan, a pretty girl with a devilish gleam in her eye, tries to get by on charm, but she doesn't have Shanae's focus. Girl Hood is a documentary film directed and produced by Liz Garbus that follows two teenage girls, Shanae and Megan, over the span of three years, from the time they are in the all-girls juvenile detention center at Thomas J.S Waxter Childrens Center in Laurel, Maryland, to when they are out in the real world. We wont be able to verify your ticket today, but its great to know for the future. By entering your email and clicking Sign Up, you're agreeing to let us send you customized marketing messages about us and our advertising partners. I was just doing anything to kill myself, honestly," she says. In the documentary Girlhood, Liz Garbus follows two young women who have encountered numerous misfortunes in the past that led them to implement their violent offences. Similarly, she seems to suffer from ambivalent attachment because she is always distressed when she is unable to receive affirmations from her mother. Shanae and Megan are both magnetic characters, and their story is as relevant as it is inspiring. The pair form a strong friendship and, under the guidance and treatment of a dedicated psychotherapist, endeavor to change their lives and strive for a brighter future. SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY: GIRLHOOD MOVIE REVIEW. Your email address will not be published. In the documentary, we learn that she runs away from foster care eleven times, ten before Waxter and once more after leaving Waxter. After her release, 19-year-old Megan appeared on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" alongside another troubled teen, Shanae. Exclusively at Laemmles Music Hall, 9036 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills (310) 274-6869. That is not to say that traumatic experience, crime or drug abuse are good, but that in these stories they exist and persist, even when the girls triumph and go to prom or spend time with family. After watching the documentary, it is easy to see that Megans environment has contributed greatly to her childhood and ultimately her adult life. "I started using cocaine, I was strung out on drugs -- bad. A narrative feature based on the two subjects of Liz Garbus 2003 documentary Girlhood, young female inmates Shanae Watkins and Megan Stahl, is in the works. Shot on digital video and Super 8 film over the course of three years, Girlhood provides a partial account of what happened to Shanae and Megan under the states alternately guarded and careless watch. The film follows them from 1999 through the year 2002. At the beginning of the documentary, Shanae and Megan are 14 and 16, serving time for murder and assault, respectively. It isnt just difficult to do justice to Shanae and Megan in an average of 44 minutes apiece; as it turns out, its impossible. The new documentary Girlhood isnt a horror movie, but there isnt another movie this year that chills the blood as quickly as the brief exchange caught on camera between a 15-year-old girl and her parents. The main character joins a girls' gang and is soon stealing, extorting money from classmates, and beating up . In American history, the history of juvenile corrections begins in, And since those who are forced into detention are disproportionately African-American, the problems caused by the detention of juveniles is particularly acute in the African-American community. An alternate perspective of Girl Hood is that it is a film that tries too hard to achieve an ending on a positive note. New York: Cengage Learning. The film then narrows its focus to concentrate on the lives of two teenagers, Shanae Owens and Megan Jensen, both incarcerated for assault at the Waxter Juvenile Facility in Baltimore. Just last week Waxter made headline news in Maryland after having been labeled by one childrens rights advocate as a house of horrors. At Waxter, girls like Shanae who have been sentenced for crimes, girls who would make mincemeat of the fillies in Thirteen, are placed alongside those who, as one news story put it, have not been found guilty of anything yet. Except, perhaps, being born poor and grievously disadvantaged. In the film's most compelling scenes Megan confronts Vernessa, who has been released from prison and who professes her love and determination to be an anchor for her daughter. Follows two female inmates - victims of horrific violence and tragedy - who are serving time in a Maryland juvenile detention center. data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAKAAAAB4CAYAAAB1ovlvAAAAAXNSR0IArs4c6QAAAw5JREFUeF7t181pWwEUhNFnF+MK1IjXrsJtWVu7HbsNa6VAICGb/EwYPCCOtrrci8774KG76 . These girls are the subjects of Liz Garbus' documentary, Girlhood. 1103 Words. Head of production Julie Gaither. Girlhood[Motion Picture]. Some boys are bailed out by their parents and in other cases they are released by the judge. Despite the locked doors and garish green paint daubing the hallways, the Waxter center doesnt look all that forbidding. Having been abandoned by her mother, with whom she has a very complicated relationship, Megan is desperate for attention and affection. "I was really, really, really confused at the time," Megan says. She's the sweetheart of the Waxter facility, even if. However, it is also noteworthy that Megan is two years older than Shanae. This documentary does look at the intersections of various identities and even struggles, but it fails to count them as essential facets of girlhood for Shanae and Megan. Hanna has won numerous writing awards. She had lived in an environment that was full of disruption. While Shanae, the victim of a horrendous violent crime herself as a child, has difficulty coming to grips with the murder she's committed, she's clearly an intelligent, charismatic, and, most importantly, motivated girl. Megan, 16, was also involved in a fight and was convicted of assault with a deadly weapon. Although large chunks of time seem to pass by unrecorded, the pairs personalities emerge through numbingly familiar stories of sexual assault, abandonment and substance abuse. Her emotional responses are not well adjusted. Furthermore, at the end of the documentary, she enrolls in a community college nearby. Footage of the two girls is then followed along with more title cards that give insight into the crimes they have committed. airs Sundays at 9 p.m. . The film, however, makes Shanae and Megans girlhoods into victory stories when, instead, they are something much more complex. Miriam has proven to have an incredibly strong voice when it comes to tackling tough, timely and complex stories that often take place in urban settings but resonate far and wide, Fawcett said. Shanae, however, simply had to acknowledge her culpability in the murder of a friend before being able to effect a significant change in the direction of her life. Treating the girls girlhoods as linear stories of overcoming erases the fullness, pain and challenge of all that comprises their girlhoods. The field of Girlhood Studies continues to grow and perhaps offers guidance in understanding where Garbus erred. Kennedy, R., and Garbus, L. (2003). But in [Garbus] attempt to give their lives a shape that the girls themselves seem to resist, this talented filmmaker has done both herself and them a disservice.. We were introduced to Shanae, a young girl, convicted of murder. Producers Liz Garbus, Rory Kennedy. On the other hand, Girl Hood creates an uncomfortable comparison between Shanae and Megan and their relationship with their mothers. Theres no denying the seduction and importance of a lot of this work, but sometimes it isnt enough to turn a camera on other peoples catastrophes. Girlhood misses some of the nuance of the girlhoods that it seeks to document in a few ways. The most salient factor in Megan's reversal of fortune however was the tireless work that her mother did to ensure that her daughter became an upstanding individual. Subsequently, she was always looking for that support and without it had less incentive and means to create a change in her life. [Write my essay for me? Get help here.]. Privacy Policy. The title of the film is overly simple and, to an extent, revealing in its simplicity. After all, Shanae explains, at least the dead girl is in heaven. She gave birth to a daughter and moved to North Carolina in an effort to start anew. Megan's mother was a drug-addled prostitute, and after being placed in, and escaping from, nearly a dozen foster homes, Megan committed a violent crime. Megan gets out earlier, but never stays in one place very long. The hard cases penned up here are girls whose youth, bright smiles and flashes of irritation at being kept under lock and key belie their grim, violent histories. Shanae and Megans story has reached a large audience and even caught the attention of talk show host Oprah Winfrey, however, many are critical of its overambitious attempts and lack of direction. teaching psychology courses. One of the biggest criticisms that Garbus. Having been abandoned by her mother, with whom she has a very complicated relationship, Megan is desperate for attention and affection. Today, the Baltimore native is living in North Carolina and acknowledges that she wasn't in a good place during her "Oprah Show" appearance. Even though her parent is giving her support, she was still scared of Shanae. Unlike Megan, who ends up bitter, Shanae has a positive outlook that things will become better. ''Girlhood'' is the newest entry in Ms. Garbus's long list of socially concerned documentaries made for theaters and television. How A Violent Teen Who Had Given Up On Life Turned It All Around. She tries to reach out to her mother multiple times despite being disappointed numerous times. But Garbus way of humanizing, in some instances, obfuscates the complexity of struggle, survival and the bad from the girls girlhood.