Educational Media Reviews Online

These short documentaries created by award-winning producer and director Jonathan Skurnik would be excellent additions to collections in transgender studies, parenting, and child development. Combined on one DVD, I’m Just Anneke (11 min.) and The Family Journey (14 min.) present an enthusiastic argument for acceptance and unconditional love of gender nonconforming children. These documentaries are especially welcome now, as parents of younger and younger children openly engage with issues of sexual orientation and gender identity.

I’m Just Anneke succeeds because it doesn’t try to generalize Anneke’s experiences or those of her family. It is simply a portrait of one 12-year-old who has dealt with depression since she was 4, social rejection since she was 10, and has just started a course of medication to suppress the hormones of adolescence. Her parents are unapologetically accepting of their child (“I don’t really get parents who don’t accept their kids”), and the filmmaker shows that they want to parent the whole child, not just focus on her gender identity: her mother says simply “The more we’ve dealt with… in a positive way the gender stuff, the better her mood has gotten.” The high point of this film is Anneke just being twelve and playing hockey, but she also has an opportunity to speak for herself. Anneke says she’s “in the middle of thinking about who I am,” which might be said for many 12-year-olds.

The Family Journey is a series of interviews with mothers, fathers, siblings, and Anneke, designed to encourage families to accept their gender nonconforming children. These families took varying paths of varying lengths to acceptance. Some recognized their child’s gender variance very early, and some have arranged programs in their child’s school to teach teachers and classmates about gender nonconforming children. The variety of gender identities in their children is a particular strength here – not all of their children have transitioned or intend to transition, and some say that transitioning isn’t necessarily the issue. As one mother says, “changing the binary gender system of these two strict boxes will benefit everyone.”

The reduced price for non-profits and home video makes it easy to recommend this DVD for all types of libraries as well as non-profit organizations and individuals.

Highly Recommended

Awards

• Change Maker Award, Media That Matters Film Festival, 2010
• Audience Award, Outfest: the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, 2010